#this also goes for six as well because the amount of people i see being rude about the aragon tour queens on the OFFICAL SIX TIKTOK

[montygatorguy]

theatre fans that hate on any cast of a show that isn’t the original are the bane of my existence. literally just shut the fuck up do you hate joy magic and fun and seeing different interpretations of characters.

[raytoebiter]

x. another life (written work)

You groaned, throwing your phone into one of the soft cushions.

To say that Scaramouche is a morning person was a complete understatement—that guy's a complete, abnormal morning freak. You're pretty sure he went to bed at around midnight and guessing from the times you've seen him prepare, he'd take at least two whopping hours to, what? contemplate which shade of color goes well for his Minecraft boxers?

Yeah.

That's how slow the asshole is. And listen, you're not one to judge; you're a morning person as well, but in fairness, it's mostly because you're still high from the adrenaline of doing a concerning amount of work before taking a short nap.

So, again, yeah. He's a fucking morning freak that you would absolutely not appreciate in your morning routine that requires the absolute of patience needed.

Clicking your tongue, you shoot a glare at your glowing device. One that could hopefully urge the phone to burst into flames.

Okay, bath. Bath. Bath.. bath.. bath..

–

“Three baskets of strawberries, thirty kilograms of flour, and that Letche brand of baking powder in..” you squinted, willing the memory out of the corner of your brain, “..in aisle three or seven. Just request three boxes of those, thank you.”

The man with the brown cap nodded, eagerly taking notes with the most worn-out pen you've seen so far, “that's it, miss..?”

You smiled. “Miss [Name]. We’ll be seeing each other more, I'm sure of it.”

“Got it! We'll have it delivered by.. presumably three days from now.”

Seconds passed by as the sounds of scribbles filled the air, until another man emerged from of the entrance, form shifting and awkward before the sound of chimes and an embarrassed voice shatters the silence, “sorry to bother you, but uh, um. Your coworker, I assume..? Your coworker is very.. aggressive, and I think he wants to go in. Inside, I mean. Here.”

Silence ensued as you stared blankly at both men, before recognition hits you like cold ass water.

How the motherfuck do I always forget that he exists, goddamnit!

You flashed the two men a customer-service smile, whispers of apologies on your lips as you rushed to the door.. and, lo and behold! The Beauty and the Beast: budget edition!

Said Beast snaps his head to you, an ugly scowl adorning his face, “calltime was 8:00AM. and it's 8:09AM. How hard is it for you to be punctual for once, you fucking–”

You sighed, eyes shutting to a close, “as you said, it's 8:09AM in the morning and it's still early. Can we save the yelling later in the afternoon?”

Your veins throbbed when a click of a tongue was all you could hear before a calmer voice replaced it once again, “yeah, whatever, fruitcake. Let's get on with it. Who were those people, anyway?”

He pats the metal part of his Beauty, slowly treading over to your side, “uh. just a few of those delivery guys. yeah.”

“‘s that so? Also, fucking gross. I can hear your saliva swirling around, shithead. Keep it down.”

“..Shut up!”

–

God.

This was gonna be an absolute comedian 12-Hour Shitshow. With the first guests being the poor two men having to witness the most atrocious altercation between two hard-headed rivals, especially the one with grape-hair.

A particularly idiotic expression coursed through your rival’s face, “no, that's why you don't need the three boxes of shitty baking powder, you dumbass! You have to finish the remaining ones in the pantry first!”

The man with the brown cap flitted his eyes to the Asshole, before going back to yours, “and as I've said, there's only two in the pantry! Two! We need more than just two, and there's barely any stores in here that sells that specific brand!”

“That damn thing is also about to expire.”

“No, it's not! We bought it just a year ago, in the highest quality!”

“Baking powders lasts up from six to eighteen fucking months! You're a barista slash baker, how do you not know that!?”

“Erm—”

“Eighteen! There's still six months left. And—”

“Fuck off with your mumbling shit. There's no need to buy lthree fucking boxes of baking powder to last you a year, you dipshit. You only need one!”

“No, we don't—”

“—Um, as much as we're enjoying this, uh. Conversation, I think we have to really get going, because um. We're running late. So. How many boxes, really?” The sheepish man put out a notepad, strikingly similar to the man with the brown cap that's now pulled down to his face.

Heat burned in your cheeks as you pinched the Asshole’s side, ignoring his utterly embarrassing squeak as you replied back, “Two. just.. two. Thank you.”

The two simultaneously and awkwardly replied, “got it!”

You and Scaramouche shared a glance as they scurried to the door, before it turned into a glare.

“That was your fault, by the way.”

“Was not.”

“It was.”

“If you hadn't made a comment on the baking powder, then this wouldn't have happened.”

Scaramouche scoffed, the snark so prominent it makes you nauseous, “oh, fuck off. you listened to me in the end, didn't you? kind of proves that you really needed my help.”

A snort left your lips as you approached him, arms folded, “kinda? shut up, I never needed it,” there was a harsh finality in your tone and you made sure to emphasize it as you jabbed a finger to his chest, “I survived 15 years without your help. And I sure don't need it now.”

And in response, Scaramouche all but blinked, shock morphing his expression before it contorted to one of mixed miniscule confusion and amusement, “ever heard of sarcasm, fruitcake? you're so easy to rile up.”

Your eye twitched. It's still 8:30AM. You open up at 9:00AM. 9:00AM..

Exhale, inhale.

“And that exhale, inhale thing you're doing is also pretty dumb, by the way.”

“Okay,” you were so close. so close to punching the asshole out of here. better yet, fire him and put the nastiest record on his file, but you know better than that. because, again, exhale inhale exhale inhale— “shut the fuck up, and turn over that damn sign. go parade out the streets since you're such a dollface, you goddamn asshole. maybe you should put that pretty face of yours to some use instead of using it for the ugliest shittiest fucking–”

“You think I'm pretty?”

What. The fuck?

Your brain short-circuits, as you blankly turn to him.

Scaramouche, the shit-eating asshole that he is, dares to even flutter his eyelashes. Eyeliner becoming more prominent amidst the pale expanse that is his face and by gods, you can only hope that the absolute nausea that's swirling in your stomach right now is reflecting on your face, because why in the goddamn fuck did he say it as if it wasn't an universal fact?

Yes, he's pretty! Of course, he is! It's like goddamn sky is blue, grass is green and Tighnari is head over heels for Cyno—so why the fuck is this hardheaded dickhead acting as if your flattery is anything different from the others!?

And after prolonged minutes of intense emotional whiplash between nausea, disgust, shock and acceptance, you reply, “no, you look like god’s abandoned piece of shit.”

He snorts, poise relaxing as he sits by one of the chairs, leg propped up over the other leg, “that's a funny thing to think about.”

“..Are you gonna do the damn thing or are you just gonna—”

“Alright, alright, you fussy shithole!”

–

It's only a short 30 minutes before you’re working on the counter again: swiveling through the counter, putting on the most customer-service smile, throwing an occasional ‘good morning’ to the elderly, and saying ‘hi’ to the chit-chat companion you sporadically talk to.

Except this time, this fucking time, there's a fucking twink bumping hips and asses with you in every turn.

Hey, listen, the café that your grandmother owns specifically intends to hold two workers minimum considering that she had this whole thing built for her husband that soon passed when you were younger. So, meaning to say, it's not particularly small. It's somewhat large if you consider it, but goddamn.

It's like every hit and bump is laced with ill purpose. But when you turn to him to reprimand him, his eyes hold the same sceptical annoyance as well.

(A gnawing thought itches at your skin, but you turn that shit off the second it appears, because it mentions quite the inappropriate thing. Hint: thing being ass.)

It's gotten so bad that by the time it hits an hour before lunchtime, one of the regulars asks the most atrocious thing.

“Um, not to offend or anything, but are you two.. dating?”

And.. that? Oh boy, did your composure nearly slip if it weren't for the hand that was aggressively on your head once again along with an insincere voice cooling the atmosphere down and basically talking in the undertone of, “fuck off and never say that again”.

Along the way of him explaining, which took 3 customers waiting in line watching the theatrical show of your expressions shifting from what to yes, he's right, his fingers slowly threaded through your scalp.

And, shit. It feels good. Like, really good. You'd rather die than ponder more over that though.

So, with renewed fury, you slap his hand away, cutting him off from the yet-still persistent customer who keeps demanding if you two were dating. Which is surprising because you're pretty sure it's been five minutes.

It's then that Scaramouche gently pulls at your ear and roughly whispers, “this guy wants to fucking date you, assshat.”

Your eyes imperceptibly widen, shifting from his to the man before you, as well as the five people behind who're so clearly tired and waiting for their daily dose of caffeine.

Customers aiming for the barista aren't typically common in your area, so this situation is a bit shocking.

A sigh left your lips, as you put out a stance, “is there a problem? There's a line waiting, you know.”

The man fumbles, as you check him out, “right! sorry.”

The moment ended as fast as it came as you tended to the customers, who still seemed a bit pissed by the whole event. By the time the clock hits an hour of lunch and the whole interior is swimming in delicate gold color, you can already feel the lethargy seeping into your bones as you slumped back against the chairs.

Watching customers wasn't really your thing since you particularly have a bad habit of overdoing it and glaring into their souls instead, but perhaps this time, it wouldn't be that bad.

A short few minutes passes by before the gasbag opens its mouth again, “stop glaring at the customers like that, fruitcake. You're gonna scare them.”

That nickname..

You rolled your eyes, “oh, shut up. They don't even care.”

“Look at that little kid over there, he's shivering under your glare.”

“You're schizophrenic, shut up.”

“Yeah, and my hair is green. Anyways, where's lunch?”

Your brows raised as you turned to Scaramouche, who's also currently leaning against the doorway of the staff room, “what lunch?”

He blankly stared at you, “what do you mean, ‘what lunch’? you self-destructive piece of shit.”

You gulp, “I don't.. eat lunch?”

And, silence. Only for a short minute though, because the gasbag can't really keep his mouth closed to save his life.

“Oh, fuck you. What do you mean ‘you don't eat lunch’? Is this why you go stupid after lunch breaks?”

A frown settled on your face as shame blossomed on your cheeks, “I just get busy! And, don't call me that. I still beat you on afternoon recitations.”

A snort, “beat me, my ass. your answers are always slurred.”

“..No, it's not.”

“Ask that little brunette friend of yours and find out.”

“You're such an asshole.”

“I'm so kind, I know. And, also,” an onigiri flew into the air as you stumble over one of the stools to grab it, “30-Minute break is over, assshat. I'll take over first and you better eat that shit, or else.”

Then, slam.

You eyed the onigiri on your hand with suspicion. It was [favourite flavor].

Your gut squirms.

–

The rest of the shift passes by as uneventfully, and as the inky dark finally looms over and the café is deprived of the usual nightly customers, the Asshole finally shows signs of weariness. And it's then that you make the mistake of commenting on it.

“Aw, Mr. Twink tired already?”

“Fuck off, I don't like talking to people.”

“Uh huh, weak ass.”

He glares at you, leg attempting to sweep over to yours but you evade anyways, “try putting on a facade and act like a suck-up bitch.”

Of course, he'd think like that.

“Well, you just—”

“—Do people usually come and ask you out like that?”

And, oh. Well, that's certainly unexpected.

Your gut squirms yet again, “what?”

Why does he care? Is he shitting me?

“Are you deaf, or what?”

“Why do you care about my love life, huh?”

His face drops to a comedic deadpan, all hints of curiosity dissolving, “And in what statement did I even state that.”

You stuck your tongue, “you implied it, not my fault.”

“And this is why you placed third in that ‘Comprehension Reading Regionals’, you know.”

Annoyance settles in your temples as you shove him by the shoulder, “the past is past, that was two years ago, get over it. and besides, i was literally–”

“Excuses, excuses.”

“Shut up! it's true, and hey, I can totally beat you up again if ever the regionals come up and–”

“Yadda, yadda, yadda. Just admit you suck at reading comprehension.”

“Not until you admit sucking on dick!”

That seemed to do the trick, considering the way that familiar scowl finally settles in on his face.

“God, I hate you. You're the reason I've been getting dick pictures in my dms.”

You scoffed, he had the nerve to complain, “at least you don't get death threats from crazy fangirls.”

and instead of an answer, you feel a sharp stab in your shin, and that stupid shit-eating smirk only widens before it leaves out of your eyesight in a very comical downward motion.

“Yeah, that's right. kneel under me, dipshit.”

“You sadistic shit,” you snapped as you did a sweep kick aimed for his shins, and surprisingly that did the job as the Asshole falls over to his ass with a ‘thump’.

A transient glance was shared in understanding before the Asshole grasped at your forearm and pulled you over down with him to have you in a quasi-headlock.

“Fuck..you—” pain blossomed in your knee as you whirled around to knee him on the stomach, a wince coming out of him as he let go of you.

A brief second passed with a glare before he attempted to pin you down on the floor, only to ultimately fail by missing one of your wrists which resulted in a jab in the forearm.

The process went back and forth.

There had been way too many instances wherein you and Scaramouche nearly went into a brawl in the middle of the classroom, art room, or even the canteen. But this? This was the official one. And fuck, are you glad that no one is in the café right now, lest they'd hear the concerning amount of expletives exploding in the air.

..And!

Sike. Turns out, the universe really, really does fucking hates you.

Faintly, the bell chimes.

Your head snapped to the front, as the Asshole shifted to get a peek at the entrance—and, boom, a small ball of greys appears and your heart jumps.

Fuck, it really was your grandmother.

Sending a quick survey at the man on top of you, whose pale face is currently decorated in ugly black and purple blotches, your instinct flies in.

Which was kicking him off, resulting in a concerningly loud thud with a groan. Which also did not help with your heart hammering in your chest and your breath hitching—

“What the fuck!?” He exclaims, and you swear to the flying fuck—

“Dear?” a velvety voice comes in, the door hinges creaking as it finally opens to the staff room and—

God, you wish you could take a picture of your beautiful grandmother’s face right now.

───────────────────⋆⋅☆⋅⋆───────────────────

|| previous episode - next episode. ||

───〃★tunes of your heartbeat masterlist

synopsis: in which your fate somehow gets entangled into a messy jumble between punk music in cozy cafés, intense rivalry, cherished yakults, parallelograms and quantum physics, competitions in contests and rainy days. or in other words; the universe seems to fucking hate your guts for whatever reason and decided to curse your love life with your awful crass emo twink-a-fuck rival. the question is; did the curse work?

taglist (50/50): @toekissers , @raineyun @localscarasimp , @potteraep , @shutingstar , @feiherp , @scaraenthusiast1 @dazqa , @wraithisd3adinside , @x-hihihi-x , @court-jester-stuff , @automaticpatroltragedy , @lalalaloveallmydays , @trulyylee , @jayzioxx , @featuredtofu @kazemiya @help-whatdoimakemyusername , @skyoverkill1 @phoenix-eclipses , @anqelkoz , @miyakomari @saechiro @franaby , @swivi , @vixialuvs , @heusalettle @kunikissr @yomishen @mywillt0live , @baldrapunzel @jiminscarmex @sushitushi , @liuaneee , @shynsgore , @mechanicalbeat1 , @marivaudages , @okukura , @azzumei @lucid1tty @iloveescara @usagiarchive @kyouzki @theunhingedmf @kangyeonie @mi2ukiss @bubblebellaz @eternallykira-143 @lumiicch

• featured song - im like a lawyer with the way im trying to get you off by fall out boy

• notes - meeEEEE AND YOUUUUUUUU SETTING ON AAAAA HONEYMOOOONNNNNNNNN give fall out boy a listen cuz GODDAMNNNuggghhh this song is an addiction i need it in my brain waves and also i think this song is popular in tiktok so i hope tjta helps UGGHHHH ME AND YOUUU SETTING ON A HONEYMOOONNIF I WOKE UP NEXT YO YOUUUUU

author's notes: how to quite literally force yourself to write? make a smau that has 60% writing in it. im not even joking dawg. but i love writing so😋😋😋 also can you tell im so ao3 style typa writing? i was gonna write more but then i realized that it's a goddamn smau hayss....

p.s - im passing the fuck out after this but oh my god we reached???? 700??? on the masterlist?? HELLO???? hello new followers omfmdkdndnd giggles okay stop

also totally-detailed schedule of the cafe shift:

Monday to Tuesday - Grandma and friends

Tuesday to Thursday - Hu Tao and granny friends

Friday to Saturday (interchanging) - [Name] and Scaramouche💜

afternoons to evenings in weekdays - double workers

mornings in weekdays - single worker

mornings to evenings in weekends - double workers

(ask to be added or removed)

[knavesflames]

hi!!! consider wandering into a gym and acting all weak so that pretty ladies will come up and offer to help you

i'm talking pretty ladies with ABS!!! dehya, clorinde, arlecchino, beidou, rosaria (take your pick, pookers)

i'm the weakest mf, i'd ask for a spotter to lift 5 lbs 😇 just to see the pretty women fr

Hi pookie!! I know you’re feeling down lately so I thought I’d try to prioritise this one for now😮 first post ever that isn’t Arlecchino based!! How crazy:0 time to give Dehya some well deserved love, I think..

Word count: 1181

Content: silly reader does not know the gym, dehya is a sweetie but also horny for reader, grinding on abs

Nsft utc!

When you walk into the gym, it’s more than obvious you are NOT a regular. Your appearance isn’t what gives it away (though it doesn’t help), it’s the fact you’re utterly adorable clueless with all the equipment. Even though you’re desperately trying to figure it out, nothing about what you’re doing is correct. From the way you struggle to lift a 4kg weight, to the way you aren’t even tall enough to reach the equipment that isn't the height of your waist or lower. You’re tiny. She feels bad for you in the beginning, and she does what no other woman in the gym does. She goes up to you, reaching to take down whatever equipment you need, spotting you even when you lift the smallest amount of weight possible. She sets the machines up correctly for you too, quietly letting you know that you’re doing it wrong. She doesn’t make it obvious, no, she knows how it could be embarrassing for you. You’re just so inexperienced.

She adores it. She’s been watching you since the day you started coming to this specific gym. Your tight clothes she knows you’re wearing to look more toned than you are. The way you struggle with every machine, the way you look around to copy other people’s motions. The way you stare at her when she’s training her muscles. Dehya is no idiot, not in the slightest, and you’re not subtle in the slightest. If anything, she enjoys the attention she’s getting from you, and she plays up to it. Lifting more than she needs to just to watch the rise and fall of your chest, grunting louder than she usually does to relish in the way your eyes glaze as you think of her grunting as she fucks you. She’s teasing you, and she loves every second of it.

So, she decides, after six long months, does she interact with you directly. Dehya, being Dehya, is just a little bored of watching you react so far away from her. She wants to hear your breathing, hear your muttered responses to her as she makes your mind go blank. You’re shy, though, she’s gathered that much, so she’ll be kind, she thinks. She’ll do it in a way that’s just as good for you both. Before she can think of what she’s doing, she’s tying her locks into a ponytail at the back of her head, careful not to put too much strain on the strands by her ears, and she’s calling out to you from across the gym.

“Hey, pretty girl,” she drawls, loud enough that your head whips around, your eyes wide at the idea of finally being noticed by the girl you’ve been pining over, the whole reason you’re going to the gym. “Come here and help me, yeah? Thanks, doll.”

You drop the weight you’re holding immediately (one you had strained to even pick up), almost scrambling over. You wait, bouncing your foot as you glance at her. You watch as Dehya moves into an exercise you’ve seen her do often, one you’ve always secretly (not so secretly, she knows) admired her doing. She lowers herself down to the floor before her eyes, blue as sapphires, focus on you again. “Sit here,” she pats the area around her hips softly, looking up at you expectantly.

“What?” You manage to splutter out words, looking at her with widened eyes almost in horror at the prospect. Only because you know immediately what’ll happen, and you already feel the coil in your stomach tighten at the idea. Somehow, though, you can’t resist from gingerly perching yourself on the side of her hip, only for Dehya to tut and shake her head with a grin.

“No, straddle me. I can’t exercise if I’m worried you’re gonna fall off, can I, doll?” She raises an eyebrow, just waiting, and eventually, you obey her, moving until your entire weight rests on her. She hums in approval, her hands finding your waist, her thumbs stroking the skin a little too intimately. “Good girl, see? God, you’re tiny.”

The words she says are breathless as she eyes you. She’s not ashamed either, the smirk on her face tells you that much, but a few seconds later, she’s using your body weight to do hip thrusts, grunting with every rep, enjoying your ever flushing face.

After a while, Dehya is past her usual rep count, and you know it, too, but she’s not stopping. She’s barely counting, and she’s more concentrated on the way her hands are squeezing ever so gently around your waist, and the way one of her hands is sliding towards your hip.

She knows it’s late at night, there isn’t anybody else here now. Everyone left a while ago, so she takes the chance. A risky move, and she does it anyway, faking innocence, like she has no idea what she’s doing. Her abs are already slick from the sweat continuously gathering, and despite you being clothed, she moves you gently towards her stomach. Her hip thrusts have slowed to a halt now, though, just to keep up the innocence she’s been feigning, she does another, but only to hide the way she ever so gently glides your clothed core against her abs.

She loves the way you gasp at the feeling of it, the way your lips part ever so slightly. So, she does the same thing. Three times, until her hip thrusts have stopped once again. No longer is she exercising, opting instead to make the pretty girl at the gym gasp and sigh in pleasure. Dehya eventually becomes more bold, one thumb tracing the band of your leggings, whispering sweet nothings about how wants to see you without them. Each word of hers, whispered with so much affection brings you closer and closer to whatever sort of cliff you’re approaching. Your hips? They don’t even need guidance from her anymore, they’re moving by themselves thanks to encouragement and praise from the woman below you.

“Good girl, just like that. Aw, you’re so tiny. So tiny you can move right across them, can’t you? You should come to the gym late at night more often.” She chuckles, moving you faster as you moan into the air. They’re stifled moans, but moans nonetheless, and her eyes light up the second she feels you trembling as your orgasm crashes over you in powerful waves. You grip her hand hard, and the hand that isn’t being crushed by your own comes to stroke your hair, her voice talking you through it.

“Yeah, that’s it. Come on, let it happen, yeah? It’s good, right? My favourite form of exercise.”

You cannot resist the abrupt, hoarse laughter that spills from your lips at her final comment. What an odd way of breaking the ice, you think, though the ice melted the second she gave you that first glance. Maybe you can employ her to be your personal trainer, or something. Maybe you can admit you only come to the gym for her, and invite her to your place.

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #58 – Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson

Introduction

Kim Stanley Robinson is one of those names I’ve been meaning to around to since approximately forever ago, one of the real Canonical science fiction writers I’ve always felt slightly ashamed I’ve never read (see also: Gene Wolfe). Ministry for the Future in particular is a book I remember getting an immense amount of buzz and downright hagiographic reviews when it came out, even well beyond the usual science fiction circuit. So I went into this with vague impressions and high expectations – which, as it always does, turned out to be a rather dire mistake.

I do not regret having read this book, but that’s on its merits as a cultural artifact rather than a work of literature. Which is to say, I think this is interesting more than it’s good. It’s more or less equal parts a (rather experimental) novel, a work of futurism, and a political manifesto – and despite being incredibly sympathetic to the latter project, I’m not sure it really succeeds at any of them. Which might just be because I’m reading it now instead of when it came out – it is incredibly of its time, in a way that’s genuinely impressively dated even just a few years latter, and which continuously took me out of it.

It was, at least, very formally interesting. The tiny chapters and constant bouncing between different areas of interest kept it from ever becoming too much of a grind, too.

Synopsis

The book is, roughly, a history of the struggle against climate change and to restore the biosphere to equilibrium, beginning with the signing of the Paris Agreement in 2015 and continuing over the next half-century so until the world has been nigh-unrecognizably transformed and victory in that struggle seems more or less assured.

It is, nominally, focused on its only explicit divergence from our own world before the book was written (so, somewhere in 2017-2019) – the titular Ministry, a subsidiary body created by the Paris Accords to pursue and safeguard the interests of future generations – at first this is basically conceived of as a meaningless goodwill gesture by most of the really powerful people agreeing to it. But after a monstrously deadly heat wave across South Asia kills tens of millions of people in a matter of days, more and more people around the world start to wake up to the necessity of drastic action.

Over the next generation the Ministry plays a major (though less so than you might imagine) role in the transition of the world to a sustainable and just future, and the book follows both their efforts and the changing conditions around them that make any of it possible.

The story is told through a dizzying variety of perspectives – there a couple of what you might call protagonists (the minister for the future herself, a Scottish aid worker caught in the heat wave who barely survives and spends the rest of his life failing to cope with PTSD), but they occupy what has to be much less than half of the book. The rest is short persuasive essays, meeting minutes, anonymous vignettes from everyone from an Antarctic research scientist-turned-geoengineer to a de facto enslaved miner in Namibia, and odd little prose poems from the perspective of ‘the market’ or ‘photons’ or similar. It’s all mixed together quite thoroughly – few chapters are more than six or seven pages, many much less, and each new chapter marks a perspective jump. It’s a fascinating reading experience, if nothing else.

Taken As A Novel

...The Ministry for the Future is just not a very good one.

Partial blame goes to I think the very admirable instinct to avoid making some select group of technocrats and activists the Protagonists of History and instead try to maintain something like a global perspective. But the unfortunate reality of it is that the world is very big, and even at 500 pages the book is comparatively quite small. The result is that this is a story where the overwhelming majority of the plot is told in the passive voice, exposition relaying how trends never before mentioned and institutions not yet introduced are conveniently doing this or that to help fix the world, and then rarely if ever mentioned again. One wonders why the titalur Minister was chosen as a protagonist at all, given how the vast majority of her narrative could just as easily been filled by another other ‘life-on-the-ground’ level perspective (her great contribution is convincing the assembled centrall bankers of the world to do something about two thirds of the way into the book).

Also – while the instinct to avoid making ones main characters the perfectly agentic and hypercompetent engine of history is certainly admirable, it’s rather undercut by then still having one of those, but just giving us no real insight or perspective into it.

The mystique of the shadowy, untouchable terrorist syndicate has a powerful hold in the minds of action and science-fiction authors, and Robinson is apparently no exception. The energy transition in the book is greatly sped up by a near-omnipotent ecoterrorist movement that, through everything from sabotage and assassination to drone strikes and missile barrages, (literally) decapitates the entire fossil fuel industry and destroys so many planes and cargo ships so as to cripple the global airline and shipping industries. I’ll leave aside plausibility (for now) – but it just seems so self-evidently obvious that these are the main characters of the story. But with the exception of a single anonymous vignette, the story refuses to ever give the people involved names, faces, or personalities, nor dive into the whys and hows of specific operations. It’s quite frustrating, all the moreso because it feels like the author just saving himself the work of figuring any of that out.

Our two ostensible main characters themselves also just feel like – not a wasted opportunity, but definitely one more could have been made of? The world changes dramatically, almost unrecognizably, through the course of the novel, but their lives really don’t. Here and there sure, there’s not nothing, but the overwhelming majority of their pagecount is spent living what could very easily have been somewhat atypical lives in contemporary Switzerland. Despite all the talk of a ‘super-depression’ and the crippling of global trade, no shortages ever particularly affect them, no natural disasters touch ther homes. A lot of Mary’s chapters really just kind of read like tourism ads for the country Robinson clearly fell in love with at some point.

Taken as Futurism

Which is to say, taken as an exploration of how the world might actually develop, and a plausible prediction of the future based on current trends. Which, given the sheer amount modern frontier technologies, economic and political theories, and just general social trends are all discussed (not to mention a great deal of the breathless marketing and reception it received) the book is clearly trying to be. And which – woof, it does not work out.

The book is full of generational political upheavals occurring mostly because it’s a dramatically convenient time for them to. Most glaringly, the cataclysmic heat wave that sets off the book’s plot also conveniently utterly discredits the BJP and leads the landslide election of an entirely fictitious political movement across all of India, who then spend the next decades dramatically transforming the nation’s politics and economy with unbroken success and to a reception of thunderous applause. There’s no characters with names or faces actually involved in this, no more than a couple paragraphs of encyclopedia-like exposition devoted to it, but it’s the example and engine the whole rest of the book hangs on. The transition of the African Union to a powerful and legitimate supernational entity and the granting of permanent autonomy to Hong Kong (and much of southern mainland China why not) are even less dwelt on.

Now, this all could be excused as just the inevitable causalities of trying to write a book with a global scope – and I am sympathetic to that. But to begin with, I know just barely enough about the politics and the economics of a lot of several of the places touched on or used as dramatic examples to see how surface level and implausible the predicted changes are, and I can’t help but think it’s probably a similar story with all the other lightly touched on placed I don’t know much about (I remain agnostic on the accuracy of the geoengineering and carbon-clearing technologies projected, except that a lot of them suspiciously amenable to a single coherent aesthetic of the future).

More damning, to me at least, is the matter of agency – only the ‘good’ people seem to possess any of it. The conservative opposition exists as this vague, undifferentiated mass – standing athwart history and slowing things down in vague ways, but never really vital or active, never a danger to the political movements that have won or the progress that has been made. There are references to xenophobia and anti-refugee sentiment, but despite a refugee crisis that makes that of the 2010s look like a rounding error, it never leads to any really dangerous political backlash. Given how the world’s actually trending, the book’s vision of politics goes beyond optimism and into outright delusion.

This is especially true for how the book conceives of violence. Political violence is, in the book’s telling, near-universally the province of the ecological Left (with the exception of two events that provide excuses for dramatic set-pieces but fail to actually achieve anything at all). As mentioned above, seemingly omnipotent and untouchable eco-terrorists assassinate dozens of hundreds of the global elite for their crimes against the planet, destroy so many jet liners and cargo ships to force the adoption of new transportation methods, and sabotage so many coal- and oil-powered plants they help force the abandonment of the as fuels. They do this with no real blowback or reverses, no ruthless campaigns of state violence breaking apart the networks or destroying the infrastructure, no loss of public support from the disruptions in food and fuel their attacks would cause – it is not a realistic vision of what ecoterrorism might look like in the coming decades, it’s a plot device in the form of Robert Ludlum villains with no action movie secret agents around to stop them.

As a Political Manifesto

Which is, after all, clearly the real motivation behind the book, and the reason it received as many accolades as it did. It’s also where the book is easily at its most interesting – if, tragically, rather incoherent. Which might be me holding it to a higher standard than is fair but look, there’s only so many essays extolling the failure of the market or the coming obsolescence of war or whatever you can put in your book before I start holding it to the standard of actual rigour.

Mostly it feels like the book is undercut by its commitment to relentless optimism and need to jump around – a great deal of the book is spent giving the most positive possible gloss on particular phenomena or institutions from across the world in a paragraph or two, then say it needs to be scaled up on a national or global scale with no further thought or consideration of costs. Even when it’s not wrong it just feels unserious.

The subject the book spends the plurality of its time on – the main thrust of its program, if anything is – is economics and monetary policy. The great project of the Ministry is convincing the assembled central bankers of the world to create a new currency – a ‘carbon coin’ minted as a reward for sequestering or preventing the removal of a single ton of carbon for at least a century, with a guaranteed minimum value and appreciation over the same period – which would in time replace the us dollar as a global reserve currency and medium of exchange. The arguments around which are frustrating, because they go from plausible and compelling to wildly optimistic to the social science equivalent of star trek technobabble and back again without warning or any detectable pattern. It’s an interesting idea, at least, though one you get the sense is being imperfectly relayed – and the arguments for why the uncrowned monarchs of the global financial system would actually agree to it just aren’t convincing in the least.

Given the amount of times the book uses standard progressive language about how vital empowering minorities, women, the traditionally excluded and so on is to the fight to save the planet, it’s honestly kind of amusing the degree to which the big dramatic set pieces involve appealing to the conscience and principles of the most embedded representatives of The System imaginable. Running through the book are both a disdain and dismissal of economics as a field and a strongly felt technocratic sensibility and desire to have seasoned experts at the helm managing their areas of expertise – it can never quite decide whether bringing the world’s central banks under increased political control is something to be fought for, or a threat to hold over the bankers heads to get them in line and focused on the important task of creating a de facto world state (the quasi-utopia envisioned at the end of the book could just as easily be the globalist dystopia from any conspiracy theorist’s screen with no changes but the valence of the adjectives used to describe it).

It’s more peripheral, but Robinson’s clear affection for the nation of Switzerland and continuous praise of its many virtues in both politics and society does clash a bit with, well, reality. It’s weird to go from a chapter about needing to abolish tax havens to talking about how enlightened self-interest has left the Swiss government entirely behind the mission of fighting climate change.

A Product of it’s Time

Is a weird thing to call a book written barely more than five years ago, I’m aware. But it’s honestly kind of shocking just how aged and dated the book feels, reading it in 2024. Despite just everything I’ve written above, I’m trying not to judge it as harshly as I might, because I feel like I’d have been much more generous if various things didn’t keep taking me out of it.

Some of them are things that can’t really be held against it – the passages about Russia and it’s relationship with Europe reads as almost comical now, to be sure, but so does every sci fi book in the ‘80s talking about the USSR – but that doesn’t mean they don’t hurt the feeling of reading the history of the future. The book was published in October 2020, so the complete non-mention of not even COVID specifically but just any pandemic or major disease outbreaks feel positively unreal.

Other things are less the book already being falsified by history and more just seeing what turned out to be pretty transient intellectual fashions immortalized in print. Seeing a serious, celebrated book talk about the revolutionary potential of the blockchain to create a democratic new economy is enough to turn a hair grey. And on a less extreme level, talking up Modern Monetary Theory as this revolutionary hack of solve economics just feels so very incredibly pre-pandemic.

Too Long; Didn’t Read

Not angry I read it, but more because writing this review was fun and engaging than for its merits as a work of art. Can’t judge it too harshly, given that the task it set for itself is basically impossible – but Robinson’s written enough books that he probably should have known that before he started it.

The set piece at the beginning of someone living through the dead heat wave was incredibly compelling drama, at least.

[rhymeswithchronic]

WELL LETS GET INTO IT THEN

Since I’m not sure if I could make a one shot out of this-

Here’s the vision: Every player spawns in with a pokemon. This is their partner. The player and their pokemon are the same age, spawning at the same time. Their partner pokemon isn’t always their ace pokemon, but it usually is. There’s something unique about some people’s partner pokemon though.

See, rarely, there’s a player that spawns with a legendary or mythical. Because of the sheer amount of potential power in these Pokemon, these players are often killed as soon as they spawn. Very few actually get anywhere.

Evbo spawns in with a Jirachi.

A Jirachi with 0 IVs, with no knowledge of how to train it, and it has one move: Wish.

They’re bonded though, and Evbo really doesn’t care about the fact that she has no attacking moves. He loves his silly little pokemon even though she totally defenseless and encourages his bad habits (come on, they’re bonded, of course she encourages his bad shopping habits to the max)

Tabi plans on attacking him, but as soon as she sees this pathetic little pokemon she can’t help but take pity and gives him a single pokeball to catch something that actually can defend itself.

He returns with a level 1 Treecko.

“I told you to get something that can FIGHT!”

“She can!” Evbo insists. “She knows tail whip AND tackle.”

Tabi shows off her partner pokemon- a Swellow that basically stays constantly perched on her head. Watching. She trains him in the way of type matchups.

So from then on, as soon as Evbo realizes there is actually a chance for him to fight, he finds himself hoping against hope that he’ll be able to survive a little longer. Cant die too early or else he won’t find out anything!

Maybe hope is the wrong word. I guess the proper word is he *wishes* to live.

From there, things progress as usual. The Guard’s partner is a Kleavor, Parrot’s a Chatot, and PrinceZam has a Pyroar. Evbo collects Pokemon that he thinks are cute or cool looking, which ends up with him getting judged even harder because he ends up with an entire team of grass and fairy types. Better than a monotype, but not by much. His Jirachi remains incapable of fighting for itself but never leaves his side, but that also means he forever has his Treecko hanging from his shoulder and Jirachi hovering somewhere next to him.

Upon being imprisoned, his entire team is taken away from him except his bonded Jirachi. The Guard ends up keeping them safe for him. You see, Jirachi is called the wish maker for a reason, and it’s because of the wish that she granted that Evbo can respawn.

She granted his wish to live.

Whenever he goes to the Gold Level, the guard gives him his Treecko back, which the Diamond Swords very avidly help him train into a perfectly EV trained Sceptile.

Yada yada, he escapes with Tabi in tow, Diamond Sword level, etc etc, but when he finds himself face to face with Tabi for the last time, he prepares himself to fight her Swellow, knowing it’s her strongest pokemon.

Only for him to realize that her entire team was a lie. She’s an experienced trainer, of course she has more than just six Pokemon stored away. And as she pulls out her real team, Evbo realizes with horror that she has developed and trained this team over the course of them knowing each other with the express purpose of countering his.

Her partner isn’t even a Swellow.

It is a perfectly trained, max IV Corviknight.

Against his grass/fairy dueltype team.

He never stood a chance.

[midnightemy35]

Walkis Six Headcannons Part2

THE BRAINROT IS TOO MUCH

Link to part 1

warnings!: slight manga spoilers! Fluff and crack

Malcom is the designated bug catcher

It's really funny to watch the group freak out when an insect flies into the room. Galuf had passed out when the insect flew in through the window that was right next to his face. The insect had flown right in front of his face and he could see its beady little eyes staring right back him

Lévis is using Galuf's unconscious body as a shield and Domina is hiding behind him. Kenny (who is also freaking out even with his lack of facial expressions) is trying to freeze the insect but Charles is yelling at him to not kill it because his mom taught him that all life is precious (Charles himself is hiding under a table)

Then Malcom walks in and gently cups the insect between his two hands and releases it outside (quite anti-climatic really) while the whole group hails him as their saviour (except Galuf who is still unconscious)

The group has sleepovers every Friday night so that they can goof off the whole night. The dorm room used is rotated every week and currently it is Charles' room and everyone is slightly unnerved by the number of painting he has of his mom

They usually play card games and gossip during these sleepovers but some card games have been banned due to previous incidents

One of these card games is UNO. Domina almost went on a rampage after being hit with a stack of four +4 cards. Charles had to teleport him somewhere else before he flooded the room all the while Lévis and Galuf were laughing their heads off

Domina and Levis are scarily good at old maid. The both of them are experts in reading people and manipulating them into taking the old maid card

Kenny is that one quiet kid that hangs at the back of the class and mostly goes unnoticed, so he has a front row seat to most of the drama within Walkis.

Lévis has a shit ton of connections within the school (chief of magic bureau’s son) so he’s got eyes and ears all around the school and the amount of tea he gets from this is astounding

Have you ever seen a group of six teenage boys sitting around in a circle shit talking almost everyone in the school? It’s so entertaining. There’s so much going on, everything is happening all at once and somehow all this drama is connected in someway.(god i want to join them so bad. I love listening to drama going on at my school but i don’t have the social skills to find people who are willing to spill the tea)

The gang like to play with Lévis’ hair(he surprisingly lets them). Domina usually just combs it out. Galuf is trying all sorts of weird ass hair styles and getting knots in Lévis’ hair (Lévis absolutely beats the shit out of him for that). Charles can do some basic hair styles like braids and ponytails but nothing really special but he likes to tend to Levis’ hair anyways (reminds him of when he used to play with his mom’s hair) Kenny and Malcom are surprisingly good at hair styling and often braid his hair and put it in really elaborate and pretty hair styles (where they attained this knowledge? We might never know)

One time, for April fools, the gang snuck into Kenny’s room and replaced his beanies with beanies with weird designs. One had bunny ears on it, another had one of their teacher’s face just printed on it, and another was neon green and looked like it was radioactive.

Kenny found it funny and kept all of them. He wears them to go out sometimes just to throw people off

The gang has once used Kenny’s magic to recreate Elsa’s frozen castle (does Elsa exist in this world? It does now). Charles’ then recreated the whole ‘let it go’ song and he looked majestic in the dress. He’s a surprisingly good singer as well

Once when they were walking around in the woods (searching for ingredients for potions class probably) they came across a lake and Malcom accidentally bumped into Domina and he fell into the lake. Everyone was laughing at Domina until he decided to retaliate by using his magic to drench them all as well. (Galuf ended up catching a cold)

Lovie isn’t as angelic as the gang mostly believes he is. Lovie is actually a really good manipulator. You know how Lévis did the whole thing of tricking Galuf? Yeah well he learnt his manipulating skills from someone and it’s his brother. Lovie doesn’t really manipulate others all that much but he will do it to secure his own interests but he probably won’t manipulate his or Lévis’ friends

[monosanimegenericzone]

Hunter x Hunter: Specialist Scarlet Eyes idea 1.

@masakuterarr <- what have you done to me

long post ahead and a lot of copium.

so back on my kurta shal bullshit in the hypothetical that he does have full scarlet eyes. what does that mean? well ill tell you.

according to togashi the scarlet eyes give the user a massive boost in aura and kurapika created a condition called emperor time to make himself a specialist and give him control over all 6 categories of nen.

and guess who (in this scenario) has scarlet eyes and knows how kurapika works.

shalnark.

now this is assuming two things: one, pakunoda scanned killua and has the memory of kurapika's hatsu explanation in full detail, meaning she transferred it to shalnark and the other five founding members before she died. two, the scarlet eyes grant an equal amount of power to every kurtan who had them.

ok so. scarlet eyed kurta shalnark right.

he has never used his scarlet eyes for nen related purposes because he has conditioned himself to hide them by containing his emotions to such a degree its scary. he probably doesn't even know about the power boost until pakunoda memory bombs him.

that being said, before greed island is introduced, he begins to entertain the idea that he could possibly use the specialist's power. what for you might ask?

to bring back the dead :)

there are a lot of things shalnark can use this power for, but he's just come off of mourning uvo and then witnessing paku drop dead in front of him. and now chrollo is suspended by a nen curse.

so on one hand, he could move forward and develop an ability that could remove nen curses. become an exorcist type and use his power to outright crush the curse.

but on the other hand. he can go backwards and undo the mistakes of the yorknew and make things right by starting where they first went wrong.

and so he decides to be selfish.

first its a struggle to remember how to make his eyes go scarlet and then the practice of harnessing that excess aura to replicate kurapika's specialist typing.

the first step goes easily because despair is the best catalyst for powerful emotions and as i said above. he's fuckin depressed as hell. so for the first time in a long time, shalnark lets himself cry.

and it works, his eyes turn red and he's got a massive boost of aura and efficiency in all six nen categories. (he doesn't name it like kurapika because he puts more effort into the following hatsu)

life and death are very much within the specialist category (see 2nd prince Camilla) so he'd be tapping mostly into specialist abilities. however, he also borrows from conjuror, emitter and a little touch of transmutation. to bring someone back youd need a lot of things so he needs access to almost all at once.

now comes the conditions. he has three modifiers that could help make this process more efficient. Emotion and Time. and then the necessary Life. Life for life is the rule of nen, especially when working backwards.

so his first two conditions are:

The dead must have died six months ago. (exactly 180 days) the further away from the exact time and date the more aura he spends.

the dead has to have been mourned by 10 people or more. as in the living have to make a gesture to express the loss of said deceased. and all 10 have to still be alive.

these are weak conditions but they're a good start. the time gap is to make up for lost time. by the time he starts making this hatsu it's been a month since the two spiders died and by his estimate he will need at least three more to perfect this to maximum efficiency. that being said, making the time sink universal is good for simple consistency.

the mourning part is using external emotions and ensuring that the deceased is worthy of coming back to life. since life wouldn't be returning to him, he would require more people than just himself.

third and fourth conditions quickly follow:

3. the dead has to have an appearance detailed enough to reconstruct with conjuration.

4. the last person who saw the dead has to say their name within two hours of the resurrection.

the third condition is simply applying conjuration techniques. and since shalnark is a nerd he probably has a good knowledge of human anatomy stored somewhere and paired with nostalgia he can ensure he can visualize his targets.

the fourth has a double function. one, it sets a time limit and two it implies that the killer has to remember who they had killed. this one is the really powerful condition that grants him a hell of a lot of power from if he can pull it off.

however, it's not enough and he still has to address the last modifier: life

5. however long it takes to complete steps 2-4, shalnark sacrifices 1 hour from his lifespan for every minute it takes. therefore, he can sacrifice a maximum of 120 hours or 4 and a half days of his life every time he does this.

6. two people that meet requirement 2 must be killed by shalnark and the resulting residual aura will be channeled through black voice and into the target.

by sacrificing two lives and a part of his own, he now has the Life required to return life.

the reason he has all of these clumped together is so that he can simply pull one trigger when all requirements are met. its a lot of setup but it could work.

he bundles it all up nicely under a fully realized hatsu five and a half months after working on it: Bleeding Heart - the Six Amendments of Death.

and of course he gets mad eepy after using all this bcs even with all those restrictions he is not fit for this.

this is one idea of many. the possibilities are endless. this is a certified nen nerd post

[misc-obeyme]

unchained - chapter two

masterpost read the chapter on ao3

recommended music: Seven Devils by Florence + The Machine word count: 2526

GN!MC x Arsenios [demon OC] a/n: The brothers all make an appearance in this chapter. And then there's a TIME SKIP lol. Because I just wanted to skip ahead to season four, so that's what that's about. Things get more interesting after this chapter, but the real action doesn't start until chapter six. Warnings: Lucifer being a little threatening, but that's about it lol.

You were sitting at the dinner table with the brothers, not really listening to the argument of the night, when you interrupted them.

"Hey, do you guys know a demon named Arsenios?" you asked.

Everyone stopped talking.

"Who doesn't know him?" Mammon asked. He had a genuinely perplexed look on his face, as though this was a strange question.

"I mean I don't know him personally," Belphie said. "That's what you mean, right, MC?"

"Well, I guess just anything you know would help," you said. "Is he famous or something?"

"Not exactly," Mammon said.

Asmo leaned forward across the table. "He's in a band, MC," he said. "That's how most people know him! They're called Angel's Temptation."

"Like the flower," Satan added.

"Right!" Asmo said. "They play at The Fall sometimes. Arsenios is the lead singer and guitarist. He's amazing, of course, it's kind of his thing. I can take you to see them sometime if you want!"

"He also plays the piano at Cafe Lament," Satan said. "I've seen him there a few times."

"It's more like background music, though," Levi added. "But he is really good. He must have amazing hand eye coordination. I bet he's really good at playing video games."

You blinked. "Okay, so none of you actually know him personally," you said. "You've just seen him around."

Asmo looked offended. "Please, MC! Arrie is one of my fans! And as such, I have made the effort to let him meet me personally!"

"Wow, how nice of you," you said, smiling.

"I've met him, too," Mammon said with a shrug. "He goes to RAD so it ain't like we haven't all had classes with him at some point. Me and Asmo have hung out with him a couple times."

"Let me guess," Levi said flatly. "You owe him money, too?"

Mammon sat up straight. "No! 'Course I don't!"

There were a lot of general sounds of disbelief from the table at large.

"I've met him," Beel said.

Everybody looked at him in surprise.

Beel shrugged. "He's friends with Barbatos. I've seen him at the castle a few times when Luke invites me over to try out his baking."

"I have met him as well," Lucifer added. "In a similar situation."

"You don't like him," you said to Lucifer, picking up on the disdain in his words.

"I don't know him well enough to say," Lucifer said. "He only attends RAD because Barbatos asked him to. My understanding is that he doesn't care much for school."

"I get that," Mammon muttered.

"Maybe I'll go to Cafe Lament sometime," you said. "I'm curious about him."

"Hang on, MC," Asmo said. "I saw you with him at the dance! You obviously know him, too!"

"I don't know him very well," you said. "I was curious, that's why I asked."

"You were at the dance with him?" Satan asked.

"He saw me there and asked me to dance," you said with a shrug.

Mammon suddenly gripped your arm. "Did ya dance with him?"

You tried to shake him off, but found yourself unsuccessful. "Maybe I did, so what?"

"You ought to be careful, MC," Lucifer said.

His voice was serious and his tone caused everyone at the table to fall silent. Even Mammon let go of you and quieted.

"Why?" you asked.

"I don't know Arsenios's entire story," Lucifer said. "But he is dangerous. From what I've heard, he spent a considerable amount of time in the human world, making pacts. He seems to be retired now, but ancient demons like him see humans as prey, not friends."

This made you shudder a little. You hadn't considered what kinds of things Arsenios may have done in his past. He was nice to you, but what did that really mean?

"I'll be careful," you assured Lucifer. He seemed content enough with this response.

You questioned Asmo further after dinner. While it seemed he and Arsenios were friends and had spent some time together, he didn't know anything more than what Lucifer had said. Apparently, Arsenios wasn't exactly forthcoming with information about his past. You didn't really hold that against him, but it was something you would keep in mind.

-

After the dance, you had so much going on, you weren't able to focus on anything else. With Lucifer losing his memory and the chaos of your magic and the ring, you were simply trying to make it through each day.

Soon enough, you found yourself preparing to return to the human world. You had only days left now that you had the Ring of Light to control your magic.

In a moment where you had a little time to yourself, you found yourself in the House of Lamentation's garden. You were simply sitting, thinking about everything that had happened.

Your mind wandered back to the dance, remembering the way Arsenios had kissed the back of your hand. You wondered what he was doing. You had ducked into the darkened dance hall when you had a chance, but it wasn't often. You hadn't seen him at all recently.

Your thoughts might as well have been broadcasting a signal of some kind because the demon in question made an appearance on the path to the House of Lamentation's front door, right where it connected with the cobblestone street outside the gate.

He stopped when he saw you, surprise in his eyes. And then he smiled, slipping into the garden by opening the gate as little as possible.

"Hey, MC," he said.

It was exactly what he had said when he first found you at the dance.

"What are you doing here?" you asked, which was exactly the first thing you said to him when you ran into him at the Demon Lord's Castle back in your first year in the Devildom.

Arsenios sat beside you on the bench. "Looking for you."

You were surprised to hear this, but you waited for him to elaborate.

Arsenios leaned back against the bench. "You know you're the talk of the Devildom? Again?"

You frowned. "I didn't know, but I'm not exactly surprised."

"They're saying you wear Lucifer's Ring of Light now," Arsenios said.

You lifted your hand so he could see the ring, snug around your finger. It glinted slightly in the Devildom starlight.

"Do you feel like the ring that connects the worlds?" Arsenios asked. His voice was quiet, but you could hear an underlying pain in it.

You put your hand down and twisted the ring slightly. "I don't know. But I'll do my best to help with uniting them."

Arsenios chuckled softly. "You and Lord Diavolo. He's eternally optimistic about it. I'm not so sure."

"You don't think it will work?" you asked.

Arsenios shrugged. "I think there's a lot of pain and prejudice to get through first. Anyway, I came by because I wanted to see how you were holding up. You look like you're doing all right, though."

"You were worried about me?" you asked.

Arsenios stood up and turned to face you. "Sure," he said easily. "Can't I worry about the human that always listens to my music?"

You shook your head a little. "Don't underestimate me."

Arsenios grinned. "You're right," he said. "It won't happen again. Take care, MC."

You watched him leave the garden, losing sight of him the moment he passed through the main gate. He was only there for a brief moment, but somehow the garden felt empty without him. There was a lingering tension in the air, like the string of a harp wound too tightly and left unplucked. It left you wondering why such an ancient demon would take the time to check in on you.

-

Arsenios made his way down the street from the House of Lamentation. He was glad to see that you seemed to be doing okay. He had heard a lot of rumors swirling around RAD. He could have asked Barbatos about you, of course. He knew that the butler would have told him the truth of things. But he somehow admitted to himself that he wanted to see you with his own eyes.

Arsenios was highly aware of you these days. Every time you stopped in the dance hall to listen to him play, he noticed. He felt your eyes on him, knew you were listening to every note. He had played in front of large audiences, allowing himself to step into a performance persona so he could entertain the masses. But when it was just you, he was always still himself.

An audience of one, something he never thought he would want or need. But now that he'd experienced those moments - the ones where he was playing for himself, creating songs on the fly, letting his heart and his fingers find the right keys, all the while having you as witness to everything he inevitably put into that music - he found himself missing you when you weren't there.

And you weren't always there. In fact, most of the time you weren't. He would never admit to anyone - not even himself - that he perhaps played that piano at RAD more than he would have otherwise. Waiting for you to hear him. Waiting for you to slip inside, to linger in the shadows.

Arsenios wasn't a fool. He knew that even if he didn't go inside the House of Lamentation, Lucifer would know he had been there.

And sure enough, the next day, Arsenios found himself confronted by Lucifer in a hallway at RAD.

"Stay away from MC," Lucifer said to him, not even bothering to pretend at politeness.

Arsenios smirked. He couldn't help himself. "Feeling threatened?"

"By you?" Lucifer let out a little laugh. "I'm unconcerned. But MC has a tendency to think all demons are their friends."

"And you think I'm not MC's friend?" Arsenios asked.

Lucifer frowned. "I am aware of your history, Arsenios. I don't trust you near them."

Arsenios found he was actually offended. He folded his arms and cocked his head. "You know perfectly well that I don't mess with humans anymore. You also know that Barbatos trusts me. Are you saying you know better than he does?"

Lucifer narrowed his eyes at this, as though he was displeased with having been confronted with this fact. "What are your intentions, then?"

Arsenios snorted. "You're dodging the question. But I don't have any intentions."

"Then why ask MC to dance?" Lucifer asked. "Why show up at the House of Lamentation?"

Arsenios paused. Memories flitted through his mind - the first time you listened to him in the dark hall, your serious face whenever you were concentrating in class, your cautious acceptance of his invitation to dance, the way you held up your hand to show him the Ring of Light. He couldn't exactly tell Lucifer that he found you compelling - that there was something about you. He tried to feign nonchalance, shrugging slightly.

"I like MC," he said easily. "That's it. Do I need to have an ulterior motive?"

"If I find out that you do," Lucifer said, his voice low and ominous. "You will regret ever coming near them."

Arsenios laughed. He knew that wasn't a smart response, but it came out anyway. Lucifer's glare deepened. Arsenios put his hands up in a placating gesture.

"I'm sorry," he said. "But I promise you there's nothing else going on here. You really don't need to go out of your way to threaten me."

"That human is under my protection," Lucifer said. "And I still don't trust you."

Arsenios was about to say something else, but Lucifer had already left, stalking down the hall and disappearing into a classroom.

Arsenios made his way to his next class, deliberately sitting down next to Asmo who happened to have that class with him. Asmo was busy checking his reflection in a little compact.

"Hey, Asmo," Arsenios said.

Asmo snapped his compact shut and looked at him, then smiled brightly when he recognized Arsenios. "Arrie! I haven't seen you around in a while! You're always skipping class, but I suppose you missed me, didn't you?"

Asmo leaned in toward Arsenios and ran his fingers up Arsenios's arm.

Arsenios laughed and caught Asmo's wrist gently. "You got me," he said. "I woke up today and went you know what I miss? Asmo's constant flirting."

Asmo nodded. "I knew it. Don't worry, hon, I'll flirt with you relentlessly for the rest of class."

"Really? You'd do that for me?" Arsenios asked. "And here your brother was just threatening me. Are you sure it's okay for you to be so chummy with me?"

Asmo gasped. "My brother? Let me guess. Lucifer?"

Arsenios let go of Asmo's wrist, leaned back in his seat, and frowned. "Is he really that worried about me? He seems to think I'm likely to eat your human."

Asmo huffed a little. "Don't worry about him," he said. "He's just protective of the exchange student. I know you would never eat MC."

Arsenios smiled. "Thanks, Asmo."

True to his word, Asmo flirted relentlessly with Arsenios for the rest of class. Arsenios didn't mind, but his thoughts kept wandering to you, sitting there in the House of Lamentation's garden, wearing the Ring of Light.

Lucifer was right, in a way. Arsenios should stay away from you. But it wasn't for the reasons Lucifer was concerned about.

There were other things Arsenios had to consider. But for now, letting you listen in when he was playing only for himself didn't cause anyone any harm. And checking in on you from time to time was also safe. He knew to be careful. He knew not to let you get too close.

-

You never did get the chance to go to Cafe Lament when Arsenios was playing there. In fact, you always seemed to miss him any time you found yourself there for other reasons.

And then it was already time for you to return to the human world. You didn't know it yet, but you would be spending quite a bit of time there. The brothers would come to visit you as you went through the tasks to become a sorcerer.

You thought of Arsenios every once in awhile, but as that time passed, he mostly faded from your mind. There was too much going on elsewhere in your life and there simply wasn't space for someone you no longer saw on a regular basis.

And then you were finally back in the Devildom, ready to start another year at RAD. You had forgotten about the way you used to hover in the darkness of the dance hall, listening to a demon play the piano. It had been so long since you had seen him, he simply slipped from your mind.

You didn't notice. You had so much to do. There were the brothers needing you, your studies with Solomon, your regular RAD classes, and now you were working to be able to join the student council, too. Every once in a while, you might remember those quieter times you spent listening to the piano. But for the most part, it was forgotten.

Until you couldn't help but remember.

masterpost | chapter one | chapter three

taglist: @avalordream @lonely-north-star @expressionless-fr comment to be added or removed!

masterlist | Thank you for reading!

[utilitycaster]

I’ve always been very interested in what you think about Caleb and Veth’s relationship. They’re not romantic, but not platonic, but not familial, but at the same time they are, but it’s different? I’m rambling. I find their relationship very interesting and I wanted to see what your take was on them :)

Also have a good day if you’re not having one already and if you are, have an even greater day

Hi anon, thanks! I assume you are asking specifically for my take but I follow a lot of people who have like, 20 times more thoughts on them than I do so I feel a little ill-equipped.

With that said: I personally did not seriously ship it romantically, but that was purely a matter of what I'm specifically into. I do think that a romantic reading of their relationship is an extremely valid one and there was, undeniably, a romantic element, which is why it's not clearly platonic. It reads as familial but in my opinion it is genuinely a relationship that only makes sense within a found family framework, ie, while early on Veth attempts to frame it as a mother and child, it really isn't that, either; that's just how she can best put what they are to each other into words because more apt ones don't exist. They care about each other and they care for each other and they did so at a time when each of them thought they had no future, even before they could admit that's what they were doing. I think that's the best way to describe it.

Something that has struck me - and that is one of the things I want to keep an eye out for when I finally one day have time to rewatch Campaign 2 - is how despite their relationship being one of convenience and coincidence (ended up in jail together, broke out, found it easier to travel together) and some degree of self-interest (Caleb benefited from having someone who could steal and who would remind him to take care of himself; Veth benefited from someone who wouldn't be chased out of shops and was interested in what a wizard could do for her; both did better with a partner for scams) it still lasted for months with no plans of separating. It didn't matter that Caleb wasn't telling Veth most of his past nor Veth telling him hers - or even her real name. They were lonely and it was better to travel with someone else, and they felt better for doing so, even if they told themselves (not even incorrectly) that it was purely a pragmatic matter.

My favorite early scenes between them are first, Caleb asking Veth if she'll leave with him should his reveal of his past to Beau go badly; and secondly and more importantly Veth saying she loves the rest of the party and that this isn't just pragmatism that's leading them to rescue the others. She's talking about the kidnapped party members; but again, because Veth and Caleb have never really defined what they have as anything but a partnership of convenience it feels like she is obliquely telling him how she feels as well.

I also of course love their scene in Felderwin - when Sam goes fully serious it's nearly always going to be a great time, and Veth's anger and drunken accusation and Caleb's intense guilt is a highlight, as is the way they are both able to move past it soon after due to the strength of their relationship.

I also think Liam and Sam did a fantastic job of laying the groundwork. Everyone did so beautifully for their Mighty Nein characters but I think Veth and Caleb's uneasy six months together feels incredibly vivid and real and are a standout among the pre-existing relationships. That might just be because Fjord and Jester had only been traveling together for a very brief amount of time, and because between Molly's death and Yasha not being around much we couldn't see as much of their friendship, but I still think about the list of grifts Caleb and Nott had together and how they were still running them mid-campaign. It was a level of work I think all players should aspire to when playing characters who knew each other in advance. There need to be inside jokes and a history and plans they've made together to breathe life into a pre-existing relationship that's more than a month long (give or take), otherwise it will fall flat and feel forced.

I think this focuses pretty heavily on their earlier relationship and that's because as time goes on they build stronger relationships with the rest of the party and develop a bit more distance. I think this is healthy! Again, a lot of their relationship - particularly on Caleb's side - came from a belief that this was the best they could hope for, and so it necessarily evolves, particularly once Veth and Yeza are reunited. I think Xhorhas/Angel of Irons arc Caleb isn't sure how to approach the relationship for a while until he finds a means of giving Veth her body back; Caleb is always someone who shows affection more through action than words. But I think that even as they build separate lives, Veth returning to a renewed version of the one she thought she lost and Caleb making something entirely different, they still mean a lot to each other and later in the campaign they are able to adjust and adapt their relationship with each other as well.

[tgmsunmontue]

More than movie magic... 10/24

Hangster AU. Explicit (eventually). Jake is a Hollywood actor and Bradley is a stunt coordinator. Jake's about to make a few self-discoveries. So is Bradley.

ONE TWO THREE FOUR FIVE SIX SEVEN EIGHT NINE

PART TEN

                Jake knows being annoyed with his mom is unreasonable, but a part of him also just can’t help it, she’s an annoying person hell-bent on making him do something he’s been putting off. God, he can never tell her that he’s had Bradley’s phone number for over a year, she’ll never let him live it down. It’s Wednesday morning now, so he has three days, assuming she doesn’t change her mind on the timeline. Now that he’s had two proper full-night’s sleep his brain feels less like it’s been put through a grinder and sat in pickle juice for days on end. He’s also feeling like he’s adjusting back to the right time after a couple of weeks skipping through time zones and continents for the promotional tour.

                He’d spent a fair amount of time last night lying in bed mulling over the fact that Bradley has been here for over two weeks, has met both his parents and cousin Freddie and Uncle Andy. Not all of the cowhands have watched him grow up, but a few did. He’s definitely met all of the current ones more than once. His other aunts and uncle all live in surrounding farms and ranches, his parents ranch the main central point geographicalluy, which is why they had based so many of the key building developments here. So the chance of Bradley having met several more members of his extended family are alarmingly high. He has no idea what he was thinking when he suggested this ranch as a potential location.

                He goes down to the kitchen, only to find it empty and he guesses the welcome wagon is well and clearly gone, now that he’s been home a whole twenty-four hours. Then his not-tired brain kicks in and he realizes that if his mom isn’t here then she’s likely in the mess hall, talking to people. He scrambles through getting dressed and then dithers over riding Blitzen or taking a car, but seeing his dad pottering around in the family stable decides it for him and by the time he steps into the stable his dad has already got Blitzen saddled up, is looking amused and no doubt his mom has talked his ear off.

                “Good luck today,” his dad says, slapping his shoulder.

                “Did mom tell you?” Jake asks, double checking the tightness and running his hands over Blitzen, stroking her nose so she can smell him and he smiles when she snorts and licks him.

                “I meant with the first day of filming. But yes, the other thing too I guess.”

                “Right. Okay. Yeah,” he says, sucks in a breath. “Thanks dad.”

                It’s still early, not even seven, although he’s got makeup at eight, so he doesn’t have a heap of time, and now that he thinks more, he’s got work, which means his time to actually talk to Bradley before his mom’s ridiculous ultimatum isn’t actually three days, but more like a few hours of spare time, which isn’t very much all, because he doubts his free time and Bradley’s free time are going to overlap. The ride between his parents house and the main buildings isn’t even ten minutes at a walk, and he does take it at a walk, despite the urge to suddenly just ride away at speed. He’s not a teenager anymore, although no doubt his mother would argue differently.

                Of course, when he leads Blitzen into the stable Bradley is there, brushing down Buttercup and talking to her under his breath and he doesn’t know whether to feel blessed or cursed. There is going to be the ghost of Bradley Bradshaw on his family ranch for years regardless of whether anything happens between them or not. He’s not prepared to see him, hasn’t thought about what he wants to say, what he can say. Fuck.

                “You’re up early. Already gone for a ride huh?” Bradley asks, gesturing toward Blitzen with his head and Jake reaches for her and begins taking off the saddle and bridle, hanging it in one of the empty stalls.

                “Just a short one. I miss it when I’m in Hollywood,” he admits.

                “You seem pretty at home here…” Jake gives him a sharp look, wonders if he knows. It’s not exactly a secret, it’s even meant to be part of the promotional PR for the film, the whole city boy returned to his roots and finds romance while saving his family ranch. “I figure you grew up near here, everyone seems to know you.”

                Jake blinks.

                Somehow, despite being here for over two weeks, Bradley hasn’t made the connection that this is Jake’s home. He feels a little inkling of amusement and wonders if this is how his mom feels when she’s telling him that he’s smart and yet somehow a dumbass at the same time.

                “What do you think of it?”

                “The ranch?”

                “Yeah,” Jake says, because that’ll do as a nice safe starting point.

                “It’s like a well-oiled machine. I can’t begin to imagine what work needs to happen, but everyone seems to know what needs to be done and just gets on and does it. I didn’t realize we’d be filming on such a large working ranch, it’s pretty amazing to see.”

                “And the land?”

                “Well, I’m a city boy, grew up thinking nothing could beat the lights of Hollywood. But got to say the night sky out here is beautiful.”

                “Hmm,” Jake hums, because he agrees, still enjoys going out camping just to get away from as much light pollution as possible and spend the time staring up at the night sky and a part of him wants to extend an invitation to Bradley to do that, wants to do that with him.

                “I’ll let you get to breakfast, I’m heading out for my own early morning ride. I’ll see you later.”

                “Yeah, sure. Enjoy your ride.”

                He watches Bradley leave, is still watching him when Bradley turns his head to look back at him and instead of looking away Jake just raises his hand in a wave of acknowledgement.

                Baby steps.

PART ELEVEN

[sapphire-weapon]

Have you noticed Leon always says you owe me one to Ada and Luis and they respond the same, I think the only one that doesn't respond like that to him is Ashley like actually she tells him they're a team and working together as partners, there's nothing to owe.

So this is a REALLY super interesting ask, actually. I don't think that it's as simple as "he keeps score with them but not her." There's a lot of different layers and moving parts to this. All of these scenarios are very different from each other, and they all come from different places. It's not just about how he views the people in question, but also how he views himself, especially within the context of their dynamic.

We'll start with Ada.

If you notice, he only says that to her in RE2make and at absolutely no other time in canon. There's a reason for that. In RE2make, Leon is kind of a bumbling dipshit. He's fresh out of police academy and has no real, practical experience to speak of. He's basically just making it up as he goes along and hoping for the best.

And then there's Ada, who's more skilled, knowledgeable, and competent than he is by basically every conceivable metric. And not only that, but in RE2make specifically, he thinks she's fucking FBI. So, in his mind, she outranks him in every sense of the word. He spends a not insignificant amount of time chasing after her and asking her for help and answers, because he trusts her as an authority.

So, when Leon tells Ada that she owes him in RE2make, that's his way of seeking her approval. It's his way of going "hey Ms. Big Shot FBI, I can stand on equal footing with you, too. See? Please tell me I did a good job oh god."

And then when RE4make comes along, the only person between them who says "you owe me" is actually her to him -- and not only does he not acknowledge that comment from her at all, but he also never tries to even the score. And that's because, in his mind, she still owes him way, way, WAY fucking more than just a simple information tip. She took advantage of him on the worst night of his life, lied to him, used him, led him on (at least, as far as he can tell; he has no way of knowing she actually caught feels), and then abandoned him for six years. And upon their reunion? Holds him at gunpoint without so much as a "hello."

So, when he calls her for help at the start of chapter 14, he's not asking for a favor. He asks her a question, and he expects her to answer it -- because she still owes him, and he feels he deserves it.

The difference in his confidence levels in his interactions with her between RE2make and RE4make are really striking, and this is actually a really great example of it.

Luis is a different story.

Leon actually never keeps score with Luis; it's Luis who tries to pull it on him, and Leon immediately pays him back out of a desperate desire to not be indebted to him in any way, shape, or form. In his mind, Luis is also someone who's already taken too much from him, as an Umbrella researcher.

Of course, it's also much harder for him to make that case, because Luis wasn't actually there in Raccoon City and had nothing to do with the actual outbreak. Leon is actually very hypocritical when it comes to Luis in a lot of ways. OG Leon tells OG Luis that he was in Raccoon City, but remake Leon doesn't do the same.

So, remake Leon demands that Luis be straight with him about his motivations while hypocritically hiding his own. In fact, one of the biggest tragedies surrounding their relationship is that Luis dies without ever having known that Leon wasn't just being affected by his Las Plagas research -- but that he's also suffered from Luis's contributions to Umbrella's research, as well.

For the vast majority of their relationship, Leon feels like there's absolutely nothing that Luis can do to pay him back for his direct contributions towards ruining his life. So, keeping score is pointless.

And yet when it comes to Ashley?

Leon has nothing to prove to Ashley like he did with Ada back in RE2. And she's never hurt, betrayed, or taken advantage of him like both Luis and Ada have done. So, for him, despite him having basically all of the power in their relationship, he sees himself and Ashley as being on completely equal, neutral ground with one another.

But here's what's interesting. He does actually keep score with her, to a certain extent. When Ashley goes over walls to unlock doors from the inside, Leon will occasionally thank her with an "I owe you one."

From Leon's perspective, Ashley is going out of her way to help him. She's not obligated to assist in her own rescue -- and, if she chose not to help, he would eventually find another way to navigate through shit, regardless. It'd just be a way bigger pain in the ass. So, when she helps him out, he feels that he owes her.

Saving her life and bringing her home isn't a favor; it isn't something he ever expects or wants her to repay. He has his role, and she has hers, and when she steps out of her role to help him, he's grateful.

And, even though he pays her back again and again and again, he never sees it that way. If, on the plane ride back to the US, Ashley asked him for something and pulled out a "hey, you owe me" -- Leon would very likely just shrug and say "I guess I do."

[korcariiwitch]

oc(s) meme. ✨

Tagged by: @laezels! Tysm for the tag! <3

(So uhhhh I decided to fill this out for both my OCs, since I haven't really posted much for Skora and needed to flesh both of them out more, so umm don't mind me 🖤)

name: velwyn melarn name: skora aldisian

nickname(s): vel, v, wynnie (hates the last one though) nickname(s): kora, sko, allie

pronouns: she/her pronouns: she/her

star sign: scorpio star sign: virgo

height: 5' 4" / 162.5cm height: 5' 9" / 175.2cm

orientation: pansexual orientation: pansexual

race: drow (bhaalspawn) race: half-elf (sun elf/human)

romancing: astarion romancing: shadowheart (might be karlach depending on how her playthrough goes 👀)

fave fruit: cherries. fave fruit: dates.

fave season: less so a favorite season and more so she likes whenever there's a storm going on. something about the feeling of the rain/snow on her skin feels invigorating and the catharsis of everything being washed away. fave season: winter, preferably indoors and cooped up next to a hearth.

fave flower: orchids (ones that grow in the dark especially). fave flower: irises and hyacinths.

fave scent: iron, mint, and eucalyptus. fave scent: sea salt and cedar wood.

coffee, tea, or hot chocolate: coffee to compensate for the lack of rest most days. prefers it black with a minimal amount of sugar. coffee, tea or hot chocolate: many various types of teas. she's a bit of a snob about it actually (affectionate).

average sleep hours: it would be the standard 4 hours of trance, if not interrupted nightmares or the debilitating migraines brought on by suppressing her bloodthirsty urges. average sleep hours: skora is adept at quieting her mind and can reliably/consistently get six hours of sleep even under the most dire of circumstances.

dogs or cats: quasits, owlbears, intellect devourers. pre-events of the game it wasn't sustainable for durge to have pets, and she finds herself drawn to the more unconventional ones. dogs or cats: skora has a fondness for dogs, having grown up with many hunting dogs in her youth.

dream trip: pre-tadpole there was no point in dreaming of travel for pleasure, outside of her father's vision of a world covered in corpses. post the events of the game i think she'd just like to see more of the world beyond what the underdark/bhaal's temple has to offer her. dream trip: i think she'd like to return home to the isle she is from, she hasn't been there since childhood due to ~certain events~ and i think having a partner/friends in tow might help make that journey palatable.

amount of blankets: it doesn't matter how many you put on her because there's a 98.7% chance she's going to end up kicking them off at some point. secretly, velwyn prefers the compression of her partner acting as weighted blanket. amount of blankets: one, no more than two. barely moves in her sleep and wakes up in the morning with the blankets exactly where she left them the night before.

random fact(s): velwyn ❤️

velwyn is quite the sketch artist, and she keeps a journal (almost like a book of shadows) in the game chronicling her journey. some of the sketches can be a bit disturbing, though, especially if she's a fondness for the subject. (e.g. a rather gruesome sketch of astarion because she didn't know what to do with her feelings towards him)

fluent in common, undercommon, elvish, deep speech and knows some abyssal and infernal as study for a certain heist.

likes to collect weird shit for study and experimentation later. has led to some 'accidents' around camp during the squad's downtime.

knows how to stitch wounds together exceptionally well, will stubbornly insist upon patching herself up half the time until she becomes more comfortable with the concept of other people taking care of her.

enjoys being challenged and called out on her own shit by others, even if she'd never admit that.

random fact(s): skora 💙

fluent in common, gnomish, celestial, primordial, elvish, draconic and also knows common sign language.

knows how to sail from her family's business, but actually gets incredibly sea sick.

while in school, she double majored in abjuration and divination with minors in illusion and necromancy magics.

has an astigmatism but refuses to 'correct it' with magic, so she'll pull out glasses while reading.

she has a natural calming presence and a quiet confidence, she doesn't feel the need to gloat but will put someone in their place if pushed.

No pressure/obligation tagging: @anderwelt, @malewife-mansplain-magus, @topaz-carbuncle, @phasebun, @starryjuicebox, @elminsters, @vspin, @tavsboots @asharaks, @bhaalbaaby and anyone else who sees/wants to do this!

[dreadfutures]

I hold in two hands:

everything is going pretty well. I am slowly making friends and deepening friendships IRL in my dream town. relationship w my family is the best it may have ever been in my life. my job is easy and satisfying and eases my conscience and I enjoy it. i am getting back into physical art. I call my best friend from grad school every week. I play DND with my best friends from college every week. I play Pathfinder with a group I've been with for six years every week. I have every cuisine imaginable available to me, there is every kind of hang out spot nearby, transit is cheap, and I'm under very little pressure in life. I have improved my digital art over the years and have the honor of being commissioned to draw people's OCs! I have a story I've been writing for four years that I am still passionate about and invested in with a dedicated readership of 100 or so people every update. I get to participate in exchanges of art and writing about fandoms I love, with people who love them. I have been able to introduce good people looking for communities to good communities full of good people. I have been able to run a (so far!) successful large fan event to celebrate all of that. I have so much I'm looking forward to, games and music and movies and books, travel, visits, museums...

and

I am tired. Depression is coming back for me like the tide and with it comes this irrational unsteadiness. Where things have been certain, solid, steady, and where I've been unconcerned and happy, I'm finding myself insecure, jealous, shy, uncertain, self deprecating, self conscious, unconfident, unhappy. everything I make I question. I can't help but feel the weight of all the things I usually brush off as meaningless. There's no amount of rationalization, reassurance, or interactions that can turn that around.

It just is. Both. All at once. For now.

I am very grateful for what I have. I really am. but I will never not be depressed, you know? Like, if I'm being pulled under by a rip current every few months, at least the water is warm now. And it'll let me out eventually I guess, as it always does, and I'll find my footing again. It's easier to find footing again and not drown than it was 5, 7, 10 years and many prescriptions ago. but right now I just wish I could find a therapist to have an outlet to express, process, experience those feelings safely with another human being who won't be affected by it all. It has been a long time since I've been the kind of childish person who goes crying and wailing about my insecurities to people in search of validation and praise that I would then reject. But watching other people do it makes me wish I wasn't so far along on the self awareness journey and could be so freely pathetic again. Because that behavior does receive so much validation, pretty intensely, lots of preening comments that feel morbidly good and bad simultaneously, you know? But it feels better than silence, even if it comes with the shame of publicly begging for attention and validation lmao. But better than silence is also just having a place to express stupid feelings and cry a river about petty things and then be able to sigh or laugh it off and put those feelings in broader contexts and move on without ruining my life and relationships.

I just fucking wish they didn't all set their appointments by telehealth only, and in the middle of my goddamn work day.

I don't want a room mate again but I wish I didn't live alone. I wish I just had someone who got me, who sees me and loved me, in the same room, day and night. I miss the person who inspired DPDF a lot these days. they weren't the first person I had that connection with and they don't have to be the last. and our connection isn't the same anymore but it's still precious and it's hard being apart but that's how it has to be. There will be others. it'll be fine. someday maybe. in the meantime it's cooling down from this heat wave and there are lunches to attend and weird driveway artisan shows to sniff out and cafes to write in and cute outfits to wear and things to learn and I'll play more good games and I'll get my hair done special and at some point the positive feelings will catch up again and maybe I'll be able to enjoy them fully like a normal human being. at some point I'll blink awake in the middle of a conversation and realize I'm feeling happy and clear again. that's how it always happens and in the meantime I hold both of these feelings in separate hands at once. Tangible. If I say out loud that they're both real then they both can be, again.

[madlad-sadgal]

Goldenheart AU

Should I really start thinking up a whole other AU when I'm still trying to plan out one? No. Am I gonna do it anyways? Yes.

Quick note #1, this is a mix of Band AU and "Separated Childhood friends who meet again as adults (except one doesn't know it's their childhood friend)" AU.

Also a note at the end.

Nimona Spoilers (Maybe? Not sure, but I'll out a cut here just in case)

In this AU, there's no kingdom surrounded by big ass walls with canons, although I'm not sure if there are shapeshifters or not (Nimona's still there, I'm just not sure if they can shapeshift or not or if they're just this weird energetic teenager). What is there though is social classes.

The Queen, aka Valerin, is Ambrosius' mother and she runs a very successful company. Ambrosius is therefor part of the richer class which basically has access to anything.

Ballister Boldheart, on the other hand, although he isn't living on the streets, his family isn't doing the best when it comes to money and he does some easy jobs to try and gather money to help his parents.

The boys meet at the park one day. Ambrosius was out playing with some friends from school (Todd maybe with a few random OCs) when he saw the scrawny boy picking up trash, so he decided to approach him. Turns out the scrawny boy (Ballister) was picking up trash to help the park keeper who'd then pay him depending on the amount of trash he picked up

Ambrosius felt bad for him so he decided to help him and didn't leave until his mom's secretary and his nanny (The Director, who else) came to pick him up

The Director obviously saw the two interact and didn't think much of it, until Ambrosius starts asking for money from his mom to help his new friend, which she actively gives him and praises him for helping people in need, and then Ballister's coming to visit and now the two are inseparable

Now she obviously doesn't like that, but she brushes it off thinking that this'll pass when Ambrosius grows up and realizes that he's much better than that

But then something happens (you choose what, can be a death, something good with the company) and Ambrosius has to move away, so the two boys who have been friends for like six-seven are now separated and heart broken, and since Bal can't afford a phone they won't be able to keep in touch, and he outright refuses to let Ambrosius give him one, so now they're separated

Fast forward a few years, it is now Ambrosius' 21st birthday, and to celebrate, he's allowed to choose one band that Valerin will pay to show up, and he chooses the Shifters/The Shapeshifters/whatever else references the movie or comic

The Shifters are a small band that's pretty recent, but Ambrosius loves their songs, and he thinks the lead singer, who goes by Bal, is cute

The band shows up and Ambrosius is having the time of his life, even more so when two members of the band, Bal and Nimona, come to personally wish him a happy birthday

Obviously, he's just talked to his celebrity crush, so he fails to notice just how familiar Bal is, and he doesn't think he'll ever meet the man again

Bal, on the other hand, is well set on seeing Ambrosius again, because holy fuck that's his childhood friend, and he had to practically beg Nimona and the rest of the band (some OCs maybe) to come here just so he could see him

Ballister started this band in hopes that it would take off and he could make a living out of it to help his parents (for plot convenience, it works out or not, depends what direction you wanna go)

So, when Ballister sees Ambrosius again in a cafe, he strikes up a conversation and they end up talking for a long while and end up exchanging numbers

What isn't planned in the plan is for the Director to recognize Ballister and know how much of a crush Ambrosius has on him (despite him not knowing who he really is) and she doesn't like that because someone from higher class dating someone lower class like Ballister hell no

Then starts her plans to foil everything, Nimona being slightly annoyed at Ballister desperately trying to get back in contact with his friend, Ambrosius having a celebrity crush that surprisingly actually works out and Valerin being oblivious to all of this

Ambrosius looks pretty much just like he does in the movie when he's wearing his civilian clothes, except he has long hair with the under part shaved (Is there a name for that haircut?)

Valerin and the Director dress like business women instead of royals

Nimona has basically the same style, except add a bunch of colour: pins, dyed streaks of hair, bright bracelets, etc.

Ballister has a similar style to Nimona, and he dyed a streak of his hair pink (because I can)

That's all I got for now. If this catches anyone's eye, I'll make another part exploring why the Director dislikes the mix of classes so much and how she frames Ballister this time, or the next part can also be about how Bal and Ambrosius get closer.

Quick note #2, this doesn't have anything to do with this, but I'm starting to realize most of my ideas come when I'm doing the dishes, and as dumb as it is, it gives me motivation to do them, so I'm not complaining

Quick note #3, I'm thinking of doing and angsty one shot of that one scene where Ambrosius gets stabbed and it's actually him, except Ballister sings "You Are My Sunshine" to him as he dies because Ambrosius used to sing it to him before everything. Would anyone read it if I posted it?

[apparitionism]

Tabled 7

And with this at-long-last final part, Tabled (my lengthy @b-and-w-holiday-gift-exchange offering for @barbarawar ) comes to an end. Does that end justify the tortuous (and torturous) trip? Probably not, but something something journey destination... it all began with “Myka sits at tables and tells lies,” and part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, and part 6 gave what I hope was a reasonable explanation for how Myka might have so fallen, as well as how she could have begun to scramble up (spoiler: with a lot of help). Anyway, she’s just got back to South Dakota—having come to a tentative understanding with Helena—only to find Mrs. Frederic waiting for her at the airport (!!).

Tabled 7

Myka has spent an evening, a night, and the entire subsequent day on her trek back to South Dakota, so her trip as a whole has now stretched to over thirty-six hours, during which she’s had emotional nadirs, shocks, and acmes; adrenaline overloads, ebbs, and re-overloads; minimal amounts of minimally palatable airport food; and far too much coffee, both interior and exterior. She desperately needs a shower, clean clothes, and, above absolutely all, some sleep lying down in a bed. Some sleep that way.

So she’s having trouble processing what she sees. Has Mrs. Frederic divined her ultimate intention and thus appeared here to prevent her from burning it all down? This possibility should strengthen her resolve; instead, it makes her want to turn and run away.

Unfortunately, she’s now through security, and she can’t turn around. Thanks a lot, DHS.

But please, she goes on to pray, not another table. And: Extra-please, not another lecture about children.

Can the people around her in the airport see Mrs. Frederic? They seem to be moving more slowly, less noisily, than reality usually offers. Or are they? It’s hard to know, here in this quiet, draggy little transit-place...

Mrs. Frederic puts a bow on the weird by pronouncing, “I have spoken with several people today. Yet you are my determinative interlocutor.”

That sounds like Myka might be a very few words away from being sent to a penal colony. Or, no: bronzed. The ultimate irony. Utterly Warehousian.

“I have for you the following salient information,” Mrs. Frederic continues, and Myka doesn’t even bother bracing herself, because she’ll have to take it, regardless. She might as well be rattled by the full impact. “I am prepared to have words with Agent Lattimer.”

She should have braced. “You are?” she asks, wishing she could sound indifferent about the prospect, wishing the idea of such words didn’t add fuel to her gut’s terror that Mrs. Frederic knows all about Myka’s meeting with Helena, a terror now compounded by the prospect of her telling Pete of it, and the further prospect that his having been told will be an additional, far higher bar over which Myka must clamber.

“Should those words occur,” Mrs. Frederic says, and now Myka does brace, “your brief liaison will seem but a dream to him.”

What... what? No bar, no clamber? Instead, deliverance? Myka, whiplash-befuddled, is struck dumb.

Mrs. Frederic waits. Her patience, as long as it lasts, is admirable, if surprising. Then she quirks an eyebrow.

It makes Myka think of Helena—and that allows her to breathe. To soften.

Mrs. Frederic softens too: she lowers the eyebrow. “Is that truly what you wish?” she asks, carefully, as if she’s prepared also to withdraw credit from the source who conveyed to her the substance of Myka’s wants. As if Myka, given one last beneficent chance, can surely be gentled into exercising her better judgment and choosing the certain path.

The sliver of solicitude allows Myka to consider Mrs. Frederic’s motives with a new charity: she may have been driven not by stereotype, as Myka has suspected, nor malice, as she has feared, but rather by a thoughtful assessment of availability—i.e., here are the Warehouse’s extant resources, and here is how they may best be deployed to ensure an acceptable balance of efficacy and safety.

Myka has spent a great many hours on airplanes and in airports preparing herself for the burn-it-down possibility, but the fact of the matter is that she, too, cares about efficacy.

She cares even more about safety.

The additional fact of the matter, however, is that she wants a future untethered from such calculations—except as reckoned by, and between, her and Helena.

So if Mrs. Frederic is willing to help fix what she had a heavy hand in breaking? There’s probably a downside, but Myka will suffer it for this unexpected upside.

“Yes. It is. Thank you,” she says.

“No,” Mrs. Frederic says, now differently severe. “Agent Jinks.”

“Steve? What about him?”

“Thank him.”

****

Myka finds the B&B dark and silent, lacking even a video-game glow and hum from Claudia’s room. Sadly, the quietude doesn’t yield sleep; rather than knitting up her exceptionally raveled sleeve of care, she tries and fails to keep “here’s how this might go” scenarios from playing in her head until she can reasonably go downstairs and begin making morning noises.

As the others appear, she tries to act as if nothing has changed.

Claudia enthuses, “Storms no match for you!” which is flattering but of course entirely untrue.

Pete is in his too-early-to-do-more-than-grunt mode, but he seems to care more about his bowl of Lucky Charms than he does about anything to do with Myka, which tells her that Mrs. Frederic has almost certainly had the promised words with him. The way that buoys her—her shoulders move down and away from her ears, where she hadn’t even realized they’d taken up residence—is probably unseemly, but she doesn’t care.

Then Abigail walks in, and her eye-flick between Pete and Myka suggests she knows everything, which she probably does, but even if she all she might have had were suspicions, they’ve probably been confirmed by Myka’s radical change in posture.

A twinge of guilt at having allowed her body to reveal her relief visits Myka... but she quashes it. That guilt is about parts of the past she’s supposed to be ignoring. Practice. Practice.

When Steve emerges, he busies himself with the first steps of making scrambled eggs. Myka reads this as a tactic, for on workdays Steve generally eats two unheated Pop-Tarts at speed. On lazier mornings, he might undertake toast, but eggs are the rarest of production numbers... and indeed, no one but Myka waits through his meticulous preparation.

“You want some?” he asks, but he’s already sliding his results onto two plates. “Airports,” he says, handing her one.

“So hard to find something normal,” she agrees, “and even when you think you might have, you’re still in a place that isn’t.”

“Sounds like you’re talking about every day here.”

His affect effortlessly encompasses both “perpetually surprised new guy” and “perpetually resigned old hand.” Myka loves him for that facility. “Not about these eggs, though,” she says around mouthfuls, “so thanks.” She pushes her empty plate away. “And, also, thanks.”

“I’ve never seen anyone eat food that fast, so thanks back for the demonstration. But also thanks why?”

“You’re welcome, and also you know why: I have you to thank. Or so I hear from someone who miraculously shifted her thinking about what’s best for me,” and she concludes, “you miracle.”

He gives a little smile and head-shake. “You said to protect you, so that’s what I did. Differently. Once I figured out you were telling me things had changed.”

His figuring? Correct, regardless of anything Myka might have intended to be saying. “Things did change,” she acknowledges, “like you said they would. But listen, what you did. The risk. You shouldn’t have taken that risk for me. In fact people in general should stop taking risks on my behalf.”

His smile grows wider. “We will when you will. Reciprocally.”

“No, no,” Myka says, “I need to take more. On my behalf and everybody else’s.”

“All the more reason you should have the right backup.”

“Well, so should you,” Myka says, fully aware, and fully remorseful, that she hasn’t provided any such thing.

Steve’s smile shifts in a way she doesn’t understand. “I think I’m going to. Maybe in not too long? You know Claud’s doing a lot more Caretakering now.” The doorbell rings. “Oooh, if that’s who I think it is, somebody’s timing is something.”

“Is it?” Myka asks. She trails, a confused duckling, behind Steve as he heads to the door.

“I think you’re about to meet my new partner,” he says.

Myka doesn’t bother asking “Am I?” as he swings the door open, because questions are not being answered sensically.

Her exhaustion is comprehensive, so it’s no surprise she’s hallucinating. She says it aloud, directing a slack-jawed “I’m hallucinating” at both Steve and the doorway-framed Helena as they stand before her, their smiles bizarrely rhyming blends of sheepishness and pride.

They don’t respond. This supports the hallucination conclusion.

Myka moves her right hand, minimally; in this way, she touches Steve, a little backhand to his torso. The purple cotton of his shirt is softer than her knuckles expect.

With her left hand, she reaches out, reaches through the doorway, and pushes, probably harder than she should, against Helena’s right shoulder. Nothing there is soft. The shoulder resists.

Fine. Not a hallucination. Not even a hologram. Everyone’s physically here, breathing and taking up space.

“Her timing,” Myka says to Steve. She’s not quite ready to speak directly to Helena. “It’s definitely something.”

Helena says, “Ssh. Let me reveal my shortcomings to my new partner in my own time.” She’s surpassingly beautiful, here in this moment: glowing with mischief and morning sun.

It’s too much. Myka squints and looks away, back to the comfort of Steve. “Your new partner?” she asks him. “Really?”

“Seems so,” Steve says, right as Helena offers, “As I understand it,” and Myka hears a harmony as their voices overlap. She hadn’t seen this coming, but she might have heard it, if she had thought to listen close enough.

But how could she have thought to, before today? “You both make the world turn a little faster than I’m comfortable with,” she tells Steve.

His smile persists. “Call me on that, no problem. But you really want to argue with H.G. Wells, who by the way is standing right here”—and he gives her a little “you really are, right?” look, which she answers with a minimalist palms-up “I suppose” shrug; more harmony—“about how time moves?”

“If history is any guide,” Helena says to him, “that and many other elements of the oeuvre.”

“I just didn’t think I’d be doing it this morning, is all,” Myka says. She’s trying to bring herself to speak to both of them, but Steve remains her direction of safety.

His brow wrinkles. “If this isn’t okay...”

It would be nice to be able to reassure him, but. “No idea if it’s okay.”

His face clears. “I appreciate your telling the truth. And I guess your voice is less agitated than it could be.”

This garners a snort from Helena. “My dear new partner. Your understatement is a balm.”

“We’ll see if I can keep that up,” he says, visibly nervous.

Myka is, now, able to address Helena. About Steve. “He can. Not always understatement, but the balm part.”

“I’m glad to know it,” Helena says, directing at Steve a formal incline of head.

That incline. Its sweet propriety. Glad. Glad. “I’m glad you’re here,” Myka tells her.

“Thank you,” Helena says. She doesn’t need to add “for saying.” Her hair is shining, here—here!—in this morning sun that illuminates the entryway. Such light visits this space every morning, but Myka has never before seen it ignite Helena’s hair.

This day: new.

“I have something in the car for you,” Helena goes on. “Wait.” She exits the doorway, moving out of the sunbeam’s path. A bright loss.

Myka turns back to Steve. “Wait,” she echoes, shrugging. “There’s not enough time in the world for me to explain to you why that’s ironic.”

“Your own private irony.”

“But you did spare me some waiting. Some not-knowing waiting. And way more than that,” she says, because it needs saying, “you spared me the hard part.”

“I don’t know her very well yet, but I’m pretty sure I didn’t.”

“Oh,” Myka says, because of course she’d meant detaching herself from Pete, but Steve is (also of course) wise and right: each day, however few or many she and Helena manage, will no doubt have its hard parts. Each day of those few or many might itself be the hard part. “But how did you... I mean, did you have this plan all along? Partner and all, and Mrs. Frederic started nodding along as you said it all out loud?”

“Oh god no. I was just trying to ease her away from the you-and-Pete thing, as gently as possible. Turns out she wanted H.G. back ages ago.”

No. No. “She what.”

Steve nods, looking sick. “But—and I hate to be the one telling you this—she thought you didn’t want H.G. back.”

Myka feels sick. The non-sense of this day... no: of these days. “She what,” she says again.

“Because you left her in Boone, she said.”

“Helena was forced to stay in Boone!” she protests, or tries to.

“But you didn’t fight anybody on it. So she thought you were okay with it.”

Of course. Here’s Myka’s inaction again, kicking her legs out from under her. “But if she wanted to bring Helena back, why didn’t she just... do that? Once she decided it was safe to let her out of Boone?”

“Like I said, she thought you didn’t want H.G. to come back. So she was trying to make sure it wouldn’t matter so much to you. If it happened. If you had something else to focus on.”

“Pete,” Myka says, the very idea a heaviness. “Kids?”

“I’m not saying I can read her mind, but yeah, I think that’s how that went. I can tell you she was really surprised to hear you were meeting with H.G. yesterday.”

“In a hotel room in an airport in Chicago,” Myka says. The base fact of it. “Do I want to know how you explained that?”

“All I explained was the airport in Chicago,” Steve says. “I didn’t know about the hotel room part.”

Right. Myka hadn’t said that part out loud. “It’s not what it sounds like.”

“Interesting utterance,” he says, cocking his head, like he’s waiting for more. “Not an immediate lie, But the eventual truth-value, plus my possible eventual headache, depend on what you think I think it sounds like.”

It’s a privilege, this glimpse into the complications of his gift; nevertheless, Myka winces. “I think you think it sounds like what I think it sounds like,” she says. “Like I wish it didn’t. Because I swear to you, it’s not that.”

She prepares herself to dig in and hash out the truth-values, but Steve says, “I get it. No dirty work in those words.”

No dirty work: it’s a diploma. In reverse. Disqualification.

“Anyway I don’t think I made a lot of sense explaining any of it to Mrs. Frederic,” he finishes.

“Enough to save me,” Myka says.

“Yes. Because if you could be happy.”

“You said that before.”

“I did. But now I mean, if you could be happy.”

“If... then?” she asks, logic being what it is.

“Then maybe I could too,” he says.

Myka wants to put an immediate stop to the idea that he would look to her, for that can’t help but end in abject failure. But she gets out only a weak “Don’t” before he continues, “Because I was thinking of a saying: ‘Happy wife, happy life.’”

“I’m not your wife.”

“Better for both of us. I’m just saying it’s a saying. About a person and somebody else. There might be a better word for where you and somebody else are—or, I guess, where you might be headed?—but it wouldn’t rhyme with life. And it’s probably important to rhyme with life.”

Myka’s heart hears him, but she shies away, scoffing, “That’s a leap. Not the rhyming. The saying.”

“Isn’t it always?”

“I don’t want to give you false hope.”

“But if we could both acknowledge that there is hope.”

She’s not sure. She’ll probably never be sure, but in the face of doubt and fear (and “endless wonder,” that misleading canard), she determines to acknowledge it. For Steve’s sake. “Okay,” she says. “In the full knowledge that you’re the one who made the hope possible.”

“No,” Steve says. Serious. Simple. Unfraught. “That’s not what I did.”

Myka has no counterargument. All she can do is say “thank you” yet again, quick and quiet, for suddenly Helena is appearing in the doorway, taking over the space. Myka suspects she’s been waiting for their conversation to end—speaking of timing, this reminds her of the hotel lobby—and she doesn’t know whether to hope Helena was eavesdropping their words or simply their tones.

She’s holding two cardboard coffee cups. Myka gestures for her to hand one over, but Helena shakes her head. “You haven’t texted me.”

So Myka dashes to grab her phone, and “Gh” says the message, the first purchase her fumbling fingers could find, sent as fast as she could remind those fingers how to do that.

Helena sets the cups down on the hall table when her own phone noises (and now Myka doesn’t know whether to be pleased or distressed that a text from her yields a generic ding). She extracts it from the interior of her jacket and smiles. “I bought these, in hope, in the Sioux Falls airport,” she says, “but they’re now cold. No doubt terrible.”

“‘Worth every penny,’ I once heard someone say about coffee,” Myka says.

“Fewer pennies here. In any event, worth to be determined.” Helena is jaunty; it’s very her, but on the edge of too her, hinting that she’s less certain than her initial doorway presentation implied. As Myka now meets Helena’s gaze, she imagines—but hopes she isn’t only imagining—that their vulnerabilities might for once be commensurate.

Helena doesn’t look away.

Steve says, “You know, ‘I was making eggs’ buys you only so much late-for-work in this job.” It’s a transparent attempt to excuse himself, but he does add, “I’m really looking forward to getting to know you, partner.”

“I hope to impress you,” Helena says.

He snort-giggles, then composes himself. Minimally. “H.G. Wells—who isn’t lying!—hopes to impress me. Okay.”

Myka can’t begrudge him his surprised delight, even if it does delay his departure. “Welcome to a world of endless... surprise. She kind of wrote the book.”

“A lot of books,” Steve augments.

Helena waves a hand. “That was Charles. So wordy.”

Steve’s brow furrows—which Myka reads as a bit of confusion over how to negotiate the Helena/Charles disjunction. He says, “Okay. I’m going to the Warehouse,” clearly (smartly) choosing not to start now.

This time he does leave, though Myka is tempted to stop him, to cling to the surer footing afforded by his buffering.

Coward.

But. Then.

Alone, precariously so, Myka and Helena situate themselves across from each other at the dining room table, their promised-coffee cups before them.

Myka supposes she should have foreseen this arrangement—table, coffee—and she should at the very least have queried the book as to what would ensue. Not that she’s had any time for that, which probably means she should now do that, should go and do that, before she finds a way to undercut its foreseen future and make blunders that will prove unsatisfactory.

“Surprise,” Helena says.

“Yes,” Myka concurs, trying for Steve-ish understatement. It doesn’t work; she knows she sounds distressed.

“May I explain?”

“I wish you would.” That comes out better, but Myka realizes that she is literally on the edge of her seat. She sinks backward, trying to make the movement look like relaxation. That probably doesn’t work either.

“The invitation from Steve,” Helena begins, but upon saying his name, she stops. “Before I continue: ‘H.G. Wells who isn’t lying’?”

“He can tell if you are,” Myka says, and she’s gratified to see in Helena’s ensuing eyebrow contortions that she’s conducting the “what exactly have I said to Steve” inventory everyone does when introduced to that fact.

Its result: “Well. Then it’s fortunate I haven’t. To him.” She seems inclined to reflect on the revelation’s full compass.

Myka does love (love!) to watch Helena think. But right now... “Explanation?” she prompts.

“It isn’t complicated,” Helena says.

“That’s unusual.”

Helena bows her head; she smiles, from that bow, up at Myka. It’s flirty. It’s beautiful. “It is,” she says, and she seems to be affirming Myka’s words and her thoughts. “Steve and I had a conversation during which I explained how you and I had left our... situation. And then, a bit later, came his invitation, which I understand was extended at the behest of Mrs. Frederic. The opportunity—the freedom—to be myself again? It was too enticing to refuse. Of course I never would have accepted in the absence of our rapprochement, but given that? Steve was so convinced, and convincing, that all would be well.” She raises her head fully now. “And it cut short the waiting.”

“I said I would hurry,” Myka says, resentful, unsure of why she’s jumped to that.

“Your return required so many flights. Any number of delays might have ensued.”

“Due to the flights?” Myka asks, but she can’t unhear the clear disjunction between those sentences.

“And everything else,” Helena acknowledges, with a head-duck.

Myka knows that duck; it’s worry. “You didn’t trust me?” she asks, but in the question she finds the reason behind her resentment: offense at the idea that Helena had such worries to begin with.

“Can you blame me?” Helena asks this with a little flinch, as if Myka’s judgment must be harsh.

“Yes I can,” Myka says, but soft. “You were supposed to be ignoring all that.”

Her answer causes Helena to raise her head again and smirk—or, no, this isn’t her smirk; rather, it’s a lip-twist that’s more... conspiratorial. She says, “And yet the foundation of trust is past experience. If I ignore the past, on what basis could I trust you?”

Playful, but a jab. Myka retreats into sarcasm, acknowledging it hit the mark: “There’s a flaw in my big idea? Shocking.”

Helena nods, slow with a sigh, as if in sadness at Myka’s imperfection. But she turns serious to say, “In any case, after all that’s happened, I certainly didn’t trust fate either.”

Fate. How they’ve been subject to it... but are they now trying to chivvy it, in a way that will backfire? Myka pushes her fear into words: “What if it’s too soon?”

“Then regret will haunt us to the end of our days,” Helena says, and Myka has to nod to the truth of it. “But consider this: rather than wasting precious time on such questions, shouldn’t we rather be grateful that, after such complications, there is even a whisper of a chance that it may not be too late?”

Too late, too late, too late. Those words have truly haunted Myka. Miraculous that they might not apply. “I don’t want coffee,” she says. Truly.

“What do you want?” Helena asks, like she might really not know.

Well, maybe she doesn’t anymore, given the vast conceptual distance between Myka’s initial saying and now. “I did tell you. I don’t know how many hours ago; I haven’t counted. I’d have to use my hands.”

“Save your hands, but tell me again. I challenge you, however: change the vocabulary.”

Myka can do that. Only a little, here and now, but she can do that. “To save the world. Our world.”

They are breathing at each other and the table is in the way; Myka ideates the drama of grasping its edge, flinging it sideways, clearing her path—but that’s not who she is. Now, more than ever, she needs to be herself.

She stands up and steps decorously to the side and around, slow, savory, even as her body threatens to effervesce.

“Can we do this?” she asks, but she knows, through her inexorable movement, with all its effervescent potential, that they will. Regardless now of consequences.

“I have no idea,” Helena answers.

These could be words of delay, but not here and not now, because regardless, regardless, they will—and at once they’re both moving, as if pressure from a familiarly heartless authority will relegate Helena yet again to disembodiment if they don’t make this fast, and thank god, god, god this once they’re fast enough; they meet and hands are at waists but they’ve touched with hands before... even so, the infinitesimal pause they both take before those hands pull and define is understandable but then over, and their at-last kiss begins as an action but swiftly transforms into a state of being: pressure, presence, soft, sharp, warmth, weight, low, lasting...

After some time—how much time? is this kind of time measurable?—they break apart into staring silence, in the stunned after of the prospect they have spent so long before.

“I can die now,” Myka is moved to murmur, even as she feels its banality as a response to this experience, this knowledge. Because she has at last truly gained the knowledge: she had hoped to gain it, and yet she now understands she had never fully believed she would, if only because fundamental questions—e.g., “what would it feel like to kiss Helena?”—aren’t often answered.

“You most certainly cannot,” Helena ripostes, bracingly practical. “One kiss is no culmination.”

Myka might object to the description of what just happened as “one kiss,” but she’s too busy being unable to process how an actual culmination might feel.

In fact she’s unable to process anything. “I have to sit down,” she says. Of all things, lightheadedness had not been among her expectations. It should have been: because of course her blood is nowhere near her brain.

Passing out will help nothing. Probably. So she backs awkwardly around the table, her logic, such as it is, being: I have to sit, and that is my chair; if I reach it, then I can sit. Fortunately, her reasoning bears out. She breathes into the relief, as she sits, of still being conscious.

Helena says, “If you can’t stand, then I’ll sit beside you.” More logic, here spoken as indulgence.

She situates herself in the closest chair and scoots it nearer, inch by accommodatingly sweet inch, and then she’s in fact sitting beside Myka, like they’re on a carnival ride together, and now they’re both turning sideways—with Myka devoutly grateful for her continued (seated) consciousness—as they steal (back) these kisses, these presses and exultations, that should so long before this have belonged to them.

“This is not enough,” Helena breathes, sultry against Myka’s mouth.

Myka makes a noise of agreement, and she moves for more, to start the movement to more.

Her hands have made their way to Helena’s shoulders, and are anticipating her hair, when she and her hands are startled by a crash-clatter from across the room.

Myka wishes she could simply ignore whatever such noise signifies... but that wish is unrealistic. She removes her hands and opens her eyes.

Claudia is standing in front of the sideboard. Much of the china that had previously adorned it lies around her in ruins. “I swear to god, this is not what it looks like,” she says. She glances down, then shakes her booted foot. A teacup handle falls from it, producing a tiny clink of pain as it hits the floor.

“It looks like you were trying to blink in but got the coordinates wrong,” Myka says. “That’s happened before. But this time you got tangled with the plateware?”

That yields an eyebrow-raise and a finger-point, then: “What I should’ve said was, ‘This is not what it looks like even to someone who knows all the words to my extensive back catalog of Caretakery mistakes.’ The thing is, I blinked in, saw something I was in no way supposed to be seeing, turned my back on that—faster than fast, and I swear I would’ve tried to blink back out but I can’t reset that quick—and I guess I did Wonder Woman arms, because...” She waves down at the china. “This stuff. Or ex–stuff. Unless you’ve got a lot of glue? Which you might. You were pretty stuck to H.G just now, like in a way I’ve never seen before and like I said was in no way supposed to be seeing, but it’s the most spectacular news of this century or any other because all the feels I can’t even!” She clasps her hands up high and squeezes her eyes shut, as if the scene Myka and Helena are presenting is too glorious to behold.

Myka turns from this emotional show to look at Helena. A half-beat later, Helena turns to Myka. Lacking any ready response, they both turn back to Claudia, who opens her eyes, drops her hands, and says, “Your faces are telling me all those words happened out loud.”

“Unfortunately,” Helena says.

“Hi?” Claudia offers, with an apology face.

Helena smiles. “Hello, darling,” she says, warmly.

Their interaction is lovely to witness, but: Warm, Myka thinks, because that��s how Helena’s body is, next to hers. Why, why, why has Claudia appeared now?

“I’d run over and hug you,” Claudia says, “but I see that seat’s taken. Instead I’ll just say I missed you.”

Myka can’t help herself; she accuses, “Not enough, you spy.”

“She called me. Was I supposed to be like ‘oh, it’s H.G., I better not pick up’?”

Myka’s immediate thought is YES. She says in its place an umbrage-laden, “You could have told me.”

“Maybe you don’t understand what you looked like every time you came back from seeing her,” Claudia says. “You think I wanted to make you look like that?”

Helena shifts position beside Myka, legible as a “you are failing to ignore the past” caution; Myka adds to it a self-admonitory on this day of all days. “Fine,” she says. “Not fine at all, but fine.”

“Anyway Artie’s already shouting about how you’re both late for work,” Claudia says.

Myka sighs. “Artie. Shouting. So everyone knows?”

“Well not about this. Which I double-pinky-swear I never meant to know about, even though it was always something to hope about. All Artie knows about, and probably even hopes about, is who works here. There. At that place. And is late. For it? So I guess we should get going?”

Myka can easily imagine agreeing that yes, yes they should get going: result being that she and Helena would proceed to the Warehouse. That place. Additional result, as history has shown, being that something would happen to once again put the promise of this day out of reach.

She sees, now, that she has to act against such results. Act against them. Act.

And she sees something else, something both sickening and enlivening: all her lies, those interventions against truth? They were acts. Sinful ones, but her agency in telling them has fortified her with the necessary heft for this moment.

Her lies were practice.

Morally inexcusable practice, but: she was a feral little fabulist. Now she must put ends before means. Use the muscle; ignore the exercise by which it developed.

So. “No,” she says.

Her refusal disturbs the space, shaping it into a new kind of silence.

In its wake, Claudia offers appraisal: eyes narrowed, jaw tilted. Eventually, she says. “Not entirely sure who I’m talking to now.” She squints tighter, sly-red-fox. “By the way,” she says, calculatedly casual, “your book buddy says hi.”

If anything could knock Myka out of her certainty... certainly, it’s guilt. “Oh god,” she says.

Claudia’s narrow tension relaxes. “Steve and I figured out you were the one doing ‘unauthorized use.’  And it took us a while, but we also figured out what you were unauthorized using.”

“Thanks for not telling on me,” Myka says.

“I literally would never. And neither would Steve.”

Silence again, until Helena breaks it with, “Myka used an artifact? Was this for personal gain?” She doesn’t look at Myka.

Myka wants to say Could we ignore that too. Instead she confesses, “For personal... desperation.”

Now Helena looks. “So at last you understand,” she says. It’s a softer condemnation than Myka might have expected, not that she had expected anything, because until this moment she hadn’t made the connection. Not through the clean line of “so at last.”

But then a new connection, or rather consequence, strikes her: “What’s its downside?” she asks Claudia.

“You don’t know?”

“I didn’t care.” At that, Helena grasps Myka’s hand, tight, and Myka knows she’s going to have to think very hard at some point about this newly realized kinship between them. Right now, though, she’d rather think about the fact that Helena is holding her hand. But for that niggling consequence. “Do I need to care?” she asks.

“It’s a downside, so yeah? But with this guy, it’s a downside-with-a-twist.” She pauses, as if waiting for... guesses? Applause? When neither Myka nor Helena responds, she says an aggrieved, “Anyway, it’s the same as the upside.”

This baffles Myka. “Seeing the future? How is that a downside? I mean maybe in the Cassandra sense, if nobody believes you, but—”

Claudia interrupts, “OOC of you to get that wrong. But I guess OOC is your new IC thing, Ms. ‘No’? Anyway I don’t think you grokked what the artifact is.”

“A book,” Myka says, because... it is? “A future-seeing book.”

“Book, schmook. And future-seeing... schmuture-seeing? It’s an oracle. It doesn’t see the future; it predicts it. Literally, it says in advance: you ask it a question about the future, and it answers. It says it. In advance of that future.”

Helena chuckles. “Etymology strikes again.”

To which Claudia nods. “Right?”

“I still don’t get it,” Myka says. “Saying versus seeing? In my defense, I’m very tired.” She is sorely tempted to put her head down, heedless, here on the table, but she feels Helena tighten her handhold again, a press intelligible as Stay with me. She breathes deep and refocuses.

“Its answer is a decision,” Claudia says. “About the future.”

Helena looks at Myka, then at Claudia. “Now that is power.”

“Also right,” Claudia says. “But it can’t make that decision if nobody asks it to. Myka.”

“I did ask it,” Myka concedes, “but now my head hurts. Are you saying that if I hadn’t asked, then none of this would have happened? Would be happening?” She can’t argue with the outcome, but: upside, downside? Her head does hurt.

Claudia’s face empties. She says, “Asking questions has consequences, Agent Bering.”

Has Claudia been taken over by... something? Myka can’t help it now: “What?” she asks. The word rings a little less desperate, here at home, as a thing she tends to say. But she’s no less lost.

“Sorry,” Claudia says, turning back into herself. “I was trying on my spooky-Mrs.-F suit. Bad fit so far.”

“The art of the gnomic utterance,” Helena intones. Her own utterance doesn’t quite rise to gnomic, but Myka can see more clearly than ever the helios toward which Helena-as-Caretaker might have troped. Losses. Gains. How can Myka place herself in relation to so many competing ledger columns?

“Did you just insult Mrs. F?” Claudia asks, her obvious confusion breaking into Myka’s reckoning. She might as well have said her own Myka-esque “What?”

“What?” Helena then asks, thus squaring that circle.

“The red hat?” Claudia says, gesturing at her own head. “And doing magic or whatever in your garden?”

Sense at last. Myka doesn’t quite suppress a laugh. “Gnomic,” she says. “Means terse. Mysterious. Not gnome-related... or actually, it is, but not those gnomes. Different derivation.”

“Etymology strikes yet again,” Helena says. She suppresses her own laugh—Myka hears it behind that overly serious observation—but not her smile.

“I’m really glad you’re here,” Myka tells her. The fact and experience—correct, appropriate—of their speaking together. “Claudia,” she says (and Claudia is looking at them like they’ve both lost their minds, which they probably have, but not about this), “go to the Warehouse. Keep everybody there. All day. Please.”

Claudia brings her hands together once again in a dramatically audible clap. “I get it. I mean I’d say something about a booty call, but I know that’s not it. You need your day.”

Our day? Our days. Our days, our weeks our months our years.

“Yes,” Myka says.

Helena follows up with, “We do.”

“Hey, but I’m no oracle,” Claudia says. “No predictions here.”

Myka and Helena give her incomprehension again.

“Not ruling out booty call,” she clarifies, laughing, but she backs away as she speaks, now blessedly making her exit—unlike her entrance, through the B&B’s front door.

That means Myka and Helena can—must—make their move. And they do, rising from the table, stepping toward the stairs—but not yet up them, for Myka can’t wait; her hands are at last finding Helena’s hair, and as they do, as she touches and feels, she says, in wonder, “It’s just us. It’s never been like this.”

“Why would you comment on it?” Helena demands, as if Myka taking even an instant to reflect threatens to make the entire situation evaporate. Her hands are busy too, running along Myka’s arms, not quite grasping, but then grasping, and then Myka can’t comment on anything, because her lips are busied, back in that new state of being.

The journey to her bedroom: she had in the past allowed herself to imagine such travel, but carefully, the fantasy within strictures. Policed possibility. The walk, but not its end... not, in fact, the culmination, the sense of which had increasingly eluded her, a frustratingly constant receding of possibility, as if her body were teaching itself over time to echo Helena’s incorporeality, her sensation waning, from body to limbs to fingertips alone, until all vocabularies of touch became words not near enough the tongue.

But now everything is nearing, nearing and blurring, boundaries dissolving, everything her body, her body everything, the stairs the hallway the room the clothes the hands the lips the skin the stumble the fall...

****

Myka slow-motions into consciousness, unable to discern where she is, knowing at first only that wherever it is, she was exhausted before she got there. Got here.

That’s mostly because she can’t remember the preceding events, and experience has established that extreme fatigue is one of the few states that interferes with her otherwise reliable recall.

So she begins to sort it out, blinking sleep-weighted eyes. Her initial perception is that she’s lying in a bed—a bed blessedly recognizable as hers—yet she also seems to be perceiving something else, something absurd: that Helena, of all people, is speaking to her. Speaking unclear words, near to her, while she is in this bed that is hers.

I’m dreaming.

The words resolve: “Are you all right?” Helena asks, and Myka snaps to.

Not dreaming.

She is in her bed, and Helena is here. Their skin is... together. Helena, propped on an elbow, is regarding Myka in full recline.

Myka wants to answer Helena’s question with a strong “yes.” But she isn’t at a table and she doesn’t want Helena to be reminded of her feral fabulisms, not here not now, so instead she dares to ask, “What happened?”

“I believe you fell asleep,” Helena says. “In the middle of things.”

Myka’s first thought is that she can’t imagine a worse blunder. Her second is that of course she can. Her third, which she formulates second by second and piece on piece as her memory returns, is the one she says out loud. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

Helena shakes her head. “I brought you coffee. That was all.”

It’s a damning pronouncement. “You’re saying I could have caffeinated, but instead I ruined everything.” Myka raises her left hand to cover her face. She’d use her right one too, but Helena’s body is trapping that arm. Move, she wants to say. I need both hands. To cover her shame.

Helena uses her free, unpropping hand to remove Myka’s, revealing her face. She interlaces their fingers. “Your sleep has addled you. I’m saying that I brought you a small gift, but in return you’ve given me a far greater one.”

New bafflement. “I have?”

“Witnessing your fulfillment of a bodily need.”

What could possibly be sufficient penance here? “Not the right one.”

Helena offers a considering head movement, a cerebral back-and-forth. “Isn’t it? Proof that you trust me enough to lose consciousness—in this way—so near. Differently meaningful, but meaningful all the same. Particularly to someone who, as you know, occasionally forgets to ‘ignore it.’”

Her words have such depth, in sound and meaning, that Myka can barely process any of it. Particularly given that they are lying down in privacy... and far more.

“What am I supposed to do now?” she asks. Blunder some more, the book would no doubt reiterate... but she’d rather get her guidance, here in this moment, from Helena.

“Enjoy it.” Helena says, and she laughs—this sound not deep but high, high and so happy.

Myka has never heard this laugh from her. It’s as much a directive as her words are. “Enjoy it—I didn’t know,” she says. That comes out more terse than she intends... because she can barely speak. The joy in the room—occasioned by everything, but especially by that new, new laugh—is so thick, interior and exterior to bodies and souls, that forcing words through it takes great effort.

“Know what?”

Myka would worry about her answer sounding too intellectual, if this were anyone else. In her bed. But it’s Helena. Thank god, it’s Helena. So she feels safe to say, “It’s a corollary. Follows from ‘ignore it’? I think?”

“Yes,” Helena says, gratifying Myka immensely, “yes, ignore it, about the past; enjoy it, about the present; and thus one additional corollary, this one about the future.”

“Ask an oracle about it?” Myka tries.

Helena frowns—exaggerated, comic. “That doesn’t follow, either poetically or epistrophically.”

“It does follow epistrophically.”

“Minimally so,” Helena sniffs. The acknowledgment, itself minimal, further pleases Myka, even as Helena goes on, “But it should scan as well. My proposal does.” She pauses, doubtless for effect. Myka tries to think out what the teased proposal might entail, but she doesn’t get far before Helena pronounces, “Absolve it.”

“That does scan,” Myka acknowledges.

“Thank you. This next doesn’t, but I know you’ll want to take on blame for how our future unfolds, so I add: absolve yourself as well.”

Ignore it; enjoy it; absolve it. These strategies—despite Myka’s having insisted on the first—are all antithetical to her way of being in the world.

But she’s been unhappy, being in the world. Unsatisfied.

Now she is being satisfied, a new state that only this skin-to-skin with Helena could possibly have brought about.

She deliriously doesn’t care whether Claudia has kept, did keep, is keeping everyone else away.

This is hers and she can and will enjoy it.

This is hers and Helena’s and she can and will see to it—she can and will ensure—that they both enjoy it.

She has never before ideated such power—could never have, but here it is, in her hands, in her body, in giving and taking: power. And if she’s still too tired to remember, on next waking, that she had it, it’s all right. She’ll have another occasion to exert it. More anothers.

“Did you just say ‘more anothers’?” Helena asks, speaking and breathing with exertion.

Apparently there’s still room, in and amongst the joy and the power, for embarrassment. “Out loud? Are you sure?”

Helena calms enough to say, with indignation, “My hearing is quite good.”

“Evasive answer,” Myka says, recovering a little. “I’ll take it as a no.”

“Evasive?” More indignation.

“It wasn’t a yes,” Myka points out.

Helena runs a hand through her hair, as if in preparation for more argument. “I propose we table this debate,” she says instead.

“Good idea,” Myka says. “Because instead of talking, or asking about talking, you should be kissing me.”

“So should you. Vice versa. Me. Kissing.”

Transportingly charming near-incoherence... “You’re right,” Myka says, her heart overflowing. “So be quiet.”

“You first,” Helena ripostes, with what sounds suspiciously like a giggle.

Myka wants to keep that sound active, so she doesn’t comply. And they continue to speak together. Through it all.

This time, Myka stays awake. That’s probably a blunder too—but it’s most satisfactory.

****

In the weeks and months that follow, Myka takes time, as she finds it, to visit the book. Often, its pages ruffle and sigh, their invitation clear: Don’t you want to know? To know more?

The temptation is real, compounded by what she feels as an exertion of pressure from the volume: Did I not gift you this future? it seems to whisper. Surely you could gift me the opportunity to exercise. To provide still greater definition.

Then again, that could simply be her guilt—her ongoing struggle to absolve it—talking.

On one such occasion (though not the only one), she hears footsteps. The rhythm, the particular ring of heel-strikes: she knows the confidence of those strides. The knowing is calming, if not itself absolving.

“Back already?” she asks without turning around.

“Absurdly simple retrieval,” Helena says. “Steve found the entire exercise an insult to the considerable intelligence he and I bring to bear on any mission we undertake.”

Helena’s interpretations of Steve’s thoughts are often baroque—often, seemingly, more suitable to her own thoughts. But when she offers such interpretations in Steve’s presence, he doesn’t wince. “Really?” Myka says, just to make sure.

“He said aloud that he was bored.”

“That’s something,” Myka concedes.

“And you?” Helena asks. “Have you contrived to place new parameters on the future?”

“I keep telling you I won’t.”

“And yet I continue to find you here,” Helena says. More seriously, she offers words that have become customary: “If you could be happy.” Steve’s utterance, shared among the three of them, has become a mantra.

“You know that’s a work in progress,” Myka says, and although that’s customary too, it’s also true: while she knows she can be, and while at certain times she genuinely is, she is by no means consistent in that achievement.

Nevertheless she has to admit, now as always, that the book has been right. The blunders—the many, many blunders, even as she’s perpetrated them, even as she’s dealt with their aftermath—have been satisfactory. Such are the components of that work. Of its progress.

Helena nods. She lays her hand upon the book, as it lies there on the shelf, as if swearing an oath. “Everything is,” she says.

****

Myka sits at tables. She tells lies. But the sitting and the lying, as activities, are now uncoupled.

Coffee, too, has shed its significance; it’s a beverage, not an event.

However: she keeps a stained shirt in her closet as a reminder of earlier, pained, connected times—of, also, the work that was even then in progress, even as she was failing, spectacularly, to recognize it as such.

She needs the reminder, because with regard to the past, “ignore it” doesn’t always work. Nor does “absolve it,” as the future unfolds.

But on the best of present days, ignoring and absolving intersect. And on those best days, Myka does, in fact and in practice, enjoy it.

END

Instead of shoehorning thoughts into tags, here’s what I’ve got:

Did both Myka and Helena get let off the hook too easily? Your call... but I’m inclined to embrace the idea that instances of grace might manifest as the reward for hard work, and acknowledging culpability may be the hardest work of all. I mean, Elton John wrote a song about it, so put that on whichever side of the ledger works for you. Also, I like it when people help Myka in ways she doesn’t know how to ask for. She seems (to me) to be very bad at asking for help. Or maybe I mean that she seems disinclined to ask for help even (or especially) when she should.

Generally the only way to come out the other side of the hard stuff is to go through. But sometimes you do have to set some things aside if you want to move forward... and that’s what this story, at base, has been about. I hope. I offer all gratitude to @barbarawar for giving me the impetus to think it through in this particular way, at my snail-in-a-school-zone pace.  Finally, if there’s a timeline in which Helena becomes an agent again and she and Steve don’t become partners, I don’t want to know about it. The potential perfection of their pairing thrills the bejesus out of me.

[pavlovianpanic]

so nathan and his post!prison (because it's prison, not jail, i just like the term jailbird a lot) thus also his in-prison / post LIS 1 verse info:

this is nathan's only verse that offers any form of "redemption".

i'll break it down in parts easily:

this follows the SAVE THE BAY ie chloe dies route for LIS.

kate marsh testified against nathan, as well as mark. nathan pleaded guilty regardless, he cracked fast under the pressure, revealed everything, and confessed ... but her testimony was also partially a victim impact statement in regards to nathan. mark was the one that likely refused to plead guilty.

a few other girls came forward against nathan, too. when girls were revealed / reached out to about their binders in the dark room, they likely might have come forward, perhaps anonymously, perhaps not. there are lot of victims here ... some that don't even know they're victims / some they might have suspected.

nathan was charged for (in vague terms, not like specific charges): drug possession, drug distribution, sexual assault, aggravated assault, charged with mark in the murder of rachel amber, charged in the assault of kate marsh, distributing the video of kate marsh being drugged, and the sole murder of chloe price along with a few other minor charges there were dropped eventually. what he actually went to prison for was the murder of rachel amber and the murders of chloe price, as well as the assault of kate marsh. a lot of the other charges were dropped because "those are the big ones" ie the ones they can really nail him on. justice systems are weird, but everything nathan did is known. even if his "time served" isn't quite for all of his crimes, his crimes are known to the public.

nathan takes less heat for the dark room photos because mark is taking the brunt of that. he took the pictures, and he was selling them in the dark market. they have their own cases against them while also being charged in somewhat tandem.

mark is responsible for like kidnapping, drugging, assault, the production of those photos, etc. he's not innocent here. their charges are just different. but when it comes down to it: mark didn't kill rachel, he didn't kill chloe, so 'murder' (while yes, papers say he was arrested for various things including that) is not quite accurate to his charges. also! the amount of time mark has been doing this? they know he’s got a history of some sort, but pinning it down? hard. maybe sean talked? maybe not.

nathan spends the next (roughly) decade in prison. he is mostly isolated or in solitary confinement due to the nature of his crimes / he is smaller than other inmates / he is often targeted for violence. he's almost been killed twice. nathan also still has a lot of meltdowns at first, but these mellow out as he is given a new dose of meds, is often somewhat sedated, and has started pursuing drawing over photography. he has always been very artistic. he also writes a lot; poems, unsent letters, stories, dreams he's had, etc. he journals a lot. that's a big LIS motif. he writes his journal to a couple of people, but mostly to kate. sometimes victoria. sometimes his dad. sometimes mark.

he has few visitors. his mother comes. his sister writes, but very infrequently. kate (ottersden) comes to see him the most, but that isn't right away. additionally, judith does have involvement in nathan's post!prison verse in our dynamic, so that does carry over.

but by default, kate is the reason nathan even seeks out redemption at all, planning to just "rot there" until she intervenes. over the next ten years, more likely eight, i think it takes her time to reach out, first through letter, then call, then after a year finally in person, so more ... seven to six years of them actually meeting face-to-face. while kate was influential in putting nathan away, she becomes influential in his release.

nathan leaves prison. he goes to a halfway house in the area / sometimes near portland / eventually goes to the gresham area of oregon, which is just outside of portland. it's somewhat lower income, so he can afford it as he starts to work odd jobs around division street, powell blvd, and other locations. dishwasher, occasional (not legal) bartender, even doing some "semi-legal" cannabis trimming (he cannot get a license for the industry, but the med and street scene are still big, but rec cannabis is also huge in oregon). lots of different things.

when he moves into his own place, it is furnished a lot from kate and the good will. after settling in, roughly two weeks in, he receives an anonymous package containing a digital camera and small tripod, as well as a strap, and other small tools. he knows this is from his father. he puts it away in his closet. it haunts him. he can't throw it away, but he can't show anyone. especially not kate, who has started to come over recently.

in kate coming over: doors unlocked, windows open, no drinks or food provided by him, curtains revealed, etc. this begins to ease up as she trusts him more.

he wants to potentailly go to mt. hood community college or clackamas community college. he lives a bit near the former.

he walks everywhere. he can't afford a car. he also uses the bus system combined with the MAX (our train basically), as well as the street cars. he also begins to bike. biking is huge in oregon, especially portland. it has its own "culture", but he just bikes around to get places. sometimes he goes on trails.

nathan looks a bit different now: darker hair and eyes, pallid complexion, still thin but a bit more filled out, and he's almost thirty now / is just now thirty. he was always a year above kate and max. he goes by nate socially.

nathan runs a lot. he should have pursued track. he doesn't watch sports anymore. he still has a lot of the same interests, but he keeps that shit to himself. his movie collection is growing again. he struggles with food sometimes — he’s a slow learner … but he learns.

he's off the drugs and alcohol. he's off everything but his meds, though he still struggles with temptation. but he's been sober for so long, out of the "prison culture" (because no one trusted him to give him anything), and while drugs are easily accessible in oregon, nathan is trying to be on the straight and narrow. he's on parole, he gets tested, he cannot fuck up.

after he's off parole? he might smoke weed. not sure yet.

does he visit mark? ... he's not allowed to. but he wants to? does he want to? he doesn't know.

has he spoken to his father? ... no. nathan has a new number. he's on kate's phone plan actually.

does he see his mother? ... unsure. he wants to. but he is afraid to see her out of prison. prison protected them. this is the world again, and his father runs the world as they know it.

what if mark gets out, too? nate is fucked.

nathan? is going for 'redemption', and seems to be seeking that a lot through kate marsh, who is one of the few who even entertains nathan. part of this is for her and her healing, she made a victim impact statement against him (he plead guilty and confessed everything, implicating not only mark but even his dad, who got his name off that shit so fast). part of this is because if nathan can change, maybe she can fully heal? it's not so simple as 'kate is good person'. it's more than that. kate is not just his victim, and now? she's reclaimed that. she's older. she's grown as he grows. she is different, too.

mark? is going for escape. become someone else. don't make the same mistakes again.

sean? was powerful enough to not get caught. he removed everything that had anything to do with him. he bought off anyone who looked into him, and if he couldn't buy them? he'd buy off their superior. stop looking into sean prescott. documents? gone. the barn and ranch house? 'a fire'. evidence was collected that was lost in connection to him. but why not help nathan? because nathan fucked sean over. and mark. and mark also fucked sean over. sean is out ofr himself. fuck nathan. fuck mark.

also for post!prison nathan -> he goes by nate now, and is considering changing his name tbh, nathan is also naturally a lot paler now, his hair has darkened, and his eyes are much more 'dead' and have 'lost color' or 'seem paler'. he's older, almost thirty now, and while he is still young, he's clearly worn and very tired, very ready to 'start over'. he's not strung out, but he knows how that feels, and he's probably emotionally strung out tbh. but ready to change. he's changed so much. he just has to keep it up. but is redemption fair to him when all his victims, ones that know and do not know, are out there? dead AND alive? kate helps with that.

mark -> goes by something else, i'm sure. a different name entirely. mark jefferson is tainted. he also changes his appearance quite a bit, as he also ages and changes in prison. he thinned out, had more facial hair in prison, likely shaves most if not all of it off post-prison, dyes his hair or lets it be grey (as he is almost 50 now, and i assume he's the type that just "goes white" entirely or is very grey all over, not very patchy, just a smooth transition). he likely goes by something somewhat similar to mark jefferson, but i'll think about it.

mark getting out, if he does, complicates things for nate. it scares him. he believes mark is coming for him, becomes very paranoid, changes his name again if he hasn't already, dyes his hair, and overall has a mental breakdown out of fear.

"In the Sacrifice Chloe ending, Max travels back in time and lets Chloe get shot. Shortly after, David enters the bathroom and arrests Nathan. He later is questioned by the police, revealing Jefferson's involvement and he gets arrested eventually."

so, this is why i discuss how nathan pleads guilty, cracks quick, and just confesses to everything. kate does testify against mark and nathan, but her testifying against nathan is more a victim-impact statement than anything else. mark was the one most unwilling to plead guilty. sean got himself absolved, as rich men do.