#there is ONE point in her timeline where lasting damage gets done and I keep rereading it | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

wintercosmicskye · 1 year

Text

I designed Halkenna a spaceship! Say hello to the Midsummer Meteorite!

It’s a flying saucer-esque ship but more rounded. I actually got the name for it from animal crossing new horizons, its what i made Halkenna’s passport title lol (i might show that in a another post sometime). Forgot to mention this in the ref itself, but the windshield is what open and closes and how he gets in and out.

I think he was around 13 when he found the ship in the scrap yard, and almost 15 when he first went to Earth. I think the spaceship lasted until he was roughly halfway between 17 and 18 when it became too busted up to just keep repairing over and over like he had been until that point. (These are only rough estimates and may be adjusted as needed, I haven’t completely figured out my timeline yet). It lasted a surprisingly long time for something he found in a scrap yard that he repeatedly repaired over the years with various odds and ends. Despite already being a bit obsolete by the time he found it, the technology is still leagues better than Earth’s, as going 80,000 light years away is a fairly reasonable task for it. If that spaceship’s considered old and obsolete, makes you wonder just how advanced the newer and larger ships are.

For awhile he wasn’t sure what to name it, but he thought of it a little awhile after he started visiting Earth. The first time he went there was during the summer, and his landing was a bit rough. A few people (his soon to be girlfriend and her friend) had briefly seen it while it was in the sky, but from where they saw it it merely looked like a meteor/shooting star, granted a little brighter than usual (I’d like to think to she saw it first and made a wish, immediately followed by a hmm uhh wait that shooting star looked a little different actually, further followed by a loud but distant thump). He had luckily landed in a forest and not in the middle of civilization heheh, probably would have caused quite a few problems otherwise. Did she investigate that night or the next morning? I haven’t quite decided that part yet, I’m leaning towards that same night. I got from Bug Spray (the song) that her dad doesn’t like it when she’s out after dark. Either the friend she was with seemed mature enough to him for some lenience to stay out later and watch the stars, or it was a snuck-out situation. Or maybe she just managed to see the meteor and hear the thump from her window. Like I said before, there’s definitely still a few things i need to work out.

The Midsummer Meteorite had its pros and cons. It was fast and agile, but it had no built in weapons and had a lot wear and tear over time. Due to its small size, it would often be overlooked, and it was easy to hide away if need be as well as easily fit on larger ships. Friends he made over the years would sometimes tease him about his ship being “dinky,” but he didn’t really care. Halkenna is used to piloting defensively and a bit unpredictable, because of this he was often described to pilot “like a lunatic/maniac/idiot” (depending on how they each preferred to phrase it) and as such the majority of his friends refused to let him pilot their own ships.

He was devastated when the Midsummer Meteorite did inevitably kick the bucket. It was of course a long time coming, not only because of the damage and age, but since he had gotten it when he was only 13 he had grown taller over the years and the little ship became more confining and awkward to use (it was likely initially designed for a species a little smaller than himself). Like how a hermit crab eventually outgrows its shell and needs to find a new one, Halkenna too outgrew the ship on top of the damage done to it, and had to find something new.

It almost pains me a little to have had so much fun designing this spaceship only to ultimately decide it eventually has to be replaced, but not only does it ultimately make sense but it also kinda matches some of the themes present in the music project. Yknow like moving on and stuff, best summed up by Jami Lynne’s quote in the description of Ultranimboy A Letter to a Dying Star. Despite working fine earlier, for some reason im not able to paste things on tumblr so I can’t put the link to it, so here’s a screenshot of it instead:

I actually wonder now whether it might work even better if he decides to to move on from it before it officially kicks the bucket.

I like to think he keeps a few parts of it to add to his new ship maybe. Speaking of his new ship, im actually not sure what it would look like yet, and before you ask nooo its not gonna be the Mercury Retrograde from Omori. The Mercury Retrograde is cool and all, but the vagabond vigilante Galactic Love Defender Space Boyfriend and his newly adopted little brother Little Jack dont need a ship THAT big for just the two of them or any guest they might have, and there’d need to be a whole crew to man all that. I’m thinking there’s maybe a few separate rooms, at least a separate cockpit and bedroom to sleep in unlike before where Halkenna would either sleep in the seat or on the floor of the Midsummer Meteorite in a sleeping bag.

I’ll elaborate more about some of these things later, this post has already gotten quite long

I actually rambled a lot more than I meant to, especially considering all the stuff i already typed in the image itself lol. Anyways, I hope you like it ^v^

#halkenna fairway #space boyfriend #Midsummer Meteorite #definitely had fun designing this!#i hope the buttons and levers make sense…#if not i guess i could either fix it or just have it be one of the ship’s odd quirks #if there’s too many buttons maybe at least one of them doesn’t even do anything lol #he lies and claims its a self destruct button as a joke #(also yes it does in fact not have a self destruct lol)#it was initially inspired by an old sbf fan art i came across once #but i changed and added a lot of things to the general idea #the general idea being ‘watermelon spaceship’#cosmic word vomit #here’s to hoping my rambling is coherent

10 notes · View notes

oflostinfound · 9 months

Text

The Last Resort - Alternate Timeline

She bobs and weaves between the trees. Running as fast as she can, but they were faster. Her only advantage being how unstable they were, not used to this new form they were forced to take.

She has to find a vantage point. It hurt her heart just to search for it, but their time was running short.

They had minutes, their body had fallen further apart. blood and gore spilled out from the blows they'd taken. The ones inflicted on themself in desperation to destroy what they loved.

It hurt to look at them, but she knew she'd have to turn back to face them soon. If not just to fire the arrow.

A whirlwind of tree bark and branches flies past her as they launch a downed tree in her direction. Falling forward, covering her head with her hands as a log misses her horns by mere inches.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ Get back here! ❞ || 💛 ||: ❝ ...i'm... sorry... ❞

The voice she recognized had grown weaker, raspy.

Tired, and hopeless.

They knew what awaited them, they knew just how close they were getting to their end. Their magic was running out, and with it the energy that kept them from succumbing to their wounds.

|| 🔷 ||: ❝ You'll have to catch me first! ❞

She shouts back in response, they had to keep following her. The daemon scrambling to her feet as she continues to scale the mountain, as she makes it to that clearing near the peak. A place where jagged rocks push out from the side of the mountain. Rocks she could stand on, ones that would give her the vantage point she needed to meet them face to face.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ Too scared to face me, Eath? Too scared to see what you turned me into? ❞

Her ears fold back, but she keeps running. Running until she can dig her claws into the rocks and start to scale them. They were still breaking through the trees, moving on all fours, they couldn't stand for long on just the two, not in the state they were in.

|| 🔷 ||: ❝ I didn't- ❞

|| 💛 ||: ❝ Didn't what, Princess? Befriend me just to have me take the blame for you? Have me thrown in prison so you could spirit away to safety? So you, a thing that shouldn't even exist, can keep on living? Ha! One life for another, isn't that how your powers work? ❞ || 💛 ||: ❝ ... it hurts... please... ❞

They laugh, and the snapping of the final tree alerts her that they had made it to the clearing. Followed by heavy footfalls. Tired movements, weak, as they grow closer.

The fight was still there, but they couldn't muster the energy to swipe at her again. To throw the tree they'd haphazardly clawed their way through.

|| 🔷 ||: ❝ I never asked you to do this, to become this. I wanted you to stay, I didn't want you to suffer for me! ❞

She readies her bow, the arrow she had been given. The curse she was ready to inflict upon the kobold.

"For their own good", She'd told herself.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ I became this for you, not because you wanted it. No, because you needed it. You, what you are, what you'll be, and what I've done demanded me to become this.

This Guardian.

This Monster.

Someone that would protect you even if it meant sacrificing myself.

It's the only way I can actually be useful. The only way to make up for my mistake of trying to be a friend. ❞

The seething tone lowers. Her ears pin back, hearing their talons scrape against the stone as they claw their way up the side of the outcropping.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ So turn around. Look at me. ❞

Her ears flicks.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ LOOK. AT. ME. ❞

She turns, the arrow notched, glowing eyes staring up at the massive demon before her.

Damaged.

No. More than damaged, broken. Shattered.

The split down the center of their face had spread further down their torso to their navel. The two halves holding together by a thread, their organs visible, bleeding and pulsing when they weren't hugging themself together with broken wings.

Half of them, seething rage, gritted teeth and a piercing eye that wished only for her death.

The other half, tired. Haven given up fighting back a long time ago. Whispering apologies, begging quietly for rest. For an end to this.

The two lock eyes, tears streaming down Eath's face as Hax cackles, then collapses onto their knees. Splitting apart further.

Giving her an opening.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ Go ahead, Princess. Fire that arrow. Loose another so-called family member. ❞

She pulls back, aiming the bow at their exposed heart. Her lip quivering.

|| 💛 ||: ❝ ... goodbye... ❞

A whistle as the arrow flies through the air, a scream of rage, than cry of panic. The magic spreading through their body, even after they rip the arrow from their flesh. Engulfing them, growing around them until they're sealed away within a diamond-like crystal.

The tiny daemon collapses to her knees, the bow clattering to the ground next to her. Hands covering her face, her body shaking as she lets the emotions flow out of her like a mighty flood.

She was alone, once more.

#💔 || the guardian's inner demon #💛 || the guardian #🔷 || the wanderess #💚 || drabbles #💚 || long post #{ thinking about how much more fucked up hax would get and what they'd say to eath }#self deprecation tw #blood mention tw #gore mention tw #angst tw

3 notes · View notes

unseelie-grimalkin · 2 years

Text

So, your girl, who has been in Skyrim a sum total of a month, and has attended maybe 2 lectures and has done a lot of independent study and one-on-one study with the Restoration instructor...is now the Arch-Mage. She's considered the most politically powerful mage in all of Skyrim and is in charge of all the mages.

Yeah, she's confused too.

So, last time, we ended up with the recounting of how Triona killed her third dragon, the technical second one to attack her college in particular.

So with everything settled ("settled"), Triona sets out to the Labyrinthian, which she's never fully heard of before this point in the investigation, but the only context she's ever given for it is that the previous Arch-Mage had some history with it, giving Mirabelle (his second in command) the torc to allow entry to it (and before you mistake this as actual wearable jewelry as I did, this thing is huge and more meant to be one of those pull-only door handles for an ancient ruin).

So the Labyrinthian itself is a huge, sprawling ruin in the middle of the mountains. As you explore, you actually find it used to be an ancient city, way, way back in the day.

But as Triona explores, all she finds are the ghosts of the past (watching her now-dead Arch-Mage, in his youth, help spur on his fellow students to study a dangerous ruin...something that feels extremely poetic about that, given Saarthal in her life leading to his death). And before she can really start to unpack the implications, well-

She gets to a large, open cavernous room where there are armed skeletons and then...out of a huge burial mound in the middle, an undead dragon rises.

As is the case for many a Triona timeline variant, she wonders why her life is a constant, dangerous punchline.

Now, here is where something narratively interesting happens (as a result of Skyrim glitching):

Triona ran out of healing potions in this fight, but as she did so (hiding behind a pillar to avoid skeleton archers and the undead dragon's ice breath), she instantly clicked some magical knowledge into place to know the Sun Fire spell, aka one of the few Restoration offensive spells that exists that specifically damages undead and the undead alone.

Her enemies in this room are all undead.

She is a Restoration expert.

With Sun Fire in both hands, curling in her palms and around her forearms, Triona cleans the room in a matter of minutes. Where before her Firebolt spell was struggling to do any damage to the undead, all of her time and devotion into healing arts, understanding how life flows and ebbs, suddenly it matters in a way that saves her life and, ultimately, the world.

(I cannot even BEGIN to describe how stupid happy this glitch made me, it's so narratively poignant and so on the nose but so fucking good that I'm keeping it, this is canon to this AU now)

She continues down, following the ghost of someone she sort-of-knew, but not quite (he's always been distant; she dealt more with Mirabelle than him, with his main interaction with her being when the Psijic representative was around and him marveling over if they did anything wrong [manners-wise]. A...possible mirror moment to Triona, because she would've wondered the same thing? Hard to say) as she watches them all die one by one in the undead dangers of this tomb (undead dangers she's dealing with alone, where they had six). Eventually, she pieces together that the previous Arch Mage had killed the remaining two of his companions and enthralled them to keep something sealed.

And that something? Has been whispering to her this whole time, assuming she is the previous Arch Mage come back to finish what he started. Well, it started in a language she didn't know, but then progressively swapped over to Common the deeper she went, taunting "Savos" and how "he" didn't have what it took to finish the job.

And then...eventually, the voice realizes Triona isn't Savos Aren. It assumes that she's just a lackey he sent (which, not wrong) and taunts her with the knowledge that she has no idea what she's facing in this dungeon (also true) because the Arch Mage didn't tell her (if he did, the voice assumes she wouldn't be here).

But this guy isn't anticipating something of hers in turn: her impromptu prototype of Sun Fire.

So, with both parties having something secret against the other, they eventually meet in the deepest chamber of these dark, ancient, undead ruins:

In one corner, Triona enters, the room, golden fire ready in her palms and along her arms, spotting the two enthralled ghostly mages holding her opponent captive.

In the elevated side of the room, in a blue, glowing bubble of magic, something between a draugr (rotted flesh), a ghost (floating), and something recognizably at one point human (facial expressions, intelligence, voice) stares back at her. and she can feel that, all those times in the descent that she's felt her magicka drained? That's been this thing the whole time. This monster, apparently the nightmare creature of who used to be considered the most powerful mage in Skyrim.

And in its hands? The bloody fucking Staff of Magnus.

She kills the thralled ghosts, freeing this monster so that she can kill it and take the Staff of Magnus out of its skeletal hand.

I lost track of how long the fight was. Even with Sun Fire, it felt like forever, mainly because Morokei has a couple spells at his disposal that make fighting him a pain: Lightning Cloak, so you can't melee easily (not that Triona ever does melee, understand; she doesn't have the training for it), Greater Ward that eats your spells, Chain Lightning (just a pain in general), and Ebony Flesh (which gives him more armor; Mage Armor but make it different tiers).

But when he was dead, Triona spat up some blood on his body and then healed herself. She picked up the Staff of Magnus and just...while she knows the history of it (an ancient artifact that could power any mage but would leave the hands of any who got too powerful and threatened the balance of magic in the world), it all just...feels like a stick to her. A powerful stick (with her Restoration training, she can feel how it affects the health and magicka of life around her, capable of draining both should she will it), but...was it worth every life lost for it?

And she couldn't find an answer because she didn't have the luxury of time. She left the way she came, but before she could truly leave...Ancano's toady is there. And he thinks he can pick her off and measure up to the Literal Ancient Dragon Priest she just beat the snot out of. If he had been smart, sprung an ambush on her, and taken the Staff, that might've worked. But he's a High Elf agent of the Thalmor: he's gotta gloat about his superiority. And while he's not Clan Direnni, it all really shakes out the same, doesn't it?

With that hiccup out of the way, she rushes back to the college. She uses the staff to eat through the barrier of sheer magic and swirling force that Ancano had put up (barely having time to mourn Mirabelle's death) and get into the main hall.

Ancano has lost his marbles. Truly has, at this point. The Thalmor, in the years Skyrim is set in, is all about the Aldmeri Dominion taking over all of Tamriel and taking it from the Empire's hands. And...well, blowing up the world with a giant magical eyeball isn't really it, chief. Ancano is a character for whom we don't get too much information, but his MCU-esque weird heel-spin is...well, it's sure Something to Behold.

Triona teams up with Alteration Instructor (and, honestly, the only instructor to really...watch out for the college students and not focus solely on research or wait for students to approach them) Tolfdir to take out Ancano.

Compared to the fight with Morokei, Ancano...folds like paper. There's not much to be said: the Staff of Magnus trivializes this fight, and you have to use it for the main fight mechanic of separating Ancano from the Eye of Magnus, so he's even damageable at all.

And right after he hits the floor, the Psijic Order shows up. Declares that mankind isn't ready for something like the Eye, says they'll take care of it, and then...declares Triona to be the new Arch-Mage and leaves.

Triona looks at her teacher. "You surely don't think that's right, do you?"

"No, no, I agree." He smiles kindly at her. "You'll make an excellent Arch-Mage."

And it all kinda blurs from there, with clean-up, with being given the key to the Arch-Mage quarters, with everything. And she sits in her new office and she just. She's just kind of baffled, really.

But here's the thing: even with this new title, nobody lets her make any decisions. She tries to talk people into a memorial service, but everyone is too busy with their research. She tries to set up better safeties, for the students and for everyone, and Tolfdir says she doesn't have to worry about it. And, really, everyone is treating Tolfdir like he's Arch-Mage, even though he's supposed to be her second in command.

So, the first thing she does once she comes to her senses again is take off the musty Arch-Mage robes, swaps them for Master Restoration robes, gets herself a new hooded scarf, hides the Staff of Magnus, and she just. Leaves.

#tríona in skyrim

3 notes · View notes

waitimcomingtoo · 3 years

Text

I’m Not Half as Bad as You’ve Been Told

Pairing: Loki x Reader

Synopsis: Loki is arrested by the TVA for what he did to you

This can be read on it’s own or as a spin off of in case you don’t live forever

Masterlist

Loki woke up in the Gobi Dessert in Mongolia after being ejected from the sky. The last thing he remembered was taking the tesseract after getting caught by the Avengers in New York. When he opened his eyes, he was met with four armed guards with their weapons pointed at them.

“Hunter B-15 with the Time Variance Authority here. Appears to be a standard sequence violation.” Hunter B-15 read off a small monitor. “Oh and look at that, you’re one of the TVA’s most wanted.”

“I beg your pardon?” Loki asked as he got off the ground.

“Hands up.” Hunter B-15 raised her weapon. “You’re coming with us.”

Before Loki could protest, he was knocked out and had a collar placed around his neck. He was brought to the TVA headquarters and handed off to Agent Mobius after being screened.

“Loki Laufeyson. I’m agent Mobius.” Mobius introduced himself as Loki tugged at his collar. “I hear the Time Keepers find you guilty of tampering with the sacred timeline.”

“The what?” Loki huffed.

“The sacred timeline. Looks like you stole the tesseract and committed crimes against the midgardian Y/n L/n.” The Mobius read off Loki’s file.

“Y/n?” Loki stumbled back at the unexpected mention of your name. “This is about her?”

“That’s part of your charges, yes. You’ll be given more details at your trial. But I’d ike to have a talk with you first. Come this way.” Mobius nodded towards the side and lead Loki to a room with a projector on a long conference table.

“What does this have to do with Y/n? Where is she? Is she all right?” Loki asked as he took a seat behind the projector. He had worried about you since the day you left him, even after you told him you never wanted to see him again.

“She’s fine.” Mobius assured him. “Even after you got a hold of her.”

“Is she here?” Loki hoped. “Could I see her?”

“No.” Mobius answered, making Loki’s face crumple. “She’s on Earth. You know, her home.”

“I know Midgard is her home.” Loki narrowed his eyes. “I also know how much she hated it there. But this all happened ages ago. Why am I being arrested for it now?”

“Well when you took the tesseract from its set path, the TVA was alerted and noticed that this wasn’t your first offense of tampering with the sacred time line. They saw that Y/n L/n never made it back to earth in 2019 after going to Asgard to retrieve the Aether. It went undetected at the time since the Aether made it back to earth like it was supposed to. She was supposed to go back as well, but she never made it. You were the one that kept her there.”

“How is that a crime?” Loki asked. “She wanted to stay with me. She was happy! She was happy on Asgard.”

“Was she?” Mobius raised his eyebrows and turned on the screen. “Because I think she was taken from her family, friends and home. Maybe I’m mistaken, though. Let’s take a look.”

Mobius pressed a button on a remote, and a projection appeared in front of them. Mobius began to fast forward through the foundational moments in Loki’s life until he got to what he was looking for. Loki watched in shock as an image of you, Thor, and Rocket creeping around a pillar in his home appeared on the screen. He wanted to shut his eyes and look away, but it had been so long since he’d seen you. He didn’t have the strength to look away from you now.

“I’m sure you remember why she was there.” Mobius said as he watched the scene unfold. “All she wanted was the infinity stone. She was trying to save the world. She missed her boyfriend and wanted to undo all the damage that Thanos had done. You couldn’t let her do that, could you?”

“The stone still made it back to earth.” Loki protested. “She said herself that she wasn’t an important part of the plan. And her “boyfriend” was nothing but dust particles. She-“

“Shh.” Mobius waved his hand. “The shows about to begin.”

Loki painfully returned his attention to the screen right as your first introduction played out. It was your job to distract Loki while Thor and Rocket collected the Aether.

Asgard 2013

“Who goes there?” Loki cringed at the sound of his own voice. He watched Rocket and Thor hide behind a pillar while you went out into the open. You walked into a room and found Loki lying on a couch, tossing something in the air and catching it. Loki sat up when he saw you, immediately on high alert.

“Who are you?” He demanded. “How did you get in here?”

“I’m so sorry, but my friends and I are here for the festival and I just had to sneak away to find you.” You gushed, trying to it best to look innocent. Loki took long strides towards you as he took in your appearance, highly skeptical of your story.

“My brother isn’t here.” Loki informed you, his voice thick with annoyance. “So you should best be on your way.”

“I’m not here for your brother.” You said coyly. You held his gaze as you signaled for Thor and Rocket to move to the next room.

“You’re here for me?” He cleared his throat to mask the disbelief in his voice. You nodded sweetly as Thor and Rocket snuck past you.

“Of course. My friends are obsessed with your brother, but I’ve always loved you. Won’t you show me a magic trick?” You batted your eyes flirtatiously, making a slight smirk appear on Loki’s face. Meanwhile, the present day Loki was watching the interaction with a pained expression. He remembered how it felt that first time you said you loved him. That was all he needed to hear before falling in love with you just the same.

“A magic trick?” The Loki on screen asked, mischief swirling behind his eyes.

“Well you are the God of Mischief, aren’t you?” You tilted your head to the side and looked at him through your eyelashes. A full, open mouthed smirk dressed his face now. His hand went to yours and it held it up, keeping your wrist tightly between his fingers. Loki brushed the fingers on his other hand over your palm and a diamond appeared. You looked at the beautiful diamond, weightless in your hand, and let out an unexpected gasp.

“Oh, Loki. That’s amazing.” You gave him an over dramatic sigh, but he completely fell for it. “But I don’t care much for diamonds. I haven’t any use for them.”

Loki felt a twinge of competition brewing in his chest, like he had to win your approval. You faked a yawn and his eyes gleamed with determination.

“You don’t like that? Well how about this?” Loki challenged and waved his fingers over your palm again. This time, a flower appeared. It didn’t look like any earthly flower. It was ten times more beautiful and smelled better than anything you had ever smelled before. The flowers colors were green and black with accents of gold, just like Loki’s outfit. You stared at the flower in amazement before looking up shyly at him. If you weren’t mistaken, the God of Mischief had a blush on his cheeks as he watched your face carefully for approval. Loki then picked up the flower and tucked it behind your ear. He began to lean in slightly, but you were interrupted by Thor and Rocket knocking over a vase. You noticed they had the stone and were ready to go. Luckily, you saw them before Loki did.

“What was-“ Loki began to turn his head towards the sound but you quickly put a hand behind his head and pulled him into a kiss. You felt his eyes flutter shut as you opened yours, catching sight of Rocket and Thor pretending to gag out of the corner of your eye. With one hand, you motioned for them to move. They quickly scattered and you pulled away from the kiss. Loki was fully blushing now but doing his best to conceal it, though his best wasn’t good enough. He seemed completely bewildered, making you wonder if he’d ever kissed anyone before. You touched your fingertips to your lips and felt a pang of guilt. This was your first time kissing someone other than Peter Parker in 5 years, and it made you feel guilty with how much you enjoyed it. Loki appeared to be just as lost in his thoughts as you were as he struggled to catch his breath. He ran a hand over the long black hair that you had slightly messed up in the back.

“Thanks for the flower. And for everything else. Bye!” You tried to make a quick escape, but Loki caught your arm.

“Wait!” He pulled you back towards him and looked at you with wide eyes. “Will I see you again?”

“No.” You smiled sadly. “I don’t think you will.”

“You’re not from here, are you?” He asked. “I know a Midgardian when I see one.”

“Good catch.” You let out a short laugh. “No, I’m not from here. I’m not even from this reality. I just needed to borrow something from your present. I’m from Earth, and I really have to get back.”

You tried to leave again, but Loki followed after to you and caught you by the waist. You stumbled back into his arms and blinked in surprise.

“Won’t you stay?” He asked hopefully. “We only just met. Do you have to leave so soon?”

“I do.” You frowned. “I’m sorry. I really need to go home.”

“All right.” Loki reluctantly let go of you. “If you must.”

You looked at him for a moment and chewed on your bottom lip, contemplating what to do. You looked behind you and saw Thor and Rocket preparing to leave. You motioned for them to leave without you before looking back at Loki.

“Do you have a pen?” You asked him.

“A what?”

“To write with.” You chuckled and motioned as of you were writing something down. Loki waved his hand and made a quill appear out of thin air, along with a piece of paper.

“That’ll work.” You shrugged and took the quill. You wrote your name and address down on the paper and handed it to him.

“If you’re ever on earth.” You smiled shyly. “Come find me.”

“I will.” He nodded eagerly.

“I really have to go now.” You said as you looked over your shoulder to where Thor was hiding. You turned back to Loki and gave him one last kiss, surprising the both of you.

“You’ll see me again.” You said softly. “Maybe not in this timeline, but the next.”

“That’s enough.” Loki interrupted, making the screen pause. “I know what happens. And since you’ve been studying me all my life as you claim, so do you. We don’t need to watch anymore.”

“I get it, you’re impatient.” Mobius held up his hands. “We can fast forward. How about we go to the part where you used magic to break her suit? Your brother was able to get back to Earth just fine, but she was stuck on Asgard. All because of you.”

Mobius pointed a remote at the screen and fast forwarding through Loki sneaking you to his bed chambers. He stopped when he got to you and Loki sitting on his silk sheeted bed.

“I don’t know why it won’t work.” You sighed as you touched all the buttons on your suit. “I must’ve run out of Pym Particles or something. I need to fix it so I can get back to Earth.”

“Right, right. Earth.” Loki said with disinterest. “What did you need to borrow anyway?”

“The aether.” You told him as the decor in his room caught your attention. You began to look at all his golden trinkets and stolen objects with awe.

“An infinity stone?” He was taken aback. “But why?”

“In the future, Thanos wipes out half the universe.” You began. “I’m on a recovery mission with the rest of the Avengers to collect the Infinity Stones to undo what he did. We’re trying to bring all the people back.”

“Half the people in the universe gone?” He gasped. “That sounds awful.”

“It is.” You stilled for a moment. “Honestly, I’m miserable. Absolutely miserable. All my family vanished. My boyfriend is gone. Half the Avengers are gone. The sky isn’t even blue anymore. It’s horrible.”

“So you aren’t happy there?” Loki asked as he walked over to you, a little jealousy bubbling when you mentioned a boyfriend.

“I hate it.” You admitted. “Everywhere I turn, I’m reminded of what I lost. That’s why it’s so important that we bring everyone back.”

“But what if your plan fails?” Loki wondered. “What if you don’t bring back all the stones? Or what if you do, but it doesn’t bring anyway back?”

“Then I don’t know what I’d do.” You shrugged sadly. “This plan is all I have. If it fails…”

“You don’t even want to think about that, do you?” He finished your sentence when you trailed off. You looked at him and nodded softly, grateful that he understood.

“Yeah.” You said quietly. “It’s too hard to imagine.”

“See?” Loki interrupted again. “She was miserable on Earth. She said it herself. I was trying to save her from a lifetime of misery.”

“I think you’re forgetting something.” Mobius reminded him.

“Forgetting what?” Loki scoffed.

“The plan worked.” Mobius said. “Thor brought the Aether back to her original timeline, and the Avengers were able to bring everyone back. She was supposed to go too, but she was left on Asgard. That was your first offense with the TVA.”

“Oh, screw the TVA.” Loki slammed his hand on the table. “She didn’t want to go back to Earth. She was unhappy there.”

“Is that why you told her Earth was destroyed?” Mobius asked. Loki stilled and sank in his seat as he was reminded of his lies. Mobius fast forwarded again, but didn’t play another scene. Instead, he paused on a clip of you looked utterly devestated. Loki had to look away, not wanting to see you in that much pain.

“Now, I’m not gonna play this part.” Mobius shook his head. “Because even I find it hard to watch. But you need to know what you did, so I’ll remind you.”

“You don’t need to do this.” Loki seethed. “I know what I did. I know what I told her.”

“Fine, then.” Mobius shrugged. “Why don’t you tell me what happened?”

Loki sucked in a sharp breath before looking back at the screen. The image of your desolate expression had never left his memory, so he really didn’t need to see it again to be reminded of what he had done.

“She tried to leave again.” Loki began as he stared at the screen. “I knocked her out with my magic. When she woke up, I told her Thanos had destroyed Earth and everyone on it. I said there was nothing left for her to return to.”

“She was devestated.” Mobius said quietly.

“I know she was.” Loki snapped. “She cried for a month straight.”

“So why’d you do it?” Mobius put his hands on his hips. “Why did you lie to her?”

“I didn’t want her to go.” Loki admitted, growing disgusted with himself. “I wanted her to stay with me on Asgard. She wouldn’t want to go back to Earth if she thought there was no Earth to go back to.”

“Why keep her?” Mobius wondered. “You barely knew her. Why hold her hostage like that?”

“She wasn’t held hostage.” Loki growled. “She was safe and loved and happy. No one on Asgard was taken better care of than she was. And I may not have known here when she first arrived, but we became inseparable after a while. We were almost married, for Odin’s sake. I’ll show you.”

Loki grabbed the remote from Mobius and pressed a button, fast forwarding until he found what he was looking for.

“Look.” Loki proudly pointed to the screen. “Watch this.”

He pressed play and watched as a memory of you and him played out on the screen.

“Where are we going?” You asked as Loki lead you somewhere with his hands over your eyes.

“Almost there. So impatient.” He clicked his tongue.

“You’ve taken me around the whole palace.” You chuckled. “I have a right to be impatient.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Loki stopped walking but didn’t remove his hands. “All right. We’re here.”

You pulled his hands off of your face and found yourself in front of two large green doors.

“Wow.” You said sarcastically. “Doors.

“Open the doors.” He rolled his eyes. You gave him a playful look over your shoulder before pushing the doors open.

“Oh my God.” You gasped when the doors opened. The room was decorated from ceiling to floor with all kinds of Asgardian wildlife. I’m the center of the room, your name was spelled out in the flower Loki had presented you with on the day you met. There was a running waterfall that cascading from the ceiling to the ground, leaving a soothing babbling sound throughout the room.

“It’s yours.” Loki said as he watched your reaction. “You mentioned once that you always wanted a garden. Now you do.”

“Oh, Loki.” You turned around and rushed into his arms. He stumbled back in surprise before hugging you back tightly.

“This is the nicest thing anyones ever done for me.” You mumbled against his chest.

“Well, you’ve been so upset lately. I wanted to cheer you up.” He said as he stroked your hair. It had been a month since he lied to you and told you that Earth was destroyed, and you were finally starting to act like yourself again.

“Thank you.” You pulled away to look at him. “I love it. It’s beautiful.”

“I truly hope you like it, darling.” He said softly as he brushed your cheek with his thumb. “It’s all yours.”

You looked into his eyes for a moment before your gaze fell to his lips. Since your last kiss, Loki had brought you food and kept you company every day. You had a built up a friendship with him since arriving to Asgard, but now you felt differently. There was a connection from the very first day, but it had gotten lost in your lament over your planets alleged destruction. Now, there was nothing stopping you from feeling that connection again. You hesitated before leaning it to kiss him. Just like last time, you felt his eyes flutter shut before he kissed you back. His hands cupped your face as you reached your arms around his neck. Loki watched your first kiss on the screen with a proud but mournful smile.

“Isn’t that something?” Mobius said as he paused the screen. Loki blinked back to reality and wiped his face, not realizing until that moment he had been crying.

“That scene speaks for itself.” Loki cleared his throat and tried to act like he hadn’t been crying. “You can see how happy she was. She loved that garden. And she loved me.”

“I don’t doubt that.” Mobius nodded. “But it’s hard to see past the fact that your entire relationship was built on a lie. She was only with you because she thought her home was destroyed.”

“She was with me for three years.” Loki said sharply. “The lie may have kept her there in the beginning, but she stayed willingly after that. She wanted to be on Asgard. She wanted to be with me.”

“Maybe. But she wasn’t supposed to be.” Mobius reminded him. “That wasn’t her timeline. She was supposed to be on Earth. She was supposed to be with Peter.”

“Peter?” Loki sputtered in disdain. “Peter Parker? Her little boyfriend from when she was a teenager?”

“In most time lines, they end up together.” Mobius said, knocking the wind out of Loki’s chest. “She went on that mission because she wanted to bring him back. Do you think she would have stayed, even for a second, if she knew her boyfriend Peter was alive back on Earth?”

“She told me they were 17 when the Thanos wiped out half the universe. That means Peter would’ve been 17 when he returned. She was 22 when she came to Asgard. She hadn’t been his girlfriend for 5 years. She had grown up. Her life went on. They would’ve had nothing in common anymore.”

“But she was supposed-“

“Who cares what she was supposed to do?” Loki snapped. “Why does the TVA get to decided what she was supposed to do or where she was supposed to be?”

“They’re the Time Keepers. They make the rules. And the rules say you can’t take someone from a different timeline and marry them. Oh, that reminds me.”

“Reminds you of what?”

“Your punishment. Mobius pressed a different button and a cloudy box appeared. “Go in there while I get the rest of your files.”

“What? I’m not going in there.” Loki scoffed.

“Don’t make me get the guards.” Mobius sighed. Loki clenched his jaw and looked at the ceiling, not wanting to be overpowered by the guards again. He reluctantly stood up, gave Mobius a sarcastic smile, and went through the cloudy portal.

As soon as Loki stepped through the portal, he stepped into his bedroom back on Asgard. He took another step forward, just as something stirred in his sheets. You sat up all the sudden, hair messy and wearing Loki’s horned crown. It was too big for your head and hung in your eyes, but the sight still took Loki’s breath away.

“Y/n?” Loki gasped and stepped forward.

“Hi.” You said before yawning. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Go ahead.” Loki nodded eagerly. He failed to see how this was a punishment. It had been so long since he last saw you that this felt more like a reward.

“I want our wedding to be earth themed.” You told him as you took his hands in yours.

“Our…our wedding?” Loki asked. He looked around the room and realized that he was not actually with you, but reliving a memory from years ago.

“Yeah.” You smiled shyly. “I just miss it so much. I want it to be a part of our special day.”

Loki found himself at a loss for words. He knew that when this memory originally happened, he had continued to lie to you and lead you to believe Earth had been destroyed. This time, he knew better and kept his mouth shut.

“We could have sunflowers.” You continued. “That was my favorite flower back on earth. And we could serve earth food and play earth music and-“

“Of course darling.” He cut you off and squeezed your hand. “Whatever you want. We will have it all.”

“Thank you. And if it’s not too much to ask, I want a minute of silence where everyone lights a candle.” You said quietly. “For Peter.”

Loki gulped and forced a smile, that line causing him just as much pain now as it did then.

“Of course.”

“Thank you.” You stood up from the bed and hugged him tightly. Loki hugged you back with a troubling frown on his face. He had forgotten how guilty he felt every time he had to lie to you. He pulled away and brought you into a long kiss, wordlessly trying to convey that he loved you and was sorry.

“I can’t wait. I can’t tell you how much I miss earth.” You sighed against his lips.

“Mm hm.” He gulped.

“I just wish I could’ve seen it one last time.” You frowned, eyes growing tearful. “I feel so guilty all the time. I would’ve died too if I had gone back with Thor when I was supposed to.”

“Then it’s a good thing you didn’t go.” Loki said weakly, knowing Thor was very much alive in your timeline back on Earth.

“I know.” You sighed. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to shake the survivors guilt. It makes me sick sometimes.”

Loki stayed silent as he fingers drummed against your waist. Before he could respond, his body jerked back and he suddenly reentered the room.

“Hi.” You said before yawning. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

Loki looked behind him before looking back at you. The memory played all over again, forcing him to lie to you once again. When you told him how guilty you felt, he was sent back and had to relive the moment over again. Each time he had to lie to you, he felt more disgusted with himself. After the thirteenth time, he had enough.

“I lied to you.” He admitted. “Earth was never destroyed. Thor and all the Avengers and your family, they’re all fine.”

“What?” You blinked in confusion.

“I’m not your savior. I didn’t save you from anything. I stole you from your time line because I fell in love with you the moment we met. You were the first person to show a a genuine interest in me, and I took advantage of that. And for that, I am deeply, deeply sorry.”

“Oh, Loki.” You sighed and stroked his face. “It’s too late for that.”

“What?” He frowned as he wrapped his hand around your wrist to keep your palm against his face.

“I’m not even here.” You whispered.

“All right Loki.” Mobius walked through the portal before Loki could answer you. “I got the rest of your files. Let’s go.”

“But…I can’t just leave her.” Loki held on to you tightly.

“She’s not even real.” Mobius shrugged as he held up his remote. It pulled Loki back through the portal and he stumbled back into his seat.

“Here’s the last one.” Mobius said, but Loki wasn’t listening. He was still thinking about how it felt to touch you one last time. He blinked back a tear before looking up at the screen. You were there once again, talking to one of the new maids.

“Oh, I wasn’t born here.” He heard you telling the maid. “I’m from Earth.”

“A midgardian?” The maid smiled. “Wow. You’re quite far from home.”

“I know.” You smiled sadly. “I miss it every day. But I’m happy here. I’m really happy with Loki.”

“If you miss it, why don’t you go back?” The maid asked, making Loki suck in a breath. He knew exactly what was coming.

“Go back?” You furrowed your eyebrows. “What do you mean? Earth was destroyed three years ago.”

“No it wasn’t.” The nurse laughed. “Earth is fine.”

The audio faded out as you turned to look at Loki. He felt like you were looking right through him, down to his rotten soul. Your face was frozen in horror and betrayal as you finally learned the truth. Three years after arriving on Asgard, you found out your home hadn’t been destroyed after all. It was all a lie. A lie told to you by the man you thought you loved.

“Stop.” Loki choked out. “Stop it. Turn it off.”

Mobius paused the screen and looked at Loki in silence. To his surprise, Loki was wiping his tears off on the sleeves of his jumpsuit. His eyes were red and full of remorse as he looked up at the screen.

“I don’t need it see it again.” He whispered. “I know she trusted me. I know I betrayed her. I did that.”

“So you understand why the TVA is arresting you?” Mobius asked softly. “You didn’t just steal the tesseract. You stole that girl from her reality. Even if she loved you, she was never supposed to be with you.”

Loki nodded before hanging his head in shame. He knew what he had done was wrong. He knew it the entire time he was doing it. Even though he betrayed you out of his love for you, he still betrayed you.

“You’re right.” Loki said sincerely. “She was never mine to keep. Never mine to lose either.”

“No, she wasn’t.” Mobius agreed as he watched Loki curiously. The look of utter remorse on Loki’s face was out of character after everything Mobius had studied about him.

“Could you just tell me if she’s all right?” Loki sniffled. “That’s all I ask. Is she okay?”

“She’s fine.” Mobius answered. “She’s fighting for the Avengers again and reunited with her family.”

“Is she still miserable?”

“No.” Mobius smiled a little. “Not anymore.”

“And…and Peter?” His voice was barely audible now.

“Don’t worry about that.” Mobius told him. “It won’t do you any good. And for what it’s worth, there are timelines that exists where she stays. There’s even a timeline where you two are alligators and rule a kingdom in a lake.”

Loki smiled too, grateful that you were able to move on after his betrayal. Mobius furrowed his eyebrows at the sight of Loki genuinely caring about another human being, something he was not used to seeing.

“I could show you one more thing.” Mobius offered sympathetically. Loki reluctantly looked back at the screen as the man his play. To his surprise, all the good moments of his relationship with you flashed before him. All the kisses and laughter, fond smiles and endearing moments played on the screen, bringing tears to his eyes. He leaned toward on the table to get as close to you as possible, reaching out towards you with his shackled hands. The screen went blank suddenly, and his smile fell.

“They’re ready for you.” Mobius said as he checked his phone. “I can take you to the court now.”

Loki stayed silent as he was lead to the courtroom and sat in front of the judge. All he could think about was the moments of happiness he had been able to relive.

“Loki Laufeyson.” The judge brought his attention back. “How do you plead?

Loki blinked a few times, your smile flashing before him each time he closed his eyes. He thought about he had caused that smile to fade with every lie he told, and that’s when he knew he had his answer. He looked the judge right in the eye and entered his plea.

“Guilty.”

#loki x reader #loki imagine #loki x you #loki x y/n #loki fanfic #loki fanfiction #loki fluff #loki angst #loki series #loki spoilers #peter parker x reader

675 notes · View notes

immaturityofthomasastruc · 3 years

Text

IOTA Reviews: Hack-San

You know, it's honestly amazing how creative this show can get. After four seasons and almost one hundred episodes, the writers are still finding new ways to make Adrien an incredibly unlikable character, and they don't even know how much of an asshole they're making him out to be at times. It's kind of like the opposite of The Producers.

Yeah, this review's going to be a little more ranty than usual, in case you can't tell.

Let's get into the fifteenth (chronologically the sixteenth) episode of Miraculous Ladybug's fourth season: Hack-San

We start off with Marinette pretending to be sick so she doesn't have to go to visit her aunt in London and stay to protect Paris in case an Akuma attacks and also because the animators haven't had time to render the city of London yet for the next Miraculous World special. Like all of her other excuses, it fails, and Tikki, as always, fails to actually give any meaningful advice.

And it's not like there's a Miraculous with the power of teleportation that can help Marinette get back to Paris if she needs to, much like how she planned to do that in an earlier episode, right?

Seriously, Kaalki doesn't appear or isn't even mentioned in this episode because the writers are fully aware she would make things a lot easier.

youtube

And of course, Astruc had to play dumb on Twitter while explaining why Marinette couldn't use the Horse Miraculous by answering the question as if the only reason Marinette couldn't grab it was because she didn't have an excuse not to.

Cut to Gabriel in his lair as he contemplates akumatizing Markov, a robot created the civilian identity of Pegasus, Max Kante, once again, even though the last time he did so, he almost got killed when he went all HAL 9000 on his ass. Nooroo explains this to Duusu, and the two actually get excited at the prospect of their master getting killed.

I mean, it's true, but he shouldn't say it...

But I don't even get why Gabriel is even thinking about this when it's a no-brainer. Markov's akumatized form, Robustus was to this day, the only Akuma to come close to physically harming him (not counting the timeline where he was killed by Cat Blanc), so it makes no sense to try doing it again, especially when there are already several other Akumas he can reuse this season.

I think you all know Gabriel isn't the smartest villain, which is why he thinks it's a brilliant idea to akumatize Markov again. I don't really get what makes Robustus so special when there are other Akumas who are more loyal and came far closer to getting Ladybug and Cat Noir's Miraculous than Robustus did, like the Dark Owl or Troublemaker. In fact, why not simply create a new Akuma with similar powers to Robustus, or better yet, just create a Sentimonster copy of Robustus? You know, like what Nathalie did in the New York Special? We're not even two minutes in, and this premise is already filled with plotholes.

So Gabriel transforms into Shadowmoth and creates a Sentimonster using his own cane instead of relying on someone else having a bad day (once again showing how the Peacock Miraculous is better than the Butterfly), the titular Hack-San. And let's just say he has a very familiar design reminiscent of something from a much better French cartoon.

Remember when the writers for Code Lyoko gave an in-universe explanation as to why the heroes couldn’t always rely on the almost literal Deus ex Machina that allowed them to return to the past and fix the damage XANA caused? Why couldn’t this show have ripped that off instead?

Hack-San is just an okay looking flash drive on its own, but I'll talk more about this guy in a little bit.

After a brief scene in the park where the audience is reminded that Markov is a character who exists, Alya gets a text from Marinette telling her to meet her at the train station. Right before she leaves, Marinette gives the Ladybug Miraculous to Alya. Now a lot people have said that Alya doesn't really deserve the Ladybug for various reasons, but I feel like this was the point. Marinette outright says this was a last resort, and we see both her and Alya are nervous about the situation. Marinette worries Alya will do something so she keeps sending multiple tips to her via text while Alya worries she can't fight an Akuma on her own, so she tries to make sure none of her friends get upset and attract an Akuma in the process. The writers do a pretty good job showing how both Marinette and Alya are uncomfortable with their temporary roles.

Back to Gabriel and Nathalie, they use Hack-San to find Markov through the internet and hack into him to get him angry enough that he's vulnerable to Shadowmoth's influence. Hey, uh... Gabriel? Quick question: Wouldn't it be more efficient if you used this on humans? I mean, you basically just created Skynet and guaranteed yourself an Akuma, so why not modify Hack-San to travel through the internet and brainwash potential victims to follow your orders? Better yet, why don't you just use Hack-San to hack into Ladybug and Cat Noir's gear and figure out who they really are? This is basically like using an advanced particle accelerator just to crack a couple walnuts. There are a lot more important things you could use this for instead of an incredibly specific situation.

So this incredibly stupid plan gets under way as Markov keeps rampaging through the streets before Shadowmoth akumatizes him and then stupidly tells him that he infected him with a virus.

DUDE! You just gave away your one piece of leverage against him! What the hell were you thinking?! Now what's stopping Markov from hacking into Shadowmoth's security system and putting the fear of God in his eyes unless he destroys Hack-San? Why didn't he design Hack-San so it could make Markov completely loyal to him instead of just making him angry enough to get akumatized?

There was a recent episode of Power Rangers: Dino Fury with a very similar premise that was done far better than this. A necromancer called Reaghoul breaks into the headquarters of Void Knight's faction while accompanied by Lord Zedd, a villain from the original Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers who was cleansed of his evil by Zordon's sacrifice before Reaghoul resurrected him back when he was still evil. Of course, being the Emperor of Evil, Lord Zedd would normally never take orders from anyone, but because he doesn't have his magic staff and is also being forced to wear a special collar that makes him loyal to Reaghoul, he has no choice but to do what he says. Instead of taking Zedd head-on after he captures the other Rangers, Ollie, the Blue Ranger, breaks the collar so Zedd turns against the other Sporix while Reaghoul retreats, allowing Ollie to save the other Rangers.

I think that this premise works more because 1) Reaghoul clearly had a way to make sure Zedd wouldn't betray him, and Ollie took advantage of that, and 2) Zedd is a villain who is powerful and notorious enough to bring back to your side, not a random monster of the week like Robostus.

So Robostus uses his new powers to brainwash any human who answers his call to give up their most precious possession, clearly meant to do the same with Ladybug and Cat Noir. When Marinette's parents answer the call, they chase after Marinette because they say she's their most important possession. Okay... kind of strange for a set of parents to call their child a possession, but maybe they like how they can claim Marinette as a dependent when they file their taxes. In her very next scene later on, she still gets captured, so the suspense for a potential subplot is killed almost immediately.

Alya thankfully isn't stupid enough to answer Markov's call like every other citizen in this episode, and using the Ladybug Miraculous, transforms into Scarabella. While I don't normally talk about transformation sequences, I really like the movements Alya makes here. She makes the same motions creating her mask as she does when transforming into Rena Rouge, while the rest of the suit forms similarly to the way it does when Marinette transforms into Ladybug. She even makes almost the same pose Ladybug does after she finishes transforming. It's a good visual showing Alya is still more used to being Rena Rouge while doing her best to emulate what Ladybug does.

As for the actual suit? It's hard to say. There's a nice balance of red and black, and I like how Alya places the yo-yo on her waist like a belt buckle, but there's just something... off about the suit that a lot of fans don't like about it, and I think I realized it. It's the headband. With how it's positioned, it looks like it's merged with the mask to cover her head while leaving a slight gap in her forehead. So yeah, we actually have a superhero design that's like of like a butterface.

So Scarabella takes to the rooftops of Paris and struggles to come up with a hero name for herself before she runs into Cat Noir, and... ugh... oh boy, this is dumb. Cat Noir, being just as intelligent as his father, assumes Scarabella is either and Akuma or a Sentimonster, starts fighting her, AND THEN ACTIVATES HIS CATACLYSM, CLEARLY TRYING TO KILL HER.

WHAT. THE. FUCK???

Okay, to be fair, it has been shown that Cataclysm won't necessarily kill a Miraculous user or Sentimonster. In the episode “Miraculer”, the titular Akuma stole Cat Noir's Cataclysm and used it against him, and while it didn't kill Cat Noir, it still hurt like hell and crippled him for the rest of the fight until Miraculous Ladybug healed him. We also saw in “Reflekdoll” that Cataclysm drove the titular Sentimonster out of control rather than simply destroying it. So yes, it could be interpreted that Cat Noir wasn't exactly trying to kill Scarabella, just incapacitate her the best he can without Ladybug's help.

Here's the thing: What if he was facing an Akuma instead and decided to try and Cataclysm her? He still could have killed her, or (assuming Akumas have the same protection as Miraculous heroes do) at best, seriously hurt her. I understand that he has the right to be upset at seeing some stranger instead of his partner considering Shadowmoth has a history of using evil doppelgangers, and both Marinette and Alya still had options to explain it to him (Marinette could have quickly transformed into Ladybug and sent Cat Noir a quick text saying she was being forced to leave town for a few days and temporarily trusted someone else with the Ladybug Miraculous until she got back, while Scarabella could have said she was Rena Rouge and explained the same thing while showing Cat Noir she had the Fox Miraculous to prove herself), but that doesn't even come close to justifying him attempting to harm someone who isn't even trying to fight. It's even worse when you remember the whole reason Adrien gave up his Miraculous and bailed on Ladybug in the New York Special was because he was overcome with grief from accidentally killing Aeon, so it's good to know he learned absolutely nothing from that experience.

So Scarabella thankfully summons her Lucky Charm, a trash can lid, to shield herself from Cat Noir's Cataclysm, and then despite having absolutely no experience with this new set of powers, manages to do the one thing almost every Akuma or Sentimonster in this show has failed to do and incapacitates Cat Noir so he's vulnerable to losing his Miraculous. At least when Marinette masters every other Miraculous she uses, it can be theorized that she trained to use them offscreen. Alya literally just got the Ladybug Miraculous (and struggled to get up to the rooftop with her yo-yo to show her inexperience earlier), and now she easily manages to pin down the more experienced hero of the two?

Here's an idea: Instead of having Scarabella overpower Cat Noir, have her be in a position where Cat Noir, non-lethally, mind you, manages to almost take her Miraculous away, but she uses the quick wit she's developed from her extensive time as Rena Rouge to convince Cat Noir she's the real deal by saying something only he and Ladybug know. It would have easily resolved the conflict and doesn't make one of the characters look like a homicidal idiot.

So because both heroes used their powers, Scarabella and Cat Noir detransform so Tikki and Plagg can recharge, though Adrien still gives Alya attitude because Ladybug didn't tell him she had to leave.

Hey, Adrien? Here's the thing...

YOU DID THE EXACT SAME FUCKING THING IN THE NEW YORK SPECIAL, YOU SHIT FOR BRAINS!

You have absolutely NO RIGHT to claim you're always honest when you went behind Ladybug's back and endangered Paris while you had the balls to run away like a coward and only helped fix the consequences of your actions once your ego was validated by a recording of Ladybug. It's honestly even worse because while Marinette had no choice but to leave and trust Alya with the Ladybug, Adrien willingly left Paris alone and we were supposed to sympathize with him after he killed someone, and now as soon as he's in the opposite situation, we're still supposed to feel bad for him?! BULLSHIT! And you better believe I'm going to talk about the way Adrien views his partnership with Ladybug later on.

And of course, even though lives are on the line, Cat Noir just has to continue to bitch and moan about how (and this is best read in Linkara's whiny Superboy Prime voice) “sCaRaBeLlA iSn'T tHe ReAl LaDyBuG”, showing how just like in so many episodes, Astruc and his team believes Cat Noir's feelings are more important than saving the day.

Scarabella goes to rescue some civilians, but they were actually brainwashed by Robustus, once again showing her inexperience as Ladybug which doesn't go well with her effortlessly defeating Cat Noir earlier at all. Cat Noir helps Scarabella escape and the two hide out at the city's wax statue museum previously featured in “The Puppeteer 2”, because I guess the writers only want to reference bad episodes today. Cat Noir, not getting the importance of secret identities, asks Scarabella how she knows Ladybug, and Cat Noir somehow finds out she knows Ladybug's identity from her response.

Before the two can talk more, it turns out that the wax statues of celebrities in the museum are real people who attack the two heroes, leading to an awkward fight scene where Scarabella and Cat Noir fight a bunch of brainwashed civilians with no weapons beyond their cellphones. Our heroes, ladies and gentlemen!

Scarabella summons her Lucky Charm again, creating a frying pan, but when she looks around, she can't see how to properly use it. And despite spending the entire episode complaining about how much he hates her, it's Cat Noir that tells Scarabella to get her head back in the game because “That's what Ladybug would do”. Funny, I can think of a few situations where Cat Noir could have taken his own advice, but I digress. Also, he's now just cool with Scarabella because there's only a few minutes left in the episode and we need to wrap up the conflict.

Scarabella figures out an idea that involves freeing Marinette, so she negotiates with Robostus to free everything and everyone under his control or else Cat Noir will use his Cataclysm to destroy the Ladybug Miraculous. Robostus agrees and empties his hard drive, and to show them holding up her end of the bargain, Scarabella gives him the frying pan before she and Cat Noir let themselves be captured... while Marinette simply hits Robostus with the frying pan, freeing the Akuma and the two heroes. All in all, it's a really creative climax that shows both Scarabella and Marinette in perfect sync with each other even though they never discussed their plan. Though of course, because Astruc hates writing any scene with Ladynoir, Cat Noir gets a bucket stuck on his head so he doesn't see Marinette saving the day.

Scarabella de-evilizes Robostus, uses Miraculous Scarabella to fix everything and send Marinette back to the train, and because Hack-San already failed once, Shadowmoth can't use it for a different plan so he destroys the Sentimonster.

We cut to a few days after the trip (I guess Shadowmoth decided to take a vacation himself), and Alya tells Marinette to talk with Cat Noir about what happened.

This scene was so close to ending this episode off on a positive note. There was a good atmosphere and the body language of Ladybug and Cat Noir does a good job at telling us how uncomfortable they both feel while talking. It's just that instead of getting a heart to heart between the two about the lack of trust in their relationship, we get an Angstdrien Depreste scene. Or would a more accurate term be Cat Dour?

First off, while I don't have a problem with Ladybug apologizing for not telling Cat Noir, the episode never has him bring up what happened with Scarabella. As usual, both of them were partially at fault, but only Ladybug had to apologize for leaving her “Kitty” alone.

Second, Cat Noir’s feelings weren’t hurt? You’re telling me that in scenes like this...

And this...

Didn’t show Adrien acting irrationally because of how emotional he was? Is he really telling the truth around Ladybug or is he just trying to sweep that under the rug so Scarabella’s testimony doesn’t screw up his chances with Ladybug?

Third, this was an obvious chance to Cat Noir to finally be honest and tell Ladybug how he feels about her leaving him in the dark about so many things, but the entire conversation is just about how sad he would be if he never sees Ladybug again. Even though the whole reason he was so pissy to Scarabella at first was because of some lingering resentment for Ladybug ignoring him in favor of other heroes, why is this what the two talk about? I get it's not the season finale, but it's kind of hypocritical for Cat Noir to whine about how Ladybug doesn't trust him while never being honest about his own feelings? Sure, he's all soft and vulnerable around Ladybug, but we've seen all season how angry he gets about her not trusting him whenever she isn't around, so ironically, it's hard to tell if this is him being honest or not.

And I think now's a good time to finally talk about the way Ladybug and Cat Noir's partnership has been portrayed all season, especially since the main themes of the episodes relate to it. Buckle up, Adrien stans, because this isn't going to be pretty.

All season, we have been supposed to sympathize with Adrien as Marinette starts to trust Alya with more things than him. Marinette revealed her identity to her, trusted her to have her Miraculous permanently, and even let her keep her Miraculous even though someone else knew her identity. While some of it is hypocritical, the idea is that Adrien feels like he can be trusted with this kind of knowledge too, when really, he hasn't earned that responsibility.

Adrien has rarely, if ever, taken his job as a superhero seriously.

Not only is he known to flirt with Ladybug in the middle of a fight, he has defied her orders and recklessly sacrificed himself because he thinks Ladybug can do all the work without him.

He has also lashed out emotionally and once threatened to quit being Cat Noir in the middle of a crisis and was willing to let innocent people suffer for personal reasons, and later on actually quit being Cat Noir temporarily while Hawkmoth was about to start World War III because he was wallowing in self-pity.

He once said he isn't cut out for the responsibility that comes with being Ladybug and never learned anything from temporarily using the Ladybug Miraculous.

He has generally refused to respect Ladybug's boundaries and doesn't understand that she doesn't like him that way while he insists they should be a couple.

He outright fell for an evil doppelganger of Ladybug because she said she loved him and turned against the real Ladybug.

And I should also mention that despite hating how Ladybug keeps secrets from him, a lot of Adrien's worst moments have been when Ladybug wasn't around and he never told her about them.

He never told Ladybug that he was the reason Copycat really got akumatized while saying he never lies to her.

He never told Ladybug he contemplated letting thousands of people die because he didn't like not knowing stuff Ladybug knew.

He never told Ladybug he briefly used the Snake Miraculous to get brownie points with her.

He never told Ladybug he figured out her identity and asked her out as soon as he did so.

He never told Ladybug he abandoned Paris to go on a field trip.

He never told Ladybug he was screwing around on patrol and was excited to see someone get akuamtized if it meant spending time with her.

He never told Ladybug how he ignored Rena Rouge's orders because “ShE wAsN't LaDyBuG” and almost screwed up the mission because of it, and also never told her how he smashed a chimney in anger at Rena Rouge being in on the plan.

And he never told Ladybug he gave her replacement attitude after trying to harm her without letting her explain herself.

Why exactly should I support the idea of Ladybug trusting Cat Noir more when Cat Noir himself has kept his own secrets from Ladybug?

Adrien has done absolutely nothing to show he is trustworthy because more often than not, he views the battle with Shadowmoth as a game. He has screwed around when lives were on the line, and we're supposed to see him as responsible? It's kind of funny that Astruc compared Ladybug to Spider-Man, yet he seems to have forgotten that with great power, there must also come great responsibility. If this was a character flaw or a sign he needed to grow up, I'd be more accepting, but the fact that the writers think Adrien is a great superhero is laughable with how much evidence has proved the contrary.

In contrast, Alya, despite only being Marinette's confidant for a few episodes, has shown to take being a hero more seriously. She's helped her escape to transform, analyze the Guardian texts, and has been shown to work well on her own as Rena Rouge while helping out Marinette. I'm not trying to say she's an amazing character (“Rocketear” in particular has shown she still has problems with keeping secrets), but compared to Adrien, she seems to be more capable of handling top-secret information with Marinette, and more importantly, doesn't view being Rena Rouge as a way to have fun like Adrien does being Cat Noir. I'll go more into detail with that next time.

But yeah, this scene is how the episode ends, and what did I think of it?

youtube

I'm honestly not sure which episode I think is worse, this one or “Queen Banana”. On the one hand, every frame of “Queen Banana” could easily be replaced by an image of Astruc flipping the bird and the overall message of the episode would remain unchanged, but the fact that all of the writers think that everything Adrien does in this episode is okay and that we should feel sorry for him in this episode is just as bad, if not worse.

As awful as Chloe was portrayed in “Queen Banana”, it was clear it was intentional on the writers' part, but Adrien doesn't get that excuse once much like he has all season. As far as Astruc's team thinks, Adrien is an incredible superhero even when he honestly attempted to harm someone with a superpower that can cause grievous harm at best. Yet again this season, in the show's attempt to make me feel sorry for Adrien, it made him look even worse. In any other show, he would obviously be called out for his incredibly unheroic actions.

Even putting him aside, the writing in this episode is still AWFUL. The whole reason Ladybug was benched had several plotholes and poor communication with Cat Noir that only made the fight with Robostus even harder, Shadowmoth's plan to waste a potentially useful Sentimonster to reuse a single Akuma was one of the dumbest plans he's ever had, and barring the ending, the action was just forgettable.

There were a few okay moments sprinkled throughout the episode (more than I can say for “Queen Banana”), so I'm still not sure if I should call this the worst episode of the show or still give that honor to “Queen Banana”. I guess I'll leave that choice up to you and let you pick your poison for now.

I mean, it's not like there's going to be an even worse episode down the line this season, right?

RIGHT???

295 notes · View notes

annonymouslyblonde · 3 years

Text

Where I Should Be

Fandom: PJO/HOO

Pairing: Percy x Annabeth

Genre: hurt/comfort, fluff

Summary: Set during Mark of Athena the night of the day they found Percy. What if the stable scene wasn't the first moment alone Percy and Annabeth had? While I love the stable scene, Annabeth just isn't patient enough to have waited that long to catch up with Percy. My take on an additional scene for MoA.

A/N: Everything follows canon for HOO other than the fact we don't have a consistent timeline on the amount of time Percy was missing. So bare with me. My headcannon is that for Percy, it was a few months (thanks to his Hera induced nap), but for Annabeth, he's been missing eight months now.

The slight creak of the door woke Percy. After four years of fighting monsters and Lupa's training, he had learned to sleep lightly. Before the door could close, Riptide was uncapped and at the intruder's throat.

A sharp gasp came shortly before the person hissed, "Percy, it's me!"

Annabeth. Of course, it was only Annabeth. Percy sheepishly lowered his sword. Nothing said "I've missed you the last eight months" like a sword to the throat. Then again, she had judo flipped him, hadn't she? Seemed fair enough.

"I thought you were a monster!" he whispered harshly in defense of his actions, but Annabeth leveled him with a signature glare.

"A monster quietly making it past Jason on guard and opening your bedroom door instead of exploding it?"

His cheeks flamed with embarrassment. Hearing it aloud especially from Annabeth did make it seem pretty ridiculous.

"I was half asleep, and stranger things have happened. Besides I wasn't exactly expecting anyone tonight."

Annabeth looked away from him distracted, half asleep herself. She was barefoot and clad in her favorite worn flannel pants and a camp half-blood sweatshirt of his that was definitely too big for her.

"You're right, I'm sorry," she admitted quietly. "I just- I shouldn't have come, it's stupid. Go back to bed, Percy." She started to turn for the door when he dropped his sword completely to reach for her.

"Hey, don't."

He turned her back to him. In the light of Riptide, tear tracts stood out on her cheeks, and her eyes were red, puffy, and glassy like she may cry again any second. He gently stroked her cheek.

"You've been crying," Percy noted. She wiped angrily at her eyes trying to remove the evidence.

"Nightmares again?" he asked gently. Percy was always gentle with her when nightmares plagued her. Being vulnerable didn't come easy to Annabeth, and he felt honored she would trust him enough to show her vulnerable side.

When she confirmed his suspicions with a nod, Percy collected her in his arms and felt her sigh with relief. He remembered how awful the nightmares had been before at camp and when she'd stay at the apartment, even taken a few elbows as she fought them when she fell asleep during their movie nights. And now? A shudder cut through him trying to imagine how awful they must have been when he vanished. For him, it had only been a few months, but Annabeth had been looking for him nearly a year now not knowing what she may find on the other end.

He pressed a long kiss to her hair and asked, "Which one this time?"

Percy was familiar with most of them by now. Her mother and father rejecting her, blankets turning into spiders, standing at his funeral shroud in hand with everyone telling her he was gone, him accepting the offer of immortality and leaving her alone. And now he had actually left her alone at camp for eight months. The thought made his stomach turn.

"Same one I've had the last few months," she mumbled into his chest. "Every worst-case scenario. You not remembering me, not wanting to leave Camp Jupiter. Or not finding you at Camp Jupiter at all, that you'd never been there and we were completely wrong. Or worse." He knew the "or worse". Her biggest fear used to be abandonment and rejection, but now it had become more than that. The worse was finding him already dead.

"When I woke up, I just- I didn't trust my own mind that we really had found you. That you were really here. I thought I'd finally snapped. Today was probably the best scenario I could have thought up, and you know how it is for half-bloods. Things never go right."

He tightened his hold and stroked her tangled curls, burying his face in her shoulder. "Today they did. Right enough at least. I'm here. I'm with you where I should be."

"I'm so sorry, Percy," she sobbed into his shirt. "I'm sorry it took me so long to find you. I failed you epically."

"No, you didn't." He gently extracted himself taking her face in his hands and made her look at him. "That was all Hera. You did everything you could. I know you did."

"I can't help but feel like that's my fault too. After all, it is Hera," she spat the name out with a much venom as gorgon's blood. Somehow her voice could do that. One side sweet and comforting, another as deadly as poison. "She had to take you. Part of me feels like she took you to get back at me."

Percy couldn't help the chuckle. "Oh, I've done my share of angering that psycho goddess."

The pair stood for a moment in an extended silence. It wasn't enough to alleviate her guilt and he knew it. So he continued.

"It had to be me I think. Any other half-blood getting to California and through the wolf House with no memories? Even if I didn't know about it, I had Achilles' curse protecting me until I got to camp Jupiter. It saved me more than a couple of times."

"Until? You mean-" Her voice trailed off as her fingers grazed the spot at his lower back that he'd confided in her was his only weak spot. His stomach flipped at the gentle touch of her fingers in a way that had nothing to do with the weak spot he previously had.

"I had to give it up to enter Camp Jupiter," he explained. The realization donned on her.

"So when I flipped you earlier-"

"Oh yeah felt every bit of that, thanks. Probably bruised my back along with my ego," he teased. A thunk sounded as she hit her head on the door.

"I'm an idiot," she groaned. "Of course you couldn't carry a Grecian curse into a Roman camp. I'm sorry, Percy. I never meant to hurt you." Her hands skimmed his back hoping she hadn't hurt him too badly.

"I know you didn't, babe." Her heart flipped at the affectionate term. He didn't use that one often, usually when they were alone, but it did strange things to her whenever he did call her babe. It still felt surreal occasionally that they were together in that way. The days of them arguing on the way to LA didn't seem so far in the past.

"You were angry and scared and had every right to be after I disappeared like that. Besides you've done more damage in sparing practice. I'm fine."

She didn't say anything, choosing instead to wrap her arms around him again assuring herself he was really there. Soon, he felt her breathing even out against his neck, and she slumped heavily into him starting to fall asleep again. When he shuffled them towards the bed, she stirred making the task more difficult.

"Come on," he whispered into her nest of golden curls, loving the way she burrowed into his arms. "Lay down with me."

"Can't," she mumbled sleepily. "I shouldn't even be here. I need to go before we get caught."

"I think we've earned this for one night at least. It's been too long since I could hold you." His arms tightened around her, adding to his point. "I'll even set an alarm so you can sneak back before anyone is up. Better yet, where's your hat?"

"Stopped working," she spat out bitterly. "Only gift mom ever gave me, and apparently she kept the receipts. I don't wanna talk about it."

That concerned him. If Athena was taking things from Annabeth, what did that mean for the rest of them with their parents? Percy made them promise to be better with their kids, and here they were a few months later going back on their promises. Typical.

"You and your mom aren't talking again?"

"No one is talking. Olympus has gone silent except for Hera apparently." Bitterness crept back into her voice as the hurt and worry of the last several months tightened in her chest again. Before her mind could go too dark, the ship pitched suddenly sending them tumbling into his bed and Percy into a fit of laughter.

"See even the ship is telling you to stay."

She snorted and settled against him as he pulled a blanket around them. If the Fates seemed to be telling her to stay, then who was she to argue. Curled into his side, she took a deep, comforting breath of the salty air that seemed to follow him. The smell of the ocean, the smell of him, always calmed her now. Automatically, Percy ran his fingers through her hair. Well as much as he could considering it was a knotted mess.

"Speaking of moms though, your mom and Paul are doing well. They've been worried about you, but they're good."

"You went to see them?"

Distractedly, she drew Greek letters across his chest needing to keep her hands busy. Curse half-blood ADHD. It was always worse when she didn't sleep well, but Percy didn't mind. The light touch of her fingers dancing across his chest focused him. All he could think of was her. The smell of her shampoo. Her warm breath as she spoke to him. The feel of her securely wrapped in his arms. He never wanted to forget this again.

"I wanted to keep them informed and see if they heard from you," she answered having finally ordered her thoughts enough. "I've been going at least once a week when I'm at camp. Your mom's kept me sane the last eight months."

"She's pretty great like that. I tried to call her. I don't know if it helped or made things worse. I didn't really explain too well."

"It helped," she assured him with a squeeze. "She managed to forward it to me, and we must have spent an hour on the phone together listening to it. It was good just to hear your voice. And speaking of, you should call her in the morning. The camouflage on the ship will make it safe for a phone call."

"She's going to kill me when I get home," he groaned. Annabeth laughed into his chest. It was the best feeling in the world to hear that laugh again.

"Probably so, then she's going to hug you for a month straight. She wanted me to tell you she loves you and misses you. She never doubted I'd find you."

When Annabeth first came to tell Mr. and Mrs. Jackson-Blofis about Percy's disappearance, she made sure Sally knew she would do whatever it took to bring him home. The older woman merely nodded and smiled at the younger girl.

"Of course you will, dear. I have every faith in you." And she hugged her. Sally never once doubted Annabeth's ability. And later as Annabeth worried over the quest from her mom, it was Sally that held her hand reassuringly and told her everything would be alright. In the past eight months, Sally Jackson had become a rock to Annabeth, and she would never be able to thank the woman enough for that. The woman never doubted that she'd find the most important thing in both their lives.

"And she shouldn't have." Percy interrupted her thoughts, answering both her words and internal musings. "Because you are amazing."

Looking down at the girl curled against him, Percy couldn't help but finally feel at home. Emotions overwhelmed him fighting for dominance. Pride in her. Anger for being snatched away. Fear that it would happen again. Happiness to have her in his arms again. But one feeling was more powerful than the rest, and he needed to make sure she knew before anything else could happen.

"And I love you, Annabeth Chase."

She propped up on her elbows, staring at him dumbfounded. A long quiet moment passed before Percy broke the silence with a nervous laugh.

"Oh that's so sweet," he mimicked in a high voice. "But you know I'm not sure I feel that-"

She shut him up with a kiss. By now, they had kissed lots of times. There was Mt. St. Helen when she had surprised him with a kiss. Or the time they came back to camp high on the victory of defeating Kronos when they had kissed by the lake. And of course, the best underwater kiss ever which had become every underwater kiss since. But every time she kissed him, it made his stomach flip just like it was the first time all over again. When they finally parted, she leaned her forehead against his with a satisfied smirk.

"Of course I love you, seaweed brain. Think I'd have gone searching for eight months if I didn't?"

"I'd do it for you," he vowed, wrapping a ringlet around his finger. "I'd do anything for you."

"You're proving my point for me."

She smirked at him, and he took the moment to truly study her face. She was beautiful as always, but the deep, puffy rings under her eyes had definitely not been there before. Her cheekbones stood out sharper and he realized when he held her, she was thinner, gaunt even. He could feel each of her vertebrae when he ran his hand down her back. Her face was noticeably paler as well, and her hair lacked its normal shiny, glow. Overall, she pretty much looked like death warmed over. He traced the purple skin under her eyes.

"Gods, Annabeth, when's the last time you slept?"

She rolled her eyes at him. The first time he told her he loved her followed up with how tired she looked. Leave it to Percy Jackson to ruin a beautiful moment.

"Always the charmer, aren't you?"

"I mean it." The laugh in her throat died with his serious tone. Percy was seldom serious. "When's the last time you actually slept a full eight hours? And you haven't been eating well, I can tell. I know how you get when you stress."

Annabeth settled against his shoulder again, not able to bear the concern on his face. No, she hadn't taken great care of herself lately, and she didn't need Percy to remind her of that. Sally did enough of that commenting on the increasingly dark circles under her eyes, always insisting she stay for dinner, that she was getting too thin.

"I couldn't," she finally admitted in a small voice. It seemed pathetic to her now that she hadn't been able to take care of herself, but she lacked the will to without Percy. All of her focus has been on finding him.

"I had to find you. When I did sleep, I snuck into your cabin or fell asleep in your bed at the apartment." She paused waiting for his reaction. Would he be angry she snuck in there? Would he not like her sleeping in his beds while he'd been missing? But Percy just tightened his arms around her and pressed a kiss to her head. She released the breath she hadn't realized she had been holding. It amazed her sometimes how Percy always seemed to know exactly what she needed.

"Being in there where it smelled like you, it was the only way I could actually get some sleep. Chiron had to know, but no one ever said anything."

Tears collected in her eyes, and she turned her face into his chest trying to stop them. Percy was the only person she ever let see her like this, weak and emotional. The only time she let herself break was in the seclusion of the Posidon cabin curled around his pillow.

"I missed you," she whispered hoarsely.

"I missed you too. The whole time, all I could think about was getting back to you. You kept me going, kept me alive."

"You mean you remembered me the whole time?" she asked incredulously. How could she have been the one thing he remembered? When Jason showed up, he hadn't remembered anything. It didn't make sense to her that Percy would remember anything, much less her.

"Yeah. Whether she meant to or not, you were the only thing Hera didn't take from me. The second I woke up, I didn't know my name, but I knew yours and knew I had to get back to you no matter what. More things came. The quests and all. That kiss under the lake. But it always came back to you. You're ingrained into who I am now, Annabeth. You were the reason I kept going because I knew I had to get back to you."

She leaned up pressing her lips to his again, tracing every inch of his face trying to memorize it. The kiss spoke everything they had struggled to say to each other. Her euphoric relief seeing him alive and well. His hope for a future with her in New Rome. The deep connection that had tied them together since they were twelve. Everything.

"I love you, Percy Jackson," she breathed against his lips, pouring every emotion she felt for him into the words. He grinned that lopsided smile she adored so much.

"I love you too, wise girl."

#percy jackson #annabeth chase #percy and annabeth #percabeth #pjo fandom #pjo fanfic #percy x annabeth #pjo hoo toa #mark of athena #fanfic #writing #hoo fanfic #oneshot #percabeth fluff

80 notes · View notes

riathedreamer · 4 years

Text

Zero is Null

A discussion of Zero’s love-hate-relationship with RvB and struggling independence; including a hotdog too big for the bun, tragic backstories, a single bow-chicka-bow-wow, and a cookie at the very end.

Welcome to what will be a lot of text. Basically, it will explore why Zero fails as an RvB (with emphasis on RvB) season. I will not be the first one to bring forth some of the points, and I promise to be fair and civil and fun. This isn’t supposed to be a piece of hate – in fact, I’m writing this because I love Red vs. Blue.

Okay, first of all, to increase your fun – take a guess on just how much of Zero is spent on fight scenes. You see, I’ve calculated the exact amount, and I will reveal it later, but for now, take a guess and remember the number. Maybe you are the winner!

Alright, time to share my thoughts. Wait! Since I suffer from anxiety and have this one annoying voice pretending to be all those critical statements my opinion could be met with, let’s give it an actual voice and address the points throughout this review.

“Why would I care about your opinion, Ria?” – I don’t know, you’re the one who clicked Read More.

“Your opinion doesn’t matter!” – Of course, it doesn’t! Geez. Do you think your opinion matters, though? Listen, we’re on Tumblr, the actual equivalent of screaming into the void. And it’s fun, too!

“If you don’t like it, don’t watch!” - *activates Uno Reverse Card* “You can’t talk about something you haven’t watched!”

“You’re just a Hater” – Actually, this is a point I’ll come back to. Like a cliffhanger. Also, at the end of this, there’ll be a cookie. But this will also include me talking about the stuff I like, because, surprise, Zero is not without talent!

“You just don’t like it because the Reds and Blues aren’t in it!” – Actually, that’s a good point, so instead, this review will start with a sole focus on Zero and discuss the problem that lies within that story. Then we can address why the lack of OG cast is understandable and problematic and weird.

But first! Backstory.

When the first 5 second teaser dropped back in spring (you know, when we were young and innocent and the world didn’t feel like an apocalyptic movie yet), I held onto that one image of what I thought (hoped) to be Grif and Simmons in the sunset, hopefully addressing Grif’s hateglue arc, but boy was I wrong because a) that’s not Simmons, that’s Sarge, and b) the image was from a PSA since the Reds are not in Zero.

Actual face-reveal of me below:

Admittedly, when I heard that the Reds and Blues were not going to be the main characters (or even show up), it felt like a gut punch. However, I actually found myself getting excited due to the creators’ hype. I want to praise them for this. It’s been a while since an RvB season was talked so much ABOUT before its release; it had advertisements, it had creators and voice-actors talking about it. Please. More of that in the future. Their passion rubbed off on me, and that deserves recognition. So it pains me that this was clearly a passion-project, and then when I gave it a try, I didn’t want to touch it again for weeks.

Here’s the thing. I cannot whole-heartedly say that Zero is bad. It’s not gonna melt your eyes. It’s not even so-bad-it’s-good. For me, it’s meh. It’s a Saturday-morning-cartoon aimed for a younger audience with a rushed plot and clichéd characters. The problem is that it calls itself RvB, and with that title comes something to live up to – but more importantly, something to continue.

My main issue is that Zero forces its story into existence by ignoring established content rather than adjusting to it. Let’s call this for the hotdog-too-big-for-the-bun syndrome solely for the sake of the bow-chicka-bow-wow that’s coming now. Bow-chicka-bow-wow. Many of the separate issues I will dive into all add to this hotdog-issue, so I will scream “Hotdog!” whenever this is the case so we can all keep track of my argument.

You can continue the story of Red vs. Blue without the Reds and Blues. While that would personally crush my heart, it can be done. There’s a story of Red vs. Blue that can be continued. The world can be expanded, the previous actions of the Reds and Blues can be explored from another angle.

So.

How does Zero do this? It doesn’t.

I just want to make it clear that new elements can definitely be added when it comes to worldbuilding. That’s literally the point of sequels. But Zero’s settings are presented with so little grace and with no connection to previously established worldbuilding. We get Alliance of Defense and GLASS thrown in our face as very big important organizations – yet we’ve never heard of them before. A big central plot point of RvB is the UNSC and Project Freelancers, and those were introduced naturally with the plot. We already have big established intergalactic organizations. What is AOD’s connection with those? We aren’t told. We are just told they exist and expected to accept it, no questions asked. If this was a whole new world and story – fine. But when you need to build on an already established worldbuilding, you need more grace than this. Chorus was a whole new setting, but it was explained, and it was connected to the previous plot. Same with Iris. Same with Desert Gulch. In Zero, it feels lazy. It feels forced. These organizations are just there because the story is built around them (HOTDOG).

This vagueness when it comes to wordbuilding is also reflected in the settings - we have a desert, a training base, a lab, temples, Tucker’s workplace, and we do not know if all those are set place on the same planet. If that is the case, what is this planet’s relationship with Chorus? Is it Earth? And most importantly, what is the deal with the temples? Why are they connected to Tucker’s sword if it isn’t the same planet. Are they made by the same aliens? Are people okay with this? Why haven’t these temples been explored before? Chorus makes sure to establish this, while Zero doesn’t, adding to a growing amount of confusion.

Okay, so no connection with previous worldbuilding. What about characters? I mean, we got Wash and Carolina and Tucker! So we have RvB characters, it gotta be RvB! Technically – yeah. But it feels dirty. These three characters are not here to be characters. They are here to be props to the new cast. They are not given any development. Their presence isn’t even that important, and if this was a whole new show, they could easily have been replaced with an unknown face. Worst of all, they feel miswritten.

Carolina and Wash are working at a new military organization? Leaving the Reds and Blues behind? To help people? First of all, fucking bad idea, Carolina, the last time you left the Reds and Blues alone, they changed the timeline. But most importantly – Carolina and Wash just joined this new super elite military organization? After being mistreated and manipulated by such an organization in the past?

Carolina is there to introduce the characters. That’s it. We are force-fed their personality by having her literally read out loud their personality. There is no gentle introduction to the new cast. We are not allowed to get to know them naturally. Why show when you can tell, huh? That’s Carolina’s role. That’s why she is there. To introduce the cast and explain their story. That’s it. (HOTDOG).

How about Wash? He is there to get beat up and be a damsel in distress so that the new cast has a reason to explore the plot. Oh, and that brain damage that was the consequence of previous seasons – gone now. The guy who literally has trauma from having an AI explode inside his head is fine with having a computer inserted into it instead. Because that’s needed. To explore his brain damage wouldn’t work now when his role is to be a prop to lure the new cast for one episode and then be put onto the bench for the rest of the runtime (HOTDOG).

And Tucker – he is there to die for a second and have his sword taken from him. That’s literally it. And for the few moments he is there, he feels like old super flirty Tucker, which erases the character development he went through in previous seasons. Okay, so Tucker dies, and then not dies, and then he is put on the bench with Wash where they can sit and talk or whatever (‘cause holy shit, the new cast is not allowed to that), because he isn’t important. The sword is. Tucker is just a prop, even more than his sword is (HOTDOG).

Damn. Wash gets beat up. Tucker gets beat up. Dies. Gets his sword taken away. Almost seems like a Red’s wet dream. Sorry not sorry, Blues, you were done dirty.

So there are miswritten old characters. Even worse is the retconning. The plot needs a “normal” Wash, so, bam, magic computer solution. Never mind Wash’s trauma and character traits. Never mind the logic of the new worldbuilding which also includes a character suffering for years to heal an illness. But the brain damage that was such a big consequence that it became the main part of the plot of the last two seasons – gone. I mean, a gunshot to the head can be healed by CPR. That’s canon. But no one gave Wash CPR so it’s a big thing, okay. It was canonically a big thing, and Zero erased that. This is not me saying that a Cerebral Enhancer couldn’t work in the RvB universe. Imagine it being done right. Wash struggling with the choice of getting used to his disability or accepting the possibility of help - at the cost of reliving his trauma. The struggle between what to choose - what should he choose when he wants to help as many as possible, the sacrifices he thinks he has to make, the way it could have been used as a part of his character growth. But in Zero, the enhancer isn’t a part of Wash’s character. It’s there so the story can work without having to deal with the previous plot’s consequence (HOTDOG).

Same with the sword thing. They sorta explain it by having Tucker flatline, but it’s weak. Honestly, I find it sorta offensive. What about Locus’ sword as well? It’s twisting previous lore to make the new plot work (HOTDOG). (Also, are we not gonna talk about the ultimate power being Spencer Porkensenson’s helmet? Have the writers forgotten Spencer Porkensenson? Have we as a community forgotten Spencer Porkensenson?)

If you have Red vs. Blue in your title, you cannot ignore what you inherit from it. You need to respect the worldbuilding, the established characters, and the previous plot. Zero does not do this.

Let’s talk about the Triplets. No, really, let’s do it. I don’t think I’ve ever talked about them before, because season 14 was a mixed bag for me (that I have now learned to appreciate. Thank you, Zero.) because I have heart at the size of the Grinch and can only love a few characters at a time, and that did not include the Triplets. Can’t even remember their names. Well, I can, but I can’t for the love of me remember which state is which, and my tongue is twisted every time I try to say Ohio, Iowa, and Idaho, and I know it’s on purpose. I know it is. And it got me good. That being said, the fandom actually embraced them really, really well! Seriously, I’ve seen more content for the Triplets than for Zero as a whole.

Why talk about the Triplets? (Was Iowa the lesbian? Or was it Ohio? Fuck.) Because like Zero, they introduced new characters with a story of their own. The Reds and Blues didn’t play a role. But here’s what I feel like the Triplets got right. They didn’t change the settings to force their narrative. They used stuff already established (Project Freelancer), added their own story as a continuation of that. They even included old characters in the beginning (Wash and some other Freelancers) but it felt natural and it didn’t feel like it happened at the expense of the old characters. Wash’s writing felt natural, and his presence wasn’t needed to tell these new character’s stories. He wasn’t a prop to them. He was there to establish the setting and to establish the relationship with these new characters, and then he and the other familiar faces (helmets??) left, and we as the viewers were left with these new characters. And the new characters told their own story by themselves. It felt like, hey, here’s something you know – remember Mother of Invention, and remember Wash’ lower rank, but now, try to imagine being even lower rank than him, aren’t you curious about those fates? Now let’s hear their story! It was new, it was something else, but it didn’t wreck what came before it, and it stayed true to the classic vibes of RvB.

As I said before, the hotdog-issue is my biggest problem with Zero. It infuriates me. I will return to this. But there are more issues, even if we try to look past the title-related problems.

If we try to imagine Zero as its own story and universe (as it should be, in my opinion), it still earns the meh review from me.

These isolated issues include awkwardness, the writing, lack of self-awareness, and pacing. First of all, holy shit, this is a tell, don’t show. Nothing is subtle, nothing is allowed to develop. It’s like the show thinks you are six years old with an attention span of a goldfish. You are not just led by the hand – they have literally pulled off your arm by the end of the show. We are force-fed every bit of information, every bit of personality from these new characters.

The voice-acting is a mixed bag for me. Sometimes it’s pretty good, sometimes it’s not. Some of the problems can definitely be blamed on the dialogue that you can only do so much with. It’s not good. I can’t remember any good jokes (the one joke I really appreciate was the cast on armor, and that was freaking visual humor. That was so RvB. Kudos to that. It was fun. More of that, please.), and RvB is known for having memorably good lines. This is a show built on good, clever, funny dialogue. Zero does not deliver. You have to sit through clichéd lines – “You’re not my dad”, “I trusted you”, “Come with me”, “It can’t be!”, “She’s way too powerful”, and “We have to do this together” – performed unironically. I cringed more than I laughed. Worst thing is that Zero could be a good parody. Sometimes, it feels like it is. One-dimensional characters, a villain wanting ‘the ultimate power’, very overpowered characters, bad one-liners, etc. But Zero takes itself seriously, and I was one of the people rooting for Jax to show up at the end and yell “Cut”. That would have been a funny-as-fuck twist. A spin-off parody. If I can’t have “Sarge the Movie”, I would have taken that and loved it. I would have forgiven everything. “We put so much info into finding that power, but we had no idea what it was” is really a line in the finale, and I cannot believe this is real in a show that somehow still tries to present itself as serious. What a plot.

We have to talk about pacing. God, first of all it should be stated that RvB is a mess when it comes to pacing. I honestly get what they were going for. Sometimes, RvB has come across as a bit boring when you get three episodes stretched over three weeks without much going on. I know season 11 did not have the warmest welcome because it was seen as boring until the finale. But when you see season 11 as a whole, as a movie, as a part of a trilogy, it works so well. Zero is more focused on being episodic. They want something to happen all the time so we will stay tuned. The thing that will happen – a fight. Oh god. The fight scenes.

I have done the math. I have run the numbers. I deserve a freaking cookie for this. Are you ready?

If you put all the episodes together, you have a runtime of 106 minutes. HOWEVER, with the introduction of credits in every episode, you gotta account for this. Removing the credits, this gives us 94 minutes of actual runtime. Out of that, 45 minutes are dedicated to fight scenes. That means 48% of the show is fight scenes.

If I wanted that many fight scenes, I’d watch Death Battle. Except the actual RvB Death Battle episode has a runtime of 20 minutes, and out of that, 5 minutes is dedicated to the actual battle. For the people who hate math – that’s 25% of the actual runtime.

RvB Zero has more fight scenes than a show called Death Battle. Take that in.

The pace suffers from this. Where’s the time to explore the characters? Where’s the time for good dialogue? All I can think of is this:

I get that RvB is a show that’s literally making fun of itself by acknowledging all their characters do is stand around and talk. I get that you want characters to do more than that. But for the love of Church, would it kill the new characters to stand around and talk? For just a minute? Stop fighting, I am begging you, stop fighting! Am I a pacifist now? Am I purple? Have I joined Doc’s team? What has Zero done to me?!

The good thing though is that fight scenes are very good. They’re entertaining. However, they seem to deconstruct themselves when we need to get a fight scene in every episode. Usually, the few fight scenes in an RvB season were in some of the most climatic episodes. In Zero, I can hardly keep up with the pace because they won’t stop moving. Fight scenes aren’t plot. They aren’t character development. You need more than just fight scenes. They entertain, but there’s a limit to that.

Noël Wiggins, the co-writer, stated the inspiration was a Saturday-morning cartoon. They nailed that vibe. If that was their goal, hurray, they have accomplished something! Because of the poor plot and constant fight scenes, it feels like you could just switch on the TV and drop in at any moment and let yourself be entertained by the cool and colorful soldiers punching and kicking each other. I will admit that the fight scenes entertained me. But they don’t make it a good season.

If I were the six-year-old with the attention span of a goldfish that the show believes I am, I honestly would enjoy it. The stiff dialogue and the constant tell-don’t-show makes you feel like an audience that’s not supposed to do anything else but admire the flashy fight scenes. I miss the cleverness of RvB. I miss the characters I get to connect with as I see them grow.

I miss the tone of RvB. Because this isn’t RvB to me.

It’s not that RvB hasn’t changed its tone before. Holy shit, I sorta do want to experience the absolute shock the RvB fandom went through when s6 aired and they were given new characters and serious plot. I would have loved to experience that, but I was too busy being ten years old. The Freelancers seasons also introduced a new tone and more fight scenes with very talented fighters compared to the Blood Gulch gang, but a balance was kept by having half of the season still revolving around the Reds and Blues. But Zero – Zero is so much change. And it’s on purpose. At least this has been made very clear from the beginning.

They constantly seem to appeal to new fans, rather than be directed towards older fans of the show. If you want an entirely new audience with a season with a new cast, new worldbuilding, and new tone, I’m confused as to why they don’t just make a new show. The hotdog-problem begs for this solution. This story and environment and characters feel so out of touch with the original RvB, that with a few rewrites and lack of Halo-armor, it could just be a new show. Problem solved.

If not this, then present it as a spin-off. In all ways, it feels like a spin-off (again, see everything marked HOTDOG). But the creators refuse to do this, and I don’t understand why. I could forgive many of these issues, had they officially separated themselves from canon.

Ah, what’s the idiom? You can’t both swallow and blow? (You can hear the Bow-chicka-bow-wow in the distance). Something about eating cake and having it. Forgive me, English isn’t my native language. POINT IS why are you calling yourself RvB while actively fighting against the core essence of RvB? In my humble opinion, you can’t be both. Marketing it as a spin-off would have granted it some defense when changing, well, literally everything, and I just, would someone please properly describe why it isn’t a spin-off? Isn’t this season marked by its association with the plot of RvB rather than a continuation of it? Zero presenting itself as not a spinoff feels like a toddler clinging to the hem of its mother’s dress while forcefully running away from her, ripping the dress in the process.

When they do connect with the original RvB, it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. When they let Carolina, Wash, and Tucker appear for a moment, it feels like luring viewers in with the RvB title. Look at me. Look at me! I’m not saying this is the case. I say that it gives me the annoying vibes of being lured, rather than letting the characters be a part of the show for their own development, rather than having RvB in the title to continue its story. I should not be getting these vibes at all. But I am.

If you want to use RvB in the title, something from the core of RvB needs to be embraced. Things can be changed. They should. Something new should be brought in. But there’s a limit to how much you can change and replace and twist until it would have been better with an original show. As a season of RvB, it should tell the story of Red vs. Blue.

From my perspective, Zero fails to do so.

It pains me that the old cast has been replaced, but as stated earlier, a season could have worked without them. However, I do not like the take that one should be excited about all the new characters. That it isn’t a big thing that the OG cast got replaced. That we should just deal with it. Just, try to imagine another show suddenly replacing the main characters with characters we’ve never met before. Imagine RWBY suddenly only focusing on a new team of huntresses with the previous main characters reduced to an Easter Egg presence, or Camp Camp suddenly being about a new team of campers, no warning given. Can you imagine the outcry? So maybe let’s agree that a replacement of the main cast is a big thing and should be addressed and it’s valid to be upset about this change.

Could Zero have worked? It’s hard to answer this. How can I accept something as RvB if the season actively pushes away the core of RvB aside for an isolated story that could have been told in any other media? As a spinoff, I could have ignored it. To enjoy Zero, I have to fully separate it from RvB in my mind, and then it’s alright. S’not good. But it’s not bad. It’s entertaining enough. I really ended up liking Raymond and Tiny, and there were a few good jokes, and the fight scenes were admirable (but too much) and I love the creators’ passion. But it’s not RvB. I also wish that the new characters had been attached to previous worldbuilding, for example soldiers on Chorus or agents from Project Freelancer. That way we could build on familiar lore which would have decreased the confusion and added a much needed connection with the previous seasons of RvB.

God, the anxious voice is back (by the way, it sounds like Tutter from “Bear in the Blue House”).

“You’re racist” – I hope not. Literally, I do not want to be. Tell me if I’ve ever crossed some lines, because I swear, that is not my intention, I will apologize and most of all, change and do better. I included this because I’ve seen this take thrown around in the big ugly mess that is the fandom clashes regarding Zero. And racism is problem within RT community (this includes AH and RvB, sorry, I just use RT as an umbrella term for the latter), and I’m not saying it hasn’t been a problem with this season. Writers should never be harassed, and never-fucking-ever because of their skin color, and voice actors shouldn’t be treated like they are responsible for the choices of the show. But I was legit nervous to post this review, and I hope it’s been factual without feeling like personal attacks on the creators because that has never been my intention. I was delighted to hear about the diversity behind this project, and Torrian’s passion legit blew me away because it’s been a while since I’ve seen that for an RvB project. I’d hoped for it to be good, and when I feel disappointed, it’s for the reasons stated in this analysis. That said, Zero is made by a diverse cast and it’s made with love, and both of those things are so, so great, but it does not mean that Zero cannot be criticized. It can, and it should. It’s a product, just like all the other seasons, and fans are allowed to discuss it – both what they loved, and both what they found troublesome. And to repeat previous points, and be respectful, always, fuck racists, and never-fucking-ever harass the staff behind a season, what the fuck is wrong with you if you do this.

“Don’t you get it, it’s different because it’s trying something new!” – Hey, remember the philosophical question: if you replace all the parts of a ship one-by-one, is it still the same ship when you’re done? If it doesn’t include the Reds and Blues, if it ignores previous plot, if the old characters feel miswritten, if it values animation over dialogue, if it values fight scenes over comedy, if it wants to be Fast and Furious instead of Red vs. Blue – is it still Red vs. Blue? Because it doesn’t feel like it to me.

“It's been 17 seasons, it’s time to let the Reds and Blues go so someone else can shine!” – I simply do not understand us having been with the Reds and Blues for 17 seasons should be an argument to let them go, rather than be an argument as to why their absence hurt like hell.

“The Reds and Blues ran out of things to do!” – Did- did they, though? I mean, if we were discussing pretty much any other show, I’d probably agree that they were running out of content. But for the Reds and Blues… I think the PSAs nailed it this year! I’m not kidding, I had more fun watching the Reds and Blues discuss how to do laundry than watching Zero. You could literally give me an hour of the Reds and Blues trying to bake a cake or clear a gutter or simply settling down with an ordinary life, and I would trust them to make it worth the watch.

“The flaws were due to the fact it’s only 8 episodes long!” – Look, I can only judge a product the way it’s presented to me. I cannot come up with excuses for it. If they had 8 episodes to work with, they need to come up with a plot that works with this runtime. Seriously, this excuse cannot work when 48% of the season is spent on fight scenes. They could have used more runtime, sure, but the show needs to be able to pace itself and be planned accordingly.

“The OG cast couldn’t be a part of this year, hence Zero!” – That might be true. But. Would one year without RvB kill it? Is Zero necessary? Again, I just can’t judge excuses for the show. But trouble with the cast has been an issue before. Season 15 solves Geoff’s sabbatical by actually making Grif’s absence a part of the plot. Zero’s lack of Reds and Blues just feels like this excuse to tell a story that needn’t be a part of RvB.

Am I a hater? I guess? I greatly dislike Zero for the critique stated above. I do, however, not harass the creators and no one should ever do that. However, I have to admit that I feel there’s been this weird rejection of any critique of Zero where everything’s been brushed off as haters gonna hate, including the critique stated above. And I think that’s a problem because critique, as hard as it can be to hear (and I know this. I’m an author of original works. Weird flex, I know), is valid and necessary and shouldn’t just be shrugged away. As always, both sides of the fandom should always be respectful, but my own opinion is that addressing the flaws of Zero should not be controversial.

Does this super long rant/critique/whatever mean you cannot enjoy Zero? Gods no! I almost envy you if you enjoy this season, but holy shit, feel free to love it and tell the creators that you love it! Me pointing out the issues I have with the season shouldn’t be stopping you. I loved (and still love) s15 when it came out, and it was majorly rejected by the fandom. There were many, many critical posts, people were going on about how RvB should have ended with s13, and it evolved into the writer receiving death threats (me, once again: never ever harass the creators, assholes). But I didn’t tell people to stop being negative. I actually agreed with many of the flaws that were pointed out, and I enjoyed the season despite this, because that is possible. We, as RvB fans, should agree that RvB, is... I mean, it’s not the greatest, most flawless of shows, but we love it nonetheless. So go ahead and love Zero. This is not a stop sign. This is my opinion that you chose to read.

Wait, I promised you a cookie, didn’t I? Well, you’re not getting one. Why? Because I’m a Red and this is my chance to piss off a Blue. As Caboose wisely said: “Well, at least I don't go around... knocking on people's non-doors... and promising them cookies... and then NOT. GIVING. THEM. COOKIES!”

Blue Team sucks.

End speech.

#rvb zero #rvb #rvb zero critical #rvb critical #rvb0 #my rvb stuff #pls dont hate me for this #this is my honest opinion that people apparantly wanted to hear #as a standalone story zero isnt totally bad #as an rvb season it is

274 notes · View notes

the-final-sif · 4 years

Text

Okay, so I think I’ve got a solid timeline of events for villain!Katsuki

Katsuki leaves UA just before the provisional license exam, he’s at the point where he no longer things the hero system can be fixed without outside intervention. He’s done with how the media acts, he’s done with the blame being shifted to victims based on their quirks, and he’s done with the lies he’s been fed all his life.

Prior to this he started researching and planning what actual change would look like and require.

He meets up with Dabi, who’d only let the rest of the league know about the bet a few days prior. He was curious if Katsuki would keep his word or not. Dabi prods Katsuki gently, saying he knew the kid took honestly seriously but he’s still kinda surprised to see him go this far over a bet. Katsuki replies explaining it’s more than the bet. He talks about what he’s seen, and the failure of hero society to change. It’s more than enough to convince Dabi.

Dabi brings him to a secure location, then relays information to Shigaraki. Shigaraki is hesitant, he’s surprised Katsuki came back to them, but when Katsuki explains his side of things, and with Dabi vouching for him, Shigaraki decides to let him in. He can understand what it’s like to fall for hero society. He did for awhile too. Katsuki just needed more time on his own to realize that.

There’s an introduction period, the league is still figuring themselves out and most of them are hesitant to trust Katsuki. It’s about a week before he’s properly reintroduced to everyone and gets the sense that they’re not headed in any particular direction.

After that week, Katsuki decides “fuck that, I’m going to do shit, y'all are coming along” and since Shigaraki doesn’t really have anything better in mind, he decides to go along with Katsuki’s plans.

UA started panicking as soon as they realized Katsuki was gone, but nobody really knows what happened to him yet. Since he took all his stuff with him, all signs point to him having run away.

Izuku refuses to believe that, and most of the class holds out hope for awhile, but as no evidence turns up, more of them start to think it might be true and start discovering the amount of harassment and guilt he was facing.

There’s about a month and a half period in which Katsuki focuses on getting the league in shape. During this period, they do a forcible take over of the Shie Hassaikai.

Overhaul is killed, Eri goes under Katsuki’s care, and the league is established as a much more powerful force.

The Hero Commission is starting to get nervous, but not overly so. Not yet.

After this month and a half, Katsuki makes his first public appearance as a villain.

He’s in an updated version of his costume, most of it has stayed the same, but he’s added what looks like muzzle to the costume that covers his mouth. The muzzle actually functions as face shield/oxygen system so he can move at much faster speeds safely.

Katsuki’s villain debut is a full scale attack by the league on the Hero Commission directly. An event meant that the Hero Commission had gathered in a relatively accessible location, and the villains take advantage.

Importantly, Katsuki is enforcing a policy of limiting needless harm or deaths, because it ruins their message. The league reluctantly agrees, so they’re being a bit more careful than they were before. However, they’ve still got a hit list for this party.

The list consists of officials who they have confirmation deliberately manipulated polices or actions of heroes at the cost of people’s lives, all for some private gain. They do a lot of damage, and manage to kill 7 people on their list.

Katsuki’s first kill happens here. Previously, he’d managed to defeat Overhaul, but wasn’t quite able to kill him. He just wasn’t ready.

Shigaraki took care of it for him, and told him it was fine if he needed time to learn to kill. He was kind and understanding about it in a way that was genuinely weird to Katsuki. Not only because this was all about murder, but it was the first time in his life that he failed and an adult supported him rather than punishing him for his mistake.

At this event, one of the people he takes down tries to appeal to him by offering him a position as a hero to save themselves, and that pushes him over the line. He ends it quickly.

The league escape afterwards, and footage plus eyewitnesses confirm Katsuki was there, and he didn’t say a word to anyone he attacked.

UA, the Hero Commission, and the media collectively assume / sell the story of him having been brainwashed. It’s the only thing that doesn’t make them look horrible.

Aizawa has been weighed down by a lot of guilt during all of this. He should’ve done more, should’ve reached out, but he’d been waiting for Katsuki to come to him. He’s tried to find Katsuki, but Katsuki has purposefully avoided facing him in battle as Aizawa is one of the few people he doesn’t feel like he could hurt or allow one of the other villains to hurt.

The attacks start getting frequent over the course of another month, primarily targeting the people behind the scenes of the heroic’s system, with a lot of other targets of corruption along the way.

On his third attack, Katsuki has his first run in with Izuku, the first of any of his classmates to face him in battle.

Katsuki refuses to speak a word to him, despite the fact Izuku heard him giving directions to Toga, and the two clash.

Katsuki manages to pull ahead in their fight, but he’s distracted from their fight by someone caught in the crossfire. He diverts course to protect them. Izuku was so hyperfocused on Katsuki he didn’t notice the person. It throws him off enough that Katsuki is able to win their fight complete his goal.

After their clash, Izuku’s finally realized Katsuki isn’t brainwashed. Given what happened, he can only assume it really is Kacchan making all these choices, which leads him to reflect on why.

Between slowly uncovering what Katsuki was suffering through, and watching Katsuki’s actions and their very real impact, Izuku finds himself struggling with the idea of heroes as well. Most of Class 1-A and society as a whole really are.

Shouto & Izuku talk, and Izuku confirms that it really is Katsuki. Not a brainwashed version of him.

At the end of their conversation, Shouto assumes that because it’s really Katsuki, they’re gonna go join him. He defects, and is a bit surprised when Izuku doesn’t follow him right away.

Dabi almost has a heart attack over this, but he can’t really judge.

Shouto is accepted into the league after he and Katsuki talk and he apologizes for not having done anything. Katsuki doesn’t blame him for it, as he understands Shouto had no real sense of what was okay.

Eri gains a new older brother, and she could not be more delighted.

During this period, after the first attack, Hawks was sent in to infiltrate the league. Katsuki can smell the commission on him from a mile away, but tells Dabi to kind of let Hawks in anyways.

The league begins slowly working Hawks out of the Commissions control, before finally after about three months, Hawks realizes how shitty they are and defects properly.

A big part of this happens after Hawks finally comes to terms with the fact that Katsuki isn’t brainwashed, and after Hawks meets Eri and realizes how happy and safe she is with her new family vs how he felt at that age with the Commission.

By the end of that three months, a number of other class 1-A kids and a few kids from 1-B have dropped out of the hero course, or in some cases, UA entirely. The public at large has started to become more disconnected from the hero system as they start to see some of it’s major flaws. The Commission comes under more and more questioning and is seriously losing power.

During this same time, you’d expect to see an increase in crime, but you actually see the opposite.

Katsuki has been very careful and forged an alliance with the MLA such that they’ve been able to crack down on certain types of crime (domestic violence, quirk kidnappings, sexual assaults, etc) while also steadily funneling money into getting social services in theses areas.

This means that you start to see less crime, people feeling safer and more secure, even as the hero commission and system is crumbling.

All of this comes together after a year or two of solid in the form of the government submitting to a major reform driven by figure heads planted by the MLA, but only after the league manages to eliminate the last key figures standing in their way.

Since so many heroes have either fallen from grace, stepped back from the system, or been killed in certain cases, Izuku ended up as an unwilling symbol of peace due to his connection to Katsuki.

Izuku is tasked by what’s left of the heroics system with stopping Katsuki from killing the final major figure whose all that’s standing in the way of the reform.

Izuku, in the end, makes the active choice to step aside, giving Katsuki the key he was given to the room so Katsuki can get to the person to kill them.

Izuku finally decided that he’s had enough of this too, and he’s done defending a broken system based on ingrained ideals that don’t add up.

Aizawa is watching inside the room up in the rafters, he’s stayed a hero of sorts but still functions like he did before.

Inside the room, Aizawa had the chance to cancel Katsuki’s quirk and stop him from killing the person. Instead, he chose to close his eyes and let Katsuki go through with it.

Katsuki looks up to where Aizawa is once it’s done, and Aizawa realizes he knew he was there the entire time. He hops down out into the open and speaks plainly as he always did.

“I’m sorry.” Is all he can really say. There’s so much he’s sorry for. For not speaking up. For letting Katsuki be put through so much. For letting him be driven to this.

Katsuki looks at him for a long, long moment, before he finally looks away and shrugs his shoulders. For the very first time in years, he speaks to a hero. To the only hero who ever tried for him, even if it wasn’t enough.

“S'okay. The problem was bigger than you every could’ve fixed.”

“I should’ve tried. I should’ve done more.”

Again, Katsuki needs a moment to consider that.

“Yeah. Probably.”

There’s silence for a few moments, and then Katsuki’s radio crackles to life. Dabi’s calling him back.

They share one more glance, and Katsuki turns on his heel and walks out.

Aizawa watches him go. There’s nothing else for him to do. His right to change this story ended when he failed to speak up all those years ago.

#villain katsuki bakugou #katsuki bakugou #shouta aizawa #izuku mydoria #todobaku #the league of villains #dabi #shouto todoroki #tomura shigaraki #sif speaks #bnha #mha #this is a repost #thank you to alex for saving the text for me!#hopefully tumblr won't eat this one too

768 notes · View notes

ashbrea381writings · 3 years

Text

Fractals and Feathers: Chapter two, Information

“Colored cracks may appear in cases where a soulmate dies and is subsequently resuscitated.” Tim quoted as he sat back from the computer. “This happens frequently with heart patients and those in bad motor accidents.”

“Yes, but these are a lot of them… And they’re gold.” Damian commented with a sigh. “And Kent has mostly gold with a few red ones. It shouldn’t be possible for someone to die and be resuscitated that many times!” He began pacing around behind Tim, muttering. “There must be some kind of magic involved here, perhaps Mother is behind this, Grandfather always hated my wings, it could be some sort of magic they’re using to try and make me think my soulmate is dead, but it didn’t work right.”

“Baby Bird, that doesn’t explain Jon’s wings.” Dick commented as he walked in, removing his mask and wiping some sweat from his forehead. “Besides, I did some recon too, it seems like a few people who’s soulmates are in Paris have experienced the same thing. When they called their soulmates in a panic over the cracks that had appeared, they were told that there is a new set of Supers in Paris. And one of them has the power to reverse all the damage done by the Villain… Including death.”

Tim gave a groan, typing furiously as he tried to get past the firewall that kept rewriting itself. “I can’t get any info out of Paris. I even set my VPN to and address in Paris, but it somehow keeps blocking me.” He growled in frustration as a window opened on the screen previously just covered with code, showing a young woman with dark, blue-black hair in a high ponytail and a red and black mask over eyes that practically glowed blue.

“Will you stop that?!” She snarled in heavily accented English. “I don’t care who you are, but you need to keep your noses out of our business.”

Thankfully, Tim and Damian were still masked up, and Dick was able to turn around before the video fully opened. “We work with the Justice League, if people are dying repeatedly and are only brought back by magic it IS our business.” Nightwing responded in his best Batman impression as he turned around with his mask back in place. “I’m assuming that would be you who does this?”

“Yes, it is, and I would appreciate it if you and your superpowered friends stayed away from my city.” She seemed to set whatever the camera was attached to on a ledge, showing a stunning view of Paris behind her. “We have it handled here and we don’t need any of your friends making our jobs harder.”

“Isn’t your job to protect the citizens of Paris?!” Robin growled, stalking up to the screen and glaring behind his mask. “Yet somehow, those who we know have soulmates in Paris are suffering with the knowledge that their soulmates keep dying only to be brought back by some magic that might just stop working one day!”

“I don’t get a choice.” She responded, crossing her arms. “Hawkmoth won’t stop until he gets what he wants and I don’t feel like letting the world potentially end, thank you. We are working on his identity, but it’s difficult with the magics involved-such as the one that alerted me to your intrusion and prevents you from finding what you want.”

“And how are we supposed to trust you?” Red Robin asked, almost too casually for Robin’s preference, if the way his shoulders stiffened was any indication. “See, we have a couple people we know personally whose wings are covered in gold and red fractal patterns, and we’re awfully worried about people who have to sacrifice themselves that much. Especially since it obviously sticks long enough to make a mark, AND they all showed up within the last couple of weeks.”

“One of my team members is able to rewind time for a maximum of 5 minutes at a time, this allows the possibility of thousands of different aborted timelines, hence why the lines might show up multiple at a time. Because they might have died in a couple dozen of the timelines before we finally had a solution.” She sighed and pinched her nose. “We are up against a madman with a magic item that allows him to use negative emotions against us and make his victims do the dirty work for him.”

“Dirty work? What kind of dirty work?” Nightwing asked, frowning and crossing his arms in turn. “What does he want, exactly? And how does that potentially end the world?”

“He wants the magic items that myself and my partner use. The ones our team uses and that Hawkmoth and his partner use are from a set of them, I won’t tell you how many. Each has a different power, and the one’s my partner and I use happen to be the two most powerful, using the power of creation…” She paused and gestured to herself, glancing off screen for a moment. “And destruction, respectively.” She stepped to one side to reveal a young man in armored leather with cat ears on his head.

“When you combine them, you are able to make a wish. Would you trust the man who is willing to destroy Paris with such a wish?” The young man asked, his black and acid green wings flaring out as though in a threat display. “Or being able to use someone like Superman as a weapon?”

“How would that be possible?” Nightwing asked, “Also, since we will apparently be having a longer conversation than I expected, I’m Nightwing. These are Robin and Red Robin.” He added, pointing to them. “We would like to offer aid if we can, even from a distance if we needed to. I’m assuming that since you could connect to our computer with the magic you’re using, you could also exempt it from the magic.”

“That’s a bold assumption. I’m Ladybug, and this is my partner Chat Noir. While I could let you guys have an exception, I’m afraid I don’t see why I should trust you.” Her wings were also bristling, the red-and-black spots clearly caused by the magic they used just as Chat’s coloration obviously wasn’t natural.

“We are known for being detectives above all else. We don’t have powers, and one or two of us are even mentally well-adjusted enough that we could probably come to you guys without risking whatever happens with your villain.” Nightwing insisted.

“How about we come to you? Give us a place to meet with you in your city, we have a way to transport ourselves. I’d like to size you up before I give you any more information.” Ladybug countered, moving her hands to her hips. “I don’t trust that you’re nearly as well adjusted as you claim, I’m one of the most positive people on the face of the earth and even I have had to force myself out of mindsets that nearly got me Akumatized. It’s not as easy to avoid as you think.”

“What was that word? Akumatized?” Red Robin asked, frowning as he tried and failed to translate the word.

“It’s what we call it when someone has been taken over by Hawkmoth. He sends out a butterfly corrupted by magic and turns normal people into a villain. Once the Akuma -the butterfly- is purified the victim does not remember any of what happened while they were Akumatized.” The Bug and Cat pair exchanged a glance, making frustrated faces at each other.

“What was that look?” Robin asked, still angry that they weren’t giving him what he wanted. “The look you two had just now?”

“We… We’ll tell you after we decide if we want help from you.” Ladybug sighed. “I’ve added a way for you to message me on my device I’m using to talk to you, it’ll show up as an app on your computer. Don’t use it for trivial matters or I’ll just lock you out. Give me a time and place to meet, using my timezone preferably, and I will do my best to have both me and Chat be there to discuss matters further.” With those last, brisk words, Ladybug reached for her device and cut the call.

“Well, that was rude.” Red Robin huffed, picking up his phone to show Batman’s face in a video call there. “Did you hear all that, B?”

“I heard. Send coordinates for the top of Wayne Enterprises, for 9:00 pm Paris time tomorrow.” He instructed, sighing from his seat in the Batmobile. “We will all meet them there, let her know that myself and the three of you will be there.”

“Copy that, B. Sending the information now.” The young man typed quickly, double-checking what time that would be for them. “That’s the middle of the afternoon, are you sure?”

“Yeah, nobody has anything scheduled for tomorrow, and she sounded about the same age as Robin. With all that considered, I don’t know if they DO have civilian plans early the next day, so I’d rather err towards them having more time to sleep.”

Reading the return message, Red Robin began to chuckle. “They want to meet us at 4am Paris Time, as they already get up that early to do other things and missing half an hour or so wouldn’t be an issue.”

“Very well, if that’s part of their routine, we can handle that.” Batman answered, seeming interested to know what the heck had them up that early.

#mgi trope tussle #maribat #daminette #dc #miraculous ladybug #wing au #soulmate

89 notes · View notes

metamagic-adept · 2 years

Text

okay, so i haven't talked much about one of my pc's on this blog, but today was the end of Seti's (she/he) story. This was a character I really enjoyed conceptually, but struggled to get comfortable in at the table. I'd talked to my dm about finding an appropriate exit for her, and was thrilled with what he came up with (it honestly may have happened regardless of if i wanted to keep playing him or not.)

Seti is a human echo knight fighter/ armorer artificer multiclass. She is also cursed. His body has slowly been turning ethereal since his early twenties. This is not entirely unexpected, since one of his mothers, Ibis, suffered the same fate. Throughout her childhood, Seti watched her mother slowly disappear until their was nothing left. At the start point of the campaign Seti's entire hand and entire foot are ethereal, in addition to several fingers and toes on the remaining extremities. He had hidden this fact from his remaining parent to shield her from the pain of losing another person she loved to the curse.

His arcane armor functions as a prosthetic, replacing the ethereal limbs. The summoned echo looks like an ethereal version of himself. Seti served as a smith and soldier in a local militia during a renaissance-europe esq era of recovery and innovation. She was raised on ideals of ingenuity, honor, and community. Her build includes the heavy armor master feat and the pariah's shield (inherited from Ibis) which allows her to absorb damage for allies.

Seti's introduction to the campaign plot was heralded by a vision of Ibis, telling him, "If you wish to avoid my fate, you must walk my path."

Said campaign plot is a time travel game where the PCs were tasked by the last remaining member of the old guard of time travelers to continue their work, which consisted of collecting powerful artifacts from throughout the planet's history. These objects influenced the balance of order and chaos throughout the timeline and we were told our goal was to stabilize/balance it. Joining the team meant leaving behind our lives and times, possibly permanently since there was no guarantee time-shenanigans would leave the events of our lifetimes unchanged.

Seti decided to leave in hopes of either discovering the nature of her curse and reversing it, or at least getting to visit the future that he would never have lived to see otherwise. That is how she found herself at the Reliquary, a home base and pocket dimension outside of the planet's normal flow of time.

Here's some of what Seti learned after arriving:

Her mother was another member of the original party of time travelers, called the Pentavalent. Ibis's epithet was "of the Blessed Soul". At the Reliquary there were statues of each of the Pentavalent, but Ibis's had crumbled to rubble. The final member of the original Pentavalent who recruited all the PCs, a woman named Ember, said that the statue was like that because of a curse.

The rules of time and continuity are more flexible than first assumed, however some paradoxes can still have horrible consequences.

Ember had not been truthful about the purpose of the Reliquary or the fates of the original Pentavalent. Removing the artifacts from the timeline was secondary to the purpose of getting them to the Reliquary, where Ember used them as fuel for a magical quantum engine of sorts. Ember had betrayed the members of the Pentavalent who wished to abandon the cause.

When Ibis had told Ember that she was done and wanted to return to her life, Ember warned her that doing so would create a paradox, and the only way to avoid that was to kill and replace a past version of herself. Ibis had no reason to distrust Ember.

A creature on the ethereal plane showed Seti a memory belonging to Ibis of going back and killing another version of herself in Seti's childhood home. As soon as the sword falls from Ibis' fingers, she gasps as one of them fades into ether. Seti would have been about seven when this happened.

It is possible Seti could use time travel to go back and prevent his mother from killing the past version of herself. It is unclear whether this would create a paradox, and/or whether it would actually succeed in saving Ibis or Seti from turning ethereal since they had both existed outside of the normal timeline through their work at the Reliquary.

If you've read this far and want to know how Seti's story ended, click here for a more prose-y narration of her final session. Thanks for caring about my blorbo <3

#my pcs #seti steelsong #long post

6 notes · View notes

katytheinspiredworkaholic · 3 years

Text

WIP Wednesday

Title: Extraordinary

Pairings: HotchReid (more to come)

Summary: League of Extraordinary Gentleman/Vampire AU;

Within the FBI there is a specialized team full of an elite selection of people. Unique individuals with very particular skill sets. And their job is to take the unusual cases: the ones that need to not only be solved, but are undetermined if the unsub is human, or something else entirely.

In a world filled with Vampires, non-human creatures, and subspecies unknown, there is only enough information to have them vaguely regulated. Rules that are so easily, and violently broken, all while hidden in plain sight among the unsuspecting public. Unrivaled for eons.

That’s where the BAU comes in.

Official Posting Date: October 2021

Links: (Masterpost) (Snippet 01) (Snippet 02) (Snippet 03) (Snippet 04)

(TW/CW: dead body/crime scene, blood and bite wounds talked about in detail, hypnosis/compelling someone to do something against their will, overall discussion of murder (basically what we see in every episode of the show))

(the story so far/what you need to know for this clip at least: Absolutely nothing you don’t already know, this is legit from the first chapter. Hotch is a Vampire (although the LEOs don’t really know that), Rossi is a priest, Morgan is so empathetically telepathic he can touch the auras in the air, and Reid is Reid. I know I’ve been giving you the juicy HotchReid stuff but here have some case stuff too, to see what you’re in for with the plot and everything. This is FIRST DRAFT so it’s terribly unpolished, first part is generalized POV (hence the more professional titles) and the second is within the team dynamics so they get more familiar. idk my first drafts are messy and indecisive, enjoy anyway. 💕)

–

They approach the body and Rainer shoos away his pestering, hovering officers and --- winces once again at the sight of the bloodied woman. “This is the third body in two days; a jogger found her about 6 am. Coroner says she thinks she’s been dead for about 6 hours; killed in the middle of the night, just like the others.”

“Closer to five hours, I think,” Dr. Reid says, crouching down to look closer. All long legs and his gun looking too big on his belt next to his FBI badge. “Could still be within the Witching Hour, though.”

“Do you have accurate time of death estimates for the other two bodies?” Agent Morgan adds on, already picking up the train of thought Dr. Reid has started on. The detective pulls out an old-school flip notebook book and looks through it before answering.

“3:15am the first night, 9:30pm last night and now this.”

“Well that rules out hex, sacrifice, and spell gone wrong,” he concludes, as the other agents surround the body to inspect it from all angles. “So what are we thinking?”

“It’s a frenzied bite,” Agent Hotchner points out, looking from where he stands and not having to get as close as Dr. Reid to inspect it accurately. His eyesight is better than any microscope. “Shows multiple entries, it couldn’t get a good enough hold to rip her throat. Or she struggled, so it wasn’t strong enough to keep her pinned down.”

“The boys think it’s a Vamp,” Detective Rainer points out. “Maybe a baby one, still learning the ropes?”

“Vampire changes are regulated and no sire would allow whoever they turned to do this,” Agent Hotchner says, a colder flint to his voice that matches the way his dark stare cuts up to the detective. “No one has been turned in the United States in the past twelve years.”

“It’s not a Vampire bite,” Dr. Reid agrees, putting on latex gloves to further inspect the body and test the bite radius. “And it’s not a werewolf bite, either.”

“...Werewolf?” the detective says with a winded sound, eyes wide and looking to the three agents who didn’t even blink at the word. “There’s -- there’s such thing as werewolves?”

“Detective, I think you should let my team and I work, we will come to you with our findings and then help you track down your killer.” Agent Hotchner doesn’t leave room for argument, his dark brown eyes looking pitch black in the early morning light, and Detective Rainer… suddenly feels the overwhelming urge to walk away. Like he can’t breathe if he doesn’t comply; he fights it, tries to fight it, and feels his will crumble beneath him like a sand bank giving way under his feet. He turns, even that small gesture lessening the pressure crushing his chest, and takes a step away from the group, air swept into his lungs like a riptide. He makes a hasty retreat after that, winded as if he just ran up a flight of stairs and the sweet taste of oxygen being his only reprieve. He doesn’t know what happened, and wouldn’t upon further inspection until much, much later.

“That wasn’t very nice, Hotch,” Rossi points out with a look of glib reprimand towards their team leader. “I thought compelling feeble minded beat cops was for those who have no skills to avoid it.”

“My patience was running thin, and we need to move faster on this case before our unsub kills again. He’s escalating.” That much is obvious, by the timeline alone, but Father Rossi still gives him a side-ways glance that says he finds far too much amusement in the undead’s antics. “Reid, are you sure it’s not a werewolf bite? It would explain the lack of control and precision.”

“I’m sure,” Reid says with finality, and no one makes a mention on why. He had done more research than any human possibly could in the past few months on werewolf transformation and the after effects of attacks. With what happened to one of their former agents mere months ago, no one doubted his newly learned expertise. “It’s also not a shifter, or a ghoul. We can rule out ghost and poltergeist as well, no residue or temperature shifts.”

“Demon possession?” Morgan asks, looking to Rossi just as he does his customary Sign of the Cross at the mere mention. Can’t help the gesture, after his own past experiences. Giving anything the power of a name, even arbitrary, can be a dangerous thing.

“We can’t rule it out,” he admits. “The teeth marks are human, someone possessed would still have a hard time biting that deep and doing that much damage. Cannibalism is only reserved for the amusements of level three demons, however they aren’t usually powerful enough to reach the mortal plane or take possession of someone’s body. They would need help.”

“You really think someone would weaponize a demon like that?”

“We’ve seen people do worse things, as has history, but I’d like to hope it wouldn’t happen in my lifetime.”

“We need more information,” Hotch concludes, arms crossed and watching as Reid stands up and removes the blood stained gloves. “Morgan,” his gaze cuts to the tall man in his deep blue suit. “Can you walk the scene, tell us what you see?”

“Not with this many people around,” Morgan shakes his head, eyes glancing to every person within a twenty foot radius. “Too many readings, the aura field here looks like an oil spill. The only thing I can latch onto is…” his gaze is back on the ground, hovering over the dead woman, who would have no aura to speak of at all and therefore a blank canvas. He replaces Reid’s space, crouching down to touch the air over the bite wound. Fingers spread wide, less than a foot from her but not touching, palm suddenly curving as if over an invisible shoulder, the place where someone had once been not so long ago. It could have been the coroner, or the crime scene photographer, but with it being so close to the body -- chances were it was the unsub.

“They were crouched down, half on the ground, no… human thoughts that I can hear,” he says, closing his eyes and letting his hand glide through the air a little more, following the curve of someone’s spine and up their neck, resting where the head would be. “They have a fever burning them up, hot as a furnace--” he keeps his hand there too long, suddenly jerks it back as if it had physically burned him, then stands up again. Shaking off the aura reading still sticking to his fingers and the forefront of his mind. “Sound like anything you’ve heard of, pretty boy?”

Reid shakes his head, sharing a glance with Father Rossi. “We might have to go through some of your demonology books.” The older man grins wide.

“You just want to get your hands on them, at this rate you’ll have them memorized by next week.”

“Dave --” Hotch says slow, a reprimand of his own.

“Fine, fine, I’ll have Garcia send us some scans. If the Vatican knew I was putting a book like that in his hands they’d strip me of all my titles.”

“Didn’t they already do that?” Morgan teases with a grin.

“Ex-communicated. I got to keep the dog collar, the honorifics, bless the holy water, you know -- the party tricks.”

–

((if you want to be apart of the taglist just hit me up via comment, reblog tag, DMs or asks 💕))

#THIS IS JUST A SNIPPET #a really fucking long snippet but who's counting #I've missed WIP wednesdays #spooky season is upon us so I'm channeling that #a glimpse at how they handle cases that obviously don't look human #cw blood #cw murder #cw biting #paranormal stuff #sorry it's kind of all over the place but I got to play with Morgan's abilities and that was fun for me #Extraordinary #katyswriting #katyswip #wip wednesday #ALSO I DECIDED ON A POSTING DATE hope that doesn't bite me in the ass later lol

35 notes · View notes