#this is how my brain collapses. what sort of shape will i b in by the time we finish? (ie my birthday lol)

[opens-up-4-nobody]

Me, explaining things in a way that's completely incoherent: I don't understand what you find so difficult to comprehend???

[luimagines]

Would you mind doing the chain confessing, but Reader falls asleep on them? Keep up the good work <3

Masterlist

A failed confession? Or a secret confession?

I can do that.

Part 1 will include Wind, Sky and Legend

Content under the cut!

Wind

Wind was tired.

You were tired.

The Chain needed to keep going and he was going to snap at the next person who so much as spoke to him.

Wind sighed and rolled his neck, trying to at least get some motion to wake him up but there wasn’t much to be done- if anything it just made him roll his head downwards and he nearly threw himself to the ground.

He felt your hand reach out to grab his arm when he almost ate the dirt.

“Careful.” You voice came out quiet even as you nearly tripped over your won feet. 

They were being pushed too much.

“Love you.” Wind muttered as he rubbed his eyes. There was a moment of sudden soberness where his own words finally registered in his own brain.

But you collapsed against his arm and side with a quiet sigh.

Wind scrambled to catch you before you hit the ground but there was no waking you up no matter how much he tried.

You feel asleep standing up- you fell asleep walking even...

Wind ran a hand through his hair as he sat next to you.

Screw it- nap time. Wind plopped himself on the ground and cuddled up next to you, too tired to be bother being self conscious.

The other will have to carry the two of you, you’re done.

Sky

You heaved in a breath and flopped onto the ground next to the fire. You were done with this shift for the night, regretted taking the mid shift. You almost fell asleep in the middle of it but were done and Sky was next.

Sky didn’t like this but he drew the short stick this night.

He sat up and stretched, letting a few bones in his back pop as he went.

He stood up and watched as he tried to get comfy into your bed roll, ready to be dead to the world once again.

A smile graced over his face as he watched you roll around for a minute before contorting yourself in a position that could not be comfortable in the long run. “Goodnight Sky.”

“Goodnight.” He replied back. “Love you.”

Sky’s heart drops to his feet as he freezes and waits for any sort of reaction or a reply or anything that means he’s just royally messed up your friendship in a rare moment of vulnerability.

Sky hears nothing from your spot and he slowly turns. He’s fearing that you’re going to be staring at him, wide eyes, mouth agape with nothing but horror- or worse- disgust in your eyes.

But nothing.

You’re asleep.

He waits for any other clue to tell him that you’re actually awake and heard him and he’s waiting for the end of his world....

But no... you’re asleep- completely dead to the world just like you wanted.

Sky takes a large breath and collapsed on the log next to the fire.

That was too close.

Legend

Are they gonna die?

Legend heaved in the hot dusty air and coughed out of his lungs not a second after.

You were in bad shape, he was sure his whole side was still on fire and there was no back up. At least none that he knew of.

“My everything hurts.” You shift next to him and roll your head on his shoulder. “This sucks.”

Legend can’t help but laugh. “Those wouldn’t be the exact words I’d use.” He finds himself saying with a bitter smile on his face. “But I agree.”

“As you should because I am usually right.” You smile slightly before your expression falls into a grimace. “I kinda wish I was wrong this time though.”

Legend nods and closes his eyes. “I know that feelings.”

It’s not looking good for either of you but he tries to be a little optimistic he think you both would live through is. It’s not gonna be pretty... and if neither of you actually get help anytime soon the healing process isn’t gonna be a joy ride either.

But he thinks you’ll make it though...

Until he feels you go a little limp next to him.

“H-hey!” Legend sits up somewhat. “Don’t do that here. You can’t just rest now, what if we get jumped again?”

“I’m sorry, I’m trying, really. I’m just... so tired.” You yawn and blink your eyes open.

“Talk to me then.” Legend tries. “We need to stay awake.”

“Mmmm... What about?”

“I love you.” He blurts and waits for your reactions. He was sure that it would at least shock you enough to get a more explosive reaction... but nothing.

“I’m in love with you.” He tries again.

Nothing.

He sits up fully even though his side protests against it and finds you with your eyes closed and your arms wrapped around yourself.

He doubt you heard him at all.

He grabs you by the shoulders and shakes you a bit.

You hum and look up at him but Legend knows that’s your struggling.

This is worse then he thought.

Part 2

[themonotonysyndrome]

Halcyon Heart

Serving you guys part 5 of the ‘Successors of the Future’ today! Oh god, I procrastinate this oneshot like you wouldn’t believe it! Honestly? I’m not too happy about this piece but the plot must keep moving. 

In this oneshot, the names of Leona, Ace and Deuce’s kids will be reveal! I did my best to keep their names within the card games theme and overall, I think they turned out ok. I went with the deep meaning name for Leona’s son. Kudos to anyone who manage to figure out the meaning behind them! 

This oneshot can’t begin without us thanking the great @tri3tri for her amazing Second Wive AU. Please drop by at her blog to see even more yandere!Malleus content. 

-

“Well... you certainly are MC’s daughter, Renata-chan.” The headmaster sigh tiredly. Behind his mask, Crowley narrowed his eyes at the three students sitting across his desk. Said girl is at least apologetic (Crowley assumed she is, because she can barely look him in the eyes), the two boys with her - Hoyle Trappola and Rex Spade are just seconds away from passing out from sheer exhaustion, sporting scorch marks on their face, hair and uniforms. 

Crowley resists pinching the bridge of his nose in irritation. And to think, his day has been going on so well too. He had finally managed to complete all of his paperwork before the end of the month, the teaching staffs aren’t passive-aggressively bickering with one another for once, and the cook in the cafeteria even left the last dessert of the day just for him! 

And then came Professor Crewel kicking his office’s door down, dragging three rowdy puppies behind him and a report about scorched marks on pavements and fountain due to misconduct of magic. 

When Crowley leans to the side to see which students were responsible, he could only sigh. Was it too much to ask for this generation of Trappola, Spade and MC/S not to inherit their parent’s ungodly habit of getting into trouble!? 

So here there are now, three students waiting for punishments. At that moment, Crowley felt as if he was transported into the past as he stares down at them. 

Crowley folded his arms across his chest and said, “Professor Crewel reported your misbehaviours and the damages done. Now, what I want to know is how this happened.” Silence. “Well? Would anyone like to share the story?” 

Almost instantly, the young Spade spoke up. “It’s all Hoyle’s fault!” An indignant hiss of, “Shut it, Rex!” interrupted him, but the boy ignored it and pressed on, “He dropped a food tray on MC/S-san when she was eating.” 

“Oi! I told you already! It was an accident, alright!?” Young Trappola is quick to defend himself, disgruntled about the whole affair. Beside him, Renata just rolled her eyes. Despite looking so much like her father, she’s surprisingly expressive with a lit fused of a temper. 

“An accident? While young Trappola did commit a mistake, does it warrant an... explosive reaction, MC/S-san?” Here, Crowley stares pointedly at the girl. 

Renata sigh. “No, headmaster.” 

“In the future, please restrain yourself MC/S-san. Now then, punishment.” The three of them groaned, and unimpressed, Crowley tilt his head at them. “Keep that up and I will extend your punishment to a month.” 

The teenagers straighten up after that. Good. So he continues. 

“The three of you will be cleaning the Hall of Mirrors starting tomorrow, right after your last class of the day. Now, because the damages are only minor, your punishment will only be for a week. If I catch any reports that the three of you misbehaving again, I will extend the punishment. Is that clear?” Crowley demanded. 

“Yes, headmaster.” The three of them drone simultaneously. 

And with that, Crowley dismisses them. Once the door is click shut, voices are raised outside - the three of them are bickering again - before footsteps carried them away. 

The headmaster could only wordlessly shake his head. Looks like he’s in for another rough few years until these three graduated. 

Just like old times. 

Outside at the quiet hallway, the only noises that can be heard this evening are Hoyle’s heated complaints, Rex’s put out sighs and Renata’s outwardly annoyance (in the inside though, Hoyle’s flying food tray was a pleasant surprise. Sometimes, it’s nice not to use Observer all the time). 

“Quit your complaining already, Hoyle.” Rex interjects when he could no longer tolerate his whining. “At least the headmaster didn’t expel us!” 

“Yeah, yeah. And you!” Hoyle said and focused his attention on Renata. She raised an inquisitive eyebrow when he glares at her. “This is not just my fault, you know! Got anything to say about that?” 

Renata nodded, her face turned serious though her lips struggle not to twitch into a cheeky grin. “Yes. Dodge better next time.” 

Rex gapes at her, incredulous and certainly not expecting that comment while Hoyle bristles. 

“This is going to be a long week.” Rex muttered as Renata pretend to be nonchalant when Hoyle demanded an apology. 

True to his word, their week shaped up to be rather long and busy. Not only did the three of them were reprimanded by the headmaster and their Dorm Leaders, they also had piles and piles of homework and club practise on top of their punishment. By the time Thursday roll by, they were ready to collapse from exhaustion. 

Tonight, Rex had to drag Hoyle by his arm as they head towards Heartslabyul’s main mirror that leads to Hall of Mirrors. A few of their dorm members watch their shenanigans with amusement while others snickered; it’s practically known throughout their dorm of their punishment. 

“For fuck’s sake, Rex, lemme go! Why can’t we let Renata clean the mirrors tonight for once!?” Hoyle exclaimed, doing his best o wrestle his arm free but surprisingly, Rex is a lot stronger than he lets on. 

“Do you want her to complain to the headmaster that we’re slacking off?” Rex suggests. “And extend our punishment? Look, the sooner we can finish off cleaning the Hall of Mirrors, the sooner we can have our free time again.” 

“I hate that you make sense.” Hoyle grumbled but decided not to argue any further. 

When they step through the mirror, they found that Renata is already there, waiting for them. Her back was facing them, and she’s currently talking to... no one. 

“ - was ok. I mean, with all things considered and I didn’t use any of my spells so shut up, Cherry.” A voice - it sounds like a woman - chatter back. “It’s just cleaning the mirrors of the seven dorms, no big deal. Mm-hmm, I promise not to throw fire at people next time, Mama.” The woman - apparently, Renata’s mother - said something, but it’s muffled. “Will do, Mama. Goodnight, I love you too.” 

Renata put something - not a phone. It’s too small to be one - into her blazer’s pocket and turn around. 

She greets them, “What kept you guys? I already swept the floor and dusted the walls.” 

“This one wanted to ditch.” Rex reply, pointing a finger at Hoyle before he grabs the mop and bucket. 

“Oi! You didn’t have to tell her.” Hoyle snapped. 

“Uh, did you think on how that’s going to be for you if it’s only me and Spade-san doing the cleaning?” Renata asked, looking and clearly judging how many brain cells he has. 

Hoyle just told her to shut up and picks up a wet sponge from a spare bucket filled with soap to start cleaning Scarabia’s mirror. 

It’s quiet as they clean up the Hall of Mirrors. As Rex mop the floor, he could see Renata focusing on her task in wiping the mirror that he and Hoyle just used. During the Entrance Ceremony, he could only catch a glimpse of her from the back of the crowd, confused as to why his seniors are mumbling and commenting about her appearance. 

Only the blind couldn’t see how beautiful the girl is. If Rex is the poetic sort, he would liken the night of a full moon and stars to her. But honestly, other than her pretty face, he doesn’t understand why their seniors tend to give her a wide berth whenever she walks by. 

Hell, he even noticed that her own dorm members are polite yet strangely distant with her. 

Rex wonders if she’s lonely. “So, uh, you’re pretty good with magic, huh MC/S-san?” He blurted out. He surprises himself at his sudden boldness. 

Thankfully Renata didn’t find it strange or awkward. “More or less. Magic always fascinated me, even when as I was a kid. I’ve been testing the limit of my magic ever since.” Pleased at herself when Heartslabyul’s mirror gleam under the bright light, she moves on to Savanaclaw’s. 

“What about you, Spade-san?” Renata threw his question back. 

“It’s alright, MC/S-san! You can call me Rex.” 

“Ah, then please call me Renata. Since you extend the same courtesy and all.” 

An easy conversation flow between them after that. Occasionally, Hoyle would join them, his brand of sarcasm or snarkiness here and there but overall, it was nice to talk to him. And when he threw a rather malicious teasing to Renata, she threw right one back. It strangely morphs into a playful banter between the three of them. 

Cleaning felt less like a punishment after that. 

-

When they finally reach the final day of their punishment, something happened. 

While Hoyle and Rex shared the same class - 1-A - Renata is in 1-B. And it just so happen that her negligence came to bit her in the ass. 

After History lesson ended for class 1-A and Hoyle was the last one to leave due to Professor Trein holding him back to talk about his recent subpar assignment, a Heartslabyul student from 1-B called him out. 

“Extra assignment? This is the worst...” Hoyle sigh in dejection once he finishes reading the piece of paper given to him by the teacher. Dangling the piece of paper in low spirits, Hoyle resigned himself to many, many trips to the library so this extra assignment can boost his grade from F to a D. 

So lost in his thought, he completely missed that his name being called. It was only when a student - his dorm member - grab his shoulder that he broke out from his train of thoughts. 

“Hey, you’re Hoyle Trappola, right? The one that was nearly flambé alive, yeah?”

Hoyle bristle. Is that what people are calling him now? The flambé dude? Urgh, this is seriously all Renata’s fault! “What do you want?” He snaps. Unfortunately for him, the Heartslabyul student was unfazed of his bad mood. 

“Listen, I need you to do something for me. I shared the same class as that Diasomnia girl, 1-B. Earlier today she left this in class.” Hoyle’s dorm member explain and showed him a plain-looking journal. “She left quickly and when I saw her at the Main Street, she was with Bakari Kingscholar. Anyway, I just thought that since you and Rex are cleaning the Hall of Mirrors with her, you can give this back.” 

“Why are asking me to do it? You just said that you saw her at the Main Street!” 

“Yeah and with Kingscholar. I couldn’t approach her; not when that guy glared at me and my legs froze up. So here you go!” 

And with that, he shoves the journal into Hoyle’s arms, making him fumble with the paper and journal before they could drop. “Oi! I’m not doing your fucking errand - ” Hoyle shouted, but by then, his dorm member had long jog off with a cheerful wave goodbye. “Seriously... this is so not my day...” 

As Hoyle made his way to the library, he absentmindedly flips through the pages of the journal. Not all care that it was rude to rummage through others’ belonging. Notes about various classes mostly filled the pages; others are just mindless doodles that the girl probably drew out of boredom. 

“Isn’t there anything good in here? Something that can knock her off her high horse maybe.” Hoyle murmurs to himself as he continues to flip the pages. Rex might be willing to let it slide that it was Renata that landed them in trouble with the principle but not him. Hoyle felt that a prank would even the score between them. 

By the time he scored himself a nice, quiet table in the corner of the library, he reaches to the last page of Renata’s journal. His eyes widen at the sight of a strange rune that took up the entire white page. There were even some notes written around it. “Well, well, what is this? Communication rune? This looks interesting...”

Later that night as Rex was about to step through the mirror, he felt something... not quite right. Perhaps he ate something bad during dinner. His uneasiness is not going to dampen his high spirits though. Finally, tonight is their last day of punishment! Tomorrow they’ll be free humans! 

“Yo, Rex! Glad to see you show up before MC/S.” 

Hoyle greets him with a wide grin, standing in the centre of the hall. 

“Oh, you were here first, Hoyle? Did you start cleaning?” Rex was surprised that Hoyle actually took the initiative to start their chore before them. Rex’s heart is touched. Maybe Hoyle isn’t all that bad - 

“What? Forget about cleaning, check out what I have!” 

Nevermind. Rex takes it back. 

Hoyle didn’t hesitate to drag the unimpressed Rex close to him and shove a piece of folded paper in between his eyes. When he unfolded it, Rex is confused. Someone had drawn a rune. Now, Rex doesn’t know all that much about runes and their inner workings, so he has no idea why Hoyle has this with him. 

“What is this? Your homework?” Rex asked, his face scrunched up. “I don’t remember seeing this in class.” 

Hoyle rolled his eyes. “It’s not homework. I found this in MC/S’s journal this morning and tried to checked all the books about runes and stuff in the library but nothing came up. How crazy is that!” He excitedly explains, eyes shining brightly. 

Rex didn’t share his enthusiasm, however. “You stole Renata’s journal?” His eyes are wide in disbelief. He threw the piece of paper back at Hoyle who easily catch it. “Do you want her to burn you again!?” 

“What she won’t know, won’t harm her. That is, if you keep this between us.” Hoyle reply, narrowing his eyes at Rex in a threatening manner. 

Rex just throws his hands up in exasperation. “She’s going to find out when she realised that her journal is missing! Look, just put put that thing back and - ”

“Hell no. I want to test this out. Aren’t you curious too?” Hoyle demanded, and that’s when Rex notices that he has a marker pen in his other hand. “And beside, I’ll give the journal back to her once we find out what this rune does.” He then walks around him towards the Heartslabyul mirror and starts drawing. 

“W-Wait! It’s against the rule - ” Rex stammers out, but Hoyle quickly interrupts him. 

“Rule 809: One should not vandalise Heartslabyul’s mirror. Yeah, yeah, I remember. But this - ” Hoyle stops drawing to gesture at the marker pen in his hand “ - is not a permanent. So I’m not technically breaking any rules if I can just clean it up later.” He answered with a nonchalant shrug. 

Rex paused to ponder. Well, Hoyle put it that way... More than that, Rex is baffled that Hoyle remembers that particular rule of their dorm. 

“Done!” Hoyle huff proudly before taking a step back to admire his handiwork. He briefly glances at the paper and then back to the mirror - it’s a perfect copy. The two boys watch as the surface of the mirror ripple once before the rune vanishes, and the mirror becomes pitch black. 

“Whoa... I’ve never seen any mirror in Night Raven College look black before.” Rex said in awe. He gently and carefully presses his fingers on the surface, and it pushes through. “It feels like any other enchanted mirrors though.” 

“It’s not suppose to lead anywhere. According to the notes, it’s a communication rune.” Hoyle explains. “But there’s no such thing as communication runes so this must be something that MC/S came up.” 

Rex’s eyes widen at Hoyle’s theory. Runes are notoriously one of the hardest subjects ever in all of Twisted Wonderland. She mentioned that she’s been experimenting with magic, but Rex didn’t expect that she could do something like this! 

Suddenly, Rex’s awe quickly turns to horror when something yanks his fingers into the mirror. 

“What the - ”

“Rex!” Hoyle shouted and grabbed his arm to pull his back. Rex’s arm is inside of the black mirror! A powerful tug completely yanks the two of them into the mirror and the surface return to normal. 

The next thing they realise is that they’re now in the mirror. 

And that’s how Renata found them; a piece of paper with her rune on it and rex and Hoyle pounding furiously from the inside of the mirror and screaming at her to get them out. 

“For fuck’s sake you guys - ”

Needless to say, the three of them are in for a long night. 

-

“So you finally decide to show up? You kept me waiting for an hour. I love to hear your excuse - why do you look like shit?”

“Shut up, Kingscholar. I don’t want to hear it from you.” 

“...Right. Any reason why there’s Heartslabyul students in my mirror then?”

“Whoa, so this is how it looks like inside of the Savanaclaw dorm!”

“I, uh, didn’t expect that you like to do homeworks in, uh, Kingscholar’s bedroom, Renata-san.”

Bakari glares at Renata who just look tired and supporting heavy, black eye bags. The girl in question refused to look at him. 

-

And there we go! This is the start to Renata, Hoyle and Rex glorious friendship and shenanigans. Their friendships mirrored their parents except the kids are lot stronger; magically-wise. I’m fleshing out their characters and Unique Magic as we go along the series but so far, I have a pretty good idea how I want them to turn out. 

[lakesandquarries]

Baby Shoes - Chapter 5

Bubby has been a doctor at Black Mesa for 20 years, living there for 50. He’s been bouncing around from project to project, working on whatever needs most help. He doesn’t have any opinions on his work or his coworkers or anything like that, preferring to keep to himself.

Then he meets Black Mesa’s newest project.

AKA: Bubby is Benrey’s dad au.

title from “Baby Shoes” by Bad Books.

thank u to my friend gordon for beta reading even after i threatened to steal his blood <3 ilu bitch

AO3 Link

Bubby had forgotten about the tinfoil until he walks into Zeki’s office. She’s ripping it off her desk, a few hairs slipping from her careful bun, and Bubby has to hide his smile behind his hand.

“Did you have something to do with this?” she demands, throwing a ball of tinfoil on the floor. 

“I’ve been with the subject all day. You can check the cameras, if you want.”

“I just might,” Zeki warns. She pulls another sheet off her chair and collapses into it. “So. Where are we moving you? The tube is all ready.”

“B-22,” Bubby says. “Near the break room. The L-shaped one.”

“The storage room?”

“It’s been years since it’s stored anything but dust.”

Zeki frowns, ripping the tinfoil off a pen. “You don’t need to do this, you know.”

“You offered, didn’t you? A real scientist is willing to try new things.”

She grits her teeth. “I’ll get it cleared with -”

“Aren’t you the department head?”

There’s a pause. Bubby doesn’t look away from Zeki, pale blue eyes staring into green. 

“Fine,” she spits. “I’ll ask the cleaning crew to clear it out.”

Bubby smiles. “I’ll start packing my things.”

He turns on his heel, leaving Zeki to her paperwork and her tinfoil covered office.

Dekkard’s back in the breakroom, sat in the corner eating his doritos. “They are stale,” he informs Bubby as he sits down across from him.

“Zeki approved the room.”

Dekkard drops the bag. “She did?”

“Very begrudgingly, I might add. Though I think at least some of her frustration was due to the tinfoil covering every available surface.”

Dekkard beams at him. “Today has truly been a wonderful day.”

“I’ll miss you after she kills you.” Bubby reaches across the table, grabbing one of Dekkard’s doritos. They’re stale, and he doesn’t even like chips, but he hasn’t eaten since this morning. Dekkard nudges the bag closer to Bubby, and before he realizes it, the bag is empty. “Alright, well, I have other work to get back to.”

Dekkard frowns. “I think you mean you have lunch to get back to.”

“I don’t have time for that. I need-”

“To take a break.”

Bubby huffs. “I’m not going to let myself be lectured by someone half my age.”

“I’m not lecturing you! I’m just saying, you seem kinda stressed, and I was thinking of heading over to the cafeteria to get something more substantial. I thought maybe you’d wanna come with.”

“To the cafeteria? Absolutely not.”

“It’s not like there’s somewhere else we can get food,”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong. Come with me.” He doesn’t wait for Dekkard, standing up and leaving, though the sound of footsteps behind him means Dekkard must be following. “You know, cooking is a kind of science.”

“Is it?”

“I’d say so.” He leads Dekkard out of the Biological Research wing, down a flight of stairs. “And I think someone high up agreed with me, once.” The area they’re in was something, once, but now it’s abandoned. The lights burst years ago, the only illumination left coming from the level above.

“Did you bring me out here to kill me?” Dekkard asks, picking his way through the room. 

“If I wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead. Here, this way.” It takes Bubby a moment to pry the door open, the hinges stiff from disuse. “I have no idea what this used to be, but. No one ever comes here.”

It was likely a lab of some sort - of course it was, that’s what Black Mesa does - but it was surprisingly easy to turn it into a kitchen. There’s a makeshift stove, no source of fire since Bubby can make that himself but just something to hold the flames. Scales and flasks serve as something like measuring cups, and he’s stolen various blades from around the facilities, along with any else he can get his hands on. It’s messy, but it’s serviceable. 

“I try to keep it decently stocked here, but it can be tricky to find ingredients. But I’m sure you’ll find anything we can make down here leagues better than the garbage they serve in the cafeteria.”

“Did you make this?” Dekkard asks, poking at a burner. “Shit, maybe you really are the Ultimate Lifeform or whatever. This is - I’ll admit it, this is clever.”

“I’m glad someone recognizes my genius.” He crosses the room, over to the makeshift freezer and his stolen microwave. “Do not tell anyone about this, though. I will kill you.”

“Secret’s safe with me.” 

“I don’t have the ingredients for anything too complicated. How do you feel about pasta? I’ve got some frozen pasta sauce I can heat up.”

Dekkard has made his way to the table. It was about to be thrown out when Bubby stole and repaired it all on his own. There’s only two chairs, but they at least are in good shape. “That sounds incredible.” He collapses into a chair, laying his head on the table. “Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve eaten real food? Everything in the cafeteria tastes like cardboard.”

“I’m familiar,” Bubby says, getting out a pot. He lights the burner with a snap of his fingers, enjoying how Dekkard’s eyebrows raise up into his hairline.

He sits down across from Dekkard as he waits for the water to boil, drumming his fingers on the table. Dekkard keeps staring at the pot, then at Bubby.

“Is something wrong? You’re staring.”

“Have you really been here your whole life?” Dekkard asks. Bubby sighs.

“Yes.”

“You’ve never - I mean you’ve been outside, right?”

“Once or twice.”

“Sorry, that - that’s a rude question, huh?”

“A bit, yes.” The water sounds like it’s bubbling, so Bubby takes it as an excuse to get up. Dekkard remains seated. “Is there a reason you’re asking this?”

“Just thinking about - about Benrey.”

Bubby adds the pasta to the pot, stirring it. “Ah.”

“I’m not gonna try and say I get it, exactly, but I think I’ve got an idea of what’s going on here. And I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, or anything, but -”

“I know what I’m doing, Dekkard.” He doesn’t have to turn to imagine the look on Dekkard’s face, one eyebrow raised and the other flat. “Yes, I’ll admit, I might be...attached. But I’m not an idiot, alright? I’ve heard all the stories.”

“Zeki tell you about Dr. Tipton?”

“She was trying to scare me. I’ve had my fair share of encounters with him. Whatever Benrey did, I’m sure he deserved it.”

Dekkard’s quiet for a moment. When Bubby turns, he’s staring at the pasta, hand resting on his chin. 

“I can see the gears in your brain trying to work,” Bubby says, turning back.

“You think they’re like you.”

“They are like me.” He continues stirring, directing all his focus into the movements of his arm. “They didn’t even have a name. I can’t - I can do something, here. I can’t just sit by and ignore this when I can do something.”

No one ever did anything for him. He’d spent seventeen years in that god forsaken tube before anyone had even considered letting him out, and it was another twelve after that before he was allowed any scrap of freedom. Even now, his autonomy is challenged constantly, by scientists half his age with a fraction of his knowledge.

Benrey doesn’t even have the luxury of being a valued experiment. Based on what Zeki’s said, Benrey’s only kept around because nothing seems to kill them, and they’re interesting to study. 

If Bubby can do something - anything - then he has to. 

“Hey,” Dekkard says. “Uh. I think the pot is on fire.”

“Oh, motherfucker.” Bubby shuts his eyes, taking a deep breath, willing the flames to die down. “I was...distracted.”

“Can’t help but feel like that was my fault.”

“A little.”

“...sorry.”

It’s nothing unsalvageable, at least. The noodles are a bit too soft, but that’s fine. 

He grabs the jar of sauce out of the freezer, heating it in his hands. He can feel Dekkard watching him as he scoops the noodles into bowls, pouring sauce over each serving. The air’s gone tense.

“Sorry,” Dekkard mumbles again as Bubby passes him a fork. He sighs.

“It’s fine. Nothing I haven’t heard before.”

“But that’s the problem, isn’t it? Look, I might be underqualified, but I’m not stupid. I see how Zeki and all the other guys talk to you. I don’t wanna be like that.”

“I put this area together five years ago,” Bubby says, spinning his noodles around his fork. “You are the first person I’ve ever invited down here.”

“Is this your way of saying we’re friends?”

Bubby purses his lips. “I don’t think I’d go that far.”

Dekkard snorts. “Alright. Acquaintances.”

“Coworkers.”

“Oh, that’s harsh.”

“Shut up and eat your pasta.”

Dekkard does, for once, shut up. He eats like it’s the first meal he’s had in decades, like some kind of rabid animal, and then leans back against his chair.

“That was the best meal I’ve had since I started working here.”

“Well, if you behave, maybe there’ll be more in the future.”

“Can’t believe you’d stoop to bribes.”

It’s...nice, Bubby thinks. Sitting down here, eating and joking with someone. Maybe Dekkard was right when he called them friends.

Still won’t admit it out loud, though. He has some dignity left.

[spookyceph]

ShigaDabi Week Day 8 | Free Day!

Rating: SFW

Warnings: Swearing; use of Ouija board

Summary: Way to Confess Your Crush #13: Get a Ouija board to tell them on Halloween.

I Sense a Presence in the Room

“You’re moving it, Twice.”

“No, you’re moving it, Spinner. Demons are moving it, and we’ll all be cursed for messing with this stuff—haven’t you watched any horror movies?”

“Both of you, shut up. You’ll scare the ghosts away before I get to ask them anything.”

“Himiko, honey, I don’t think the ghosts are the ones likely to get spooked in this situation.”

“Why are we using a board with English letters? I mean, I do remember the basics from school, but that was some time ago. Wouldn’t it be easier to play Mr. Kokkuri or something?”

“I can read it.”

“See? Dabi knows English.”

“Yeah, but what if the ghosts don’t?”

Like he was watching a tennis match, Tomura turned his head to and fro, following the bickering as it volleyed around. Just a few short months ago, he couldn’t have imagined such a scene: his friends gathered on both sides of the hideout’s bar, playing a game better suited to middle school kids. Then again, a few short months ago, he couldn’t have imagined using the words his friends in any sentence.

The game had been Toga’s idea. A fun way to celebrate Halloween, she'd said. Tomura didn’t care about some imported holiday, just as he hadn’t paid any attention to Bon when it came and went a couple months back. But he did enjoy seeing the others participate, learning all the different ways they interacted. So, silent, he watched from the edge of their circle as they finally settled down, cramming their fingertips on the planchette in the middle of the Ouija board Toga had picked up from who-knew-where.

A lack of holiday spirit hadn't been the only reason he'd sat out. The sight of so many hands squeezed into such a small area sent a chill rolling down Tomura’s spine. He wasn’t about to risk Decaying someone over a silly party game.

“Okay…” A quivering note had crept into Spinner’s voice despite his earlier accusations of Twice moving things. “What do we ask first?”

Toga bounced on her heels. “I know, I know! Who am I going to marry?”

A collective groan filled the room. Nevertheless, the heart-shaped plastic pointer gave a jerk, like an eager dog tugging on its leash, and began to slide across the board. Everyone held their breath. Tomura squinted in concentration, sounding out each letter chosen in his head.

D…E…K…U.

“What’d it say? Tell me, tell me, tell me!” Toga demanded the second the planchette stopped.

“Deku,” Tomura answered, wrinkling his nose. Maybe demons were rigging the game.

Toga held a differing opinion. With a squeal, she hugged herself and collapsed into a fit of maniacal giggles.

“Oh? Shigaraki speaks English too?” Even through his ever-present ski mask, Mister looked impressed. “A man of many talents.”

Tomura shrugged. “It can be useful sometimes.” Mostly for online games, but still.

“Hey, it’s spelling something else,” Dabi said.

Instantly righting herself, Toga watched with huge, shiny eyes as a second name emerged.

“Ochako,” announced Dabi, triggering a second giggle explosion. “Congratulations, vampire girl. You’re a bigamist.”

Spinner snorted. “What a load of crap…”

“Let’s ask it what unlucky slob gets stuck with you then, lizard lips.”

Toga was on it like a shark on a baby seal. “Yeah! Spinner next!”

Heedless of stammered protests and long-suffering sighs, the planchette launched into action. Tomura smiled wryly as the next name took shape.

“I knew it.” Dabi clicked his tongue. “Mandalay.”

“Total bullshit.” Spinner’s entire face had flushed deep forest-green, the edges of each scale almost black.

“Don’t get all bent out of shape. Not like you’re the first nerd to be into catgirls.”

“Get fucked, staple-face.”

“Let’s ask the board whether he does. I’ll do it if no one else gets the honor!”

“You’re making me blush, Twice.”

“Dabi’s true love next!” declared Toga, mercifully taking the reins again.

The planchette went to work. Tomura craned forward, curious despite himself.

T…O…

That could be the start of hundreds of names, Japanese or otherwise.

…M…U…

Wait—maybe he was separating the syllables incorrectly?

…R…A.

“Well? Who’s the one destined to tame the Blue Flame?” Mister asked with a laugh.

Not Tomura. It couldn’t be. That was simply impossible. The stupid board had to mean someone else—without kanji there wasn’t any way to tell one name from another if the sounds matched.

Except when he looked up, he caught Dabi staring straight at him.

Dabi, whose blue eyes burned hot and electric as they met his.

Dabi, the only other person in the room who knew English.

Dabi, his true love, according to the board.

In one smooth motion, Tomura pushed away from the bar and spun on his heels. He didn’t look back despite the bewildered and shocked questions the others pelted him with as he marched out of the bar. It was a miracle he didn’t accidentally Decay the door in his haste.

He’d gotten as far as the top step in the upstairs hallway before he heard pursuing bootsteps.

“Hey, wait up.”

Tomura refused to give in to weakness and look over his shoulder. If he hurried, he could make it to his room in time.

“Fucking hell, mophead, come on. Don’t make me run. I’ve got shitty lungs.”

A switch flipped in his brain, killing power to all rational thought. Tomura halted and did a sharp one-eighty. Dabi skidded to a stop just out of reach. A good thing too—there was no telling what might’ve happened if one of Tomura’s hands, fingers hooked into talons, had been able to grab him. Dabi read the other warning signs with a neutral face: tensed shoulders, narrowed red eyes, breath hissing in and out.

Only two words managed to bob to the surface of the stew of rage and humiliation Tomura’s mind was boiling in, but they were enough. “Not. Funny.”

“Who’s laughing, mophead?”

Slowly, the question and its serious tone sank in. Tomura blinked, his roiling emotions thickening into a sludge of confusion. “You…you rigged the game.”

“Guilty. The girls were in on it too. Toga was going to ask fluffy stuff about her crushes anyway, so I only had to bribe her to keep quiet and not gush to anyone else. Magne used her quirk to tug everyone’s hands in the right direction. Her English is even better than mine, as it turns out.”

“You had her spell my name.”

“And the others, yeah.”

“B-but…”

Dabi arched his eyebrows. “But if I wasn’t making fun of you, why would I do such a thing?”

“ Yes.”

“Because I think you’re interesting and smart and hot in a gangly, goth sort of way. I like you is what I mean.”

Tomura opened his mouth, but no sound came forth. So, he closed it with a click of teeth. Then he tried again. Same results.

With a sardonic smile skewing his lips, Dabi shook his head. “I’ve been dropping hints for months, but they flew over your head every time. So, when Toga suggested the stupid Ouija board game, I figured I might as well literally spell it out for you. Speaking of dropping hints, Spinner wasn’t embarrassed about the catgirl thing. He was pissed because your name didn’t pop up. Just thought I should mention it, in the spirit of fair competition.”

Though Tomura glanced all around the hallway, there was neither a convenient couch to faint on nor a hole to crawl into. So, he settled for the next best option: directness.

“I…don’t know what to say.”

Dabi’s smile softened as he shrugged. “You don’t have to say anything right now. When you’re ready, you can tell me to fuck off or whatever. I just wanted to tell you how I feel.”

He turned to go, but some unknown impulse spurred Tomura into grabbing his wrist, two fingers safely tucked away. Both red and blue eyes widened in identical degrees of astonishment.

“Uh…” Tomura scrambled for a reasonable follow-up. “Do you want to, um, talk about it?”

The way Dabi’s staples followed the curves of his smile did warm, strange, fluttery things to Tomura’s insides. “About which part? Telling me to fuck off or being my one true love?”

“I-I-I—”

“Relax, mophead. I’m just trying to lighten the mood.”

“Oh.” Tomura looked at Dabi’s hand, which had moved to link fingers with two of his and certainly felt serious. “Does that mean—”

“Yeah, let’s talk. Up on the roof fine? Kurogiri hates it when I smoke inside.”

“Sure. Okay.” He definitely wasn’t the former, but something in the back of his mind assured him the latter would stick eventually.

Warm fingers on a scarred hand gave his a squeeze. “After you.”

[snowdice]

Finding the Time to Study Fic 2 [Day 6]

Here is my starting post for today’s study break stories session. See this post for more details and feel free to send me asks to keep me going! It’s been a lot of fun so far! I will reblog this post with the story as I write them today. I’ll be constantly looking for ideas of times and places for Janus to have missions, so feel free to send in any you can think of at any point!

If you are a new follower or just don’t want all of these posts clogging your dash, please feel free to block the tag “study break stories” as all posts and voting about it will go there. You can still see the finished product of the story even if you are blocking that tag as I will not tag the edited chapters with “study break stories” but with the (TBD) name of the fic.

Chapter 1, chapter 2, and chapter 3 are under the cut.

I don’t have too much to do today, so this’ll be shorter.

Set Up

Chapter 1

The words in front of him seemed to squirm back and forth across the screen as he watched, despite the fact that he’d bought this screen to prevent that exact thing from happening. The ‘d’s and ‘p’s and ‘b’s seemed to blur together into a sludge of incomprehensible nonsense, just like the voices around him seemed to. He wasn’t quite sure how long he’d sat there staring at this report. Time itself seemed almost like the words and the people, it swirled past him in a blur of sounds and colors, but he never could quite grab ahold of it.

 Something smacked him in the forehead, and he startled, looking up. “Remus,” Janus sighed. He picked up the projectile that had just been lobbed at him. “Did you steal paper from the 20th century supply again?” he asked, staring at the folded-up piece of white paper in the shape of a crane. It was one of Remus’s favorite designs. “That’s not what it’s for.”

“There’s a message inside!” Remus replied, happily.

Janus glared at him and carefully unfolded the paper. He squinted at it, and yeah, that was way worse than the screen. Maybe it was worth his money. Or maybe Remus’s handwriting was just horrendous.

 He squinted at it for a few moments and then looked back up. He blinked at his surroundings. The note had said ‘Go home. Work ended three hours ago.’ and that certainly seemed accurate considering he and Remus were the only people left in the office.

“I still have to finish this report about the New Easter Island mission,” he said to Remus.

“I’ll do it,” Remus said. “You’ve been working without a break for hours, and I probably owe the agency some time since I took a coffee break to 22nd century France this afternoon.”

“You what?” Janus asked.

 ”They have the best coffee,” Remus said, and then grinned wolfishly, “and the best guys.”

“Stop doing that stuff,” Janus hissed. “Your lucky I haven’t reported you already.”

“You wouldn’t,” Remus said, very sure of himself. “You like me too much. Plus, without me, you’ll forget to go home and sleep every night. So, it’d be a loose-loose. Now up! It’s time for you to go home.”

Janus sighed and stood. “Fine,” he said. “I’m going, but that report better be done like you said or I will report you for your coffee excursions.”

“Sure, you will,” Remus said. “Now shoo.”

 Janus spared him one more glare before standing from his desk and waving his hand through the air. The machine at his wrist buzzed softly and the display screen lit up around him. He jabbed a finger at the last of the three pre-set locations and, with a feeling like he’d just stepped into a pool of softened butter, he was home.

He groaned and fell back onto his couch immediately. “Time?” he asked.

“1:57am,” a soft voice said from his ceiling. He groaned. Considering the agency liked to keep their schedules aligned even though his house sat almost 2 millennia before the agency even existed, he’d have to be up in 4 hours to head back to work. They said it was to ‘stop them from experiencing time jet lag’ and ‘maintain their circadian rhythm,’ but with Janus it usually just ended up with him ‘not getting enough sleep’ and ‘suffering greatly.’

 Sure, he had been fine with it, encouraged the policy even, when the agency was created, but that had been before he’d had to live it.

His stomach suddenly grumbled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten since before the mission he’d been on earlier that day. He was exhausted, but he also knew trying to go to bed this hungry would result in him not being able to sleep at all. He dragged himself to his feet and into one of the barstools at the kitchen island. He didn’t want to wait for the auto cook feature to cook him something and he especially didn’t want to cook something himself, so he pressed a few buttons on the side of the counter and a protein infused, still cold pop tart popped out of the table.

 He thought it might be a Hot Fudge Sunday one, but he honestly couldn’t tell. The protein infusion made all of them taste rather horrible. For all he knew, it was one of the Burnt Rubber pop tarts Remus had once snuck into his pantry. To be fair, he hadn’t even noticed until he’d went to go stock his pantry and realized that there was half a box of those things. It was just another example of Remus using time travel for things he shouldn’t. They were a year 2513 delicacy.

The 2510s were an odd set of years.

 He chewed on the possibly chocolate, possibly rubber flavored pastry and glanced out the window. Though it was dark, one could still see the water of the man-made lake his home sat on thanks to the floating lights that hovered above it. Each agent working for the TPI received a home and alternate identity in a time and location of their choice. (Within reason, that is. Remus’s request to live among the dinosaurs was quickly denied and new rules were put into place immediately after.) Janus had chosen the late 24th century with a moderately sized home on Lake BlueBox. He didn’t have many close neighbors, but the ones he did know thought he was an accountant who went by the name of Declan Banks.

 No, he had not chosen the last name. Yes, everyone got those types of names. The Agent Management Office had a sense of humor or were just not creative. Janus only knew one employee in the AMO and he’d been avoiding him for the past three years as much as possible. Cowardly, maybe, but he knew if he gave the man too much information about his general lifestyle, he’d be dragged into the AMO to talk about his mental state and feelings, and honestly, that would make everything worse.

 As soon as he finished the poptart, a glass of water popped up from the table making him jump despite the fact that he had been the one to set it to do that automatically years ago. He downed half of the water and picked up the glass to take it to his bedroom. He should probably clean himself off before bed, but he couldn’t be bothered today, and just stripped off his uniform and collapsed into bed in his underwear. The morning was going to come far too soon, he knew. Yet, his mind would not quiet. His brain kept filling out the report he trusted (well, hoped he could trust) Remus had already finished by now.

 He eventually groaned and rolled over in bed. “Play something,” he requested. The screen by the side of his bed lit up.

“Randomizing the ‘Something’ video playlist,” the soft voice said from the ceiling.

A dance recital which he knew had been recorded in 2033 started playing. The images moved on the screen in front of him, but the sound drifted from all around him. He let his eyes linger over the way the dancers’ bodies moved as the sounds washed over him. The image of elegantly twisting limbs remained in his head long after his eyelids drifted shut and he finally fell asleep.

 Chapter 2

The morning was just as torturous as Janus had expected it would be. He chewed through another poptart, this time bothering to actually check and see that it was a cinnamon-sugar one and drank three cups of caffeinated orange juice. Then, he waved his hand through the air and selected the 1st saved location on his device. He popped up directly behind his desk where he’d been standing the night morning before.

Someone, probably Remus, had shut his integrator down. He swiped a finger across the power button, and it flickered back on, scrolling through its morning start up routine.

 The machine scanned through all of the data in the three main system it was connected to and sorted all information into things that concerned him, could concern him, and did not before then sorting the first two categories into order of importance. As it did, he set up his screen reader so he would hopefully not start the day with more of a migraine than he already had. It took about 3 seconds for everything to turn on and settle.

Sitting down in his desk, he dismissed the notification that Remus had finished and submitted the report from their mission the day before.

 A mission had been scheduled for him today, and the details were in his inbox. A piece time travel technology had been accidently dropped by an archology student in the 1890s during a trip. It was an earlier model of emergency time travel given to time travels that would dump them back into the Registration Office in the year they originated. It wasn’t extremely dangerous, but could pose some problems, especially if someone who didn’t know what it was activated it.

Surveillance agents had tracked it down and found that it had been picked up by a local and sold. Though no one from that time had known what it was, they had identified that it was made out of a precious metal and it had been crafted into an expensive necklace. Janus and Remus were supposed to retrieve it today. It had been pinpointed that the most opportune time for the extraction was 1923 during a masquerade ball held by those who had bought the necklace.

 It was a fairly low stakes mission. He wasn’t set to leave for another couple of hours, so he clicked through the rest of the important notifications and then set off to meet his missions coordinator, Rhi, in her office.

Rhi and Janus got along fairly well. She was a well put together woman who took her job incredibly seriously. It was fair as her job was to organize all information and materials from every other department and make sure the agents she was assigned to got and understood all of it. A mistake from her could lead to an agent’s death or something far worse.

 This, of course, made her relationship with Remus… interesting to say the least. Janus could never place whether they were nemesis, frenemies, or mortal enemies, and he doubted he would ever know.

“Okay, but it’s the 1920s America,” Remus was already in her office arguing when Janus arrived. “There were so many gangsters! I could be a gangster. I would make a fantastic gangster! Just give me a gun, a snazzy suit with a white hat, and a buttload of alcohol. I will be running Chicago with Al Capone in five minutes.”

“Al Capone didn’t become a crime boss until 1925 and you are going to 1923,” Rhi said, sounding bored, “you aren’t going to Chicago, and as I have already stated, your cover is already decided.”

 “But-”

“It is nonnegotiable, Agent Clockson,” she said firmly. Remus pouted, but seemingly accepted his fate.

“May I come in?” Janus asked.

“Please do,” Rhi said. “You have been to the 1920s before, correct?” she asked Janus.

“Yes ma’am.”

She tapped the screen on her desk in response. “In the last two years?”

“About two months ago,” he responded. She tapped something else.

“Any blacks, reds, or yellows?” she asked.

“All green.”

“Great. Do you need a refresher course on basic cultural or linguistic procedures?”

“No.”

She pushed one more thing and then swiped the check-in document over to him. He glanced at the report stating he’d had no incidents of any level the last time he visited the 1920s and had opted out of the optional refresher course, and then pressed his finger against the screen to sign it with his fingerprint.

 The document returned to her side of the desk automatically. “Okay,” she said swiping another document from her left over to be in front of her. She twisted her wrist to copy it and slide copies to Janus and Remus. “Here are exact details on the time, place, and event you are going to, as well as details about your cover.” Janus scrolled through his quickly. It wasn’t as detailed as some he’d had considering this was a brief in-and-out missing, but he still took care to memorize everything on the page.

As he and Remus read through their things, Rhi got to her feet and turned to the storage compartments behind her desk.

 She grabbed out two packages and when they’d both signed that they’d read and understood the paperwork, she slid them across the desk to them. “These have everything you need,” she said. “Clothes, money, and an invitation to the party you’re off to attend. You are to get changed now, have a last check in with costuming to make sure everything is in order, and then report to decontamination in 23 minutes. Your set to leave in 38 minutes. Any questions?”

“How much-?” Remus started.

“None, agent,” Rhi said.

“But-”

“No alcohol,” Rhi said. “It is the prohibition era in the United States anyway.”

“Like there’s not going to be alcohol at the rich people party,” Remus said sullenly.

She pressed her lips together. “It is an in-and-out mission,” she said to both of them, and then turned to glare at Remus. “Do not get arrested.”

 “I don’t know,” Remus said joyfully. “I think I still have room for a 1920s mug shot on my wall.”

“Behave,” she said, “or I’ll report you for the cat you smuggled in from the 1800s.”

“You’d never,” Remus said. “You enjoy the cute pictures of Diesel Fuel I send you every day too much, and you know it!”

“Just… don’t get arrested.” She turned to Janus. “Don’t let him get arrested.”

“I’ll do my best,” Janus promised, standing. “Now come on, Remus, we need to get changed.”

“You just want to see me naked,” Remus replied with a wink, but he did stand.

 “If I see you naked one more time in my life Remus, my eyeballs will fall out of their sockets,” Janus said, waving to Rhi as he pulled Remus out of the door.

“Kinky.”

Janus’s eyeballs almost did fall out right then and there with how hard he rolled them.

They got changed quickly, Remus complaining and saying if he couldn’t dress like a gangster, he should at least be allowed to wear a flapper dress. Janus had long ago learned to ignore his ramblings. He did seem enthused about the included mask for the masquerade. It was a silver fox shaped mask with green accents that reminded Janus of the Egyptian God Anubis.

 Janus’s own mask on the other hand, was only designed to take up the left half of his face. It was mostly golden with a black swirled design. Attached to the side there was a plume of golden tipped white feathers. He had to give it to the costuming department, they did have good taste.

Once they were both dressed, they were poked and prodded by one of the costumers to make sure everything was accurate, fit right, and had been put on correctly.

After that, they went to the decontamination area to have themselves and everything they were taking with them sterilized so they didn’t accidently take any pathogens to the 1920s. They also received an oral vaccination to be sure they didn’t pick up anything from the 1920s and bring it back.

Then they were ready to go. The correct time-space coordinates had already been sent to their timepieces. With a push of a button, they were off.

  Inciting Incident

Chapter 3

Janus and Remus both appeared at the same moment a couple of feet apart in what looked like the inside of a garden shed. There was already a man waiting for them a few feet away. “Sup babes,” Remy said, just like he always did. The T-Agent looked their costumes up and down and whistled. “Now that,” he said, “almost makes me want to be one of you time jockeys.”

“They wouldn’t let me have a gun or a canister of moonshine,” Remus pouted.

Remy snorted. “Sorry, babes, but that makes my job a lot easier. If I’ve gotta fish you outta the 1920s criminal justice system, I’d rather it not be because you shot someone on accident ‘cause you don’t know how to use the safety.”

 Remus groaned dramatically. “Everyone is lame.”

Remy just shook his head. “Meet back here when you’ve got the necklace,” he said. “Don’t make a move until after 11:05pm and before 11:17. That’s your window.”

“We know,” Janus said. “See you then.”

“Have fun at the party boys,” Remy said and then lowered his shades to look at Remus, “but not too much fun.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Remus, already towing Janus out of the garden shed. The way had been specifically cleared for them, so they met no other people before they’d rounded the house the party was taking place and had gotten onto the driveway in front of the house.

 Without missing a beat, they strolled up to the front of the house, just as a car pulled into the end of the driveway. Janus rang the doorbell, and a few moments later, a man who was clearly the butler answered the door. They handed over their invitation, and the man immediately let them in.

The party had already started when they slipped into the medium sized ballroom that had been decked out in streamers and other decorations. Janus’s nose immediately wanted to scrunch as the smell of sweat from all the dancing already going on as well as the too strong perfume meant to cover that stench wafted over him. It was by far not the worst smelling time period, but he was pretty sure some people still weren’t aware deodorant had been recently invented.

 He checked his time piece which had been disguised as a fancy wristwatch for this trip. “Okay,” he said. “We have about two hours before we need to make our move. We should…”

Remus’s attention was already being dragged away by a young man who seemed to be providing guests with food. “I’m going to go ‘mingle’,” he said, winking.

“No!” Janus hissed. “Re- Richard! No!”

Yet, he was already disappearing into the horde of stinky bodies, likely to go scandalize a bunch of rich folks, and leaving Janus alone. Janus mumbled a curse under his breath that he was sure no one around him would understand even if they could make it out.

 Unsure what to do with himself, he wandered over towards where the live musicians were playing jazz music, being sure to keep out of the way of the dancers. He was edging around the makeshift dancefloor, when one of said dancers must have misstepped and knocked into another one. The second man stumbled right towards Janus, arms pinwheeling. Janus reached out on instinct to catch the man as he fell.

There was a moment where the two of them just stared at each other, surprise evident on the other man’s face. He was wearing a mask that just covered the area around his eyes and the top of his nose, revealing a smattering of freckles across his cheeks that Janus imagined extended to his nose.

 The mask was a light blue velvet with a flower stuck on the side near his right ear, and a trail of curled golden ribbon bobbed down around his chin. The party continued on around them, a blur of movement and sound.

“Are you alright?” Janus asked.

The man blinked up at him and then tilted his head slightly to the side as though confused, before a smile slowly grew on his face. “Oh, I’m fine Dove.”

“Dove?” Janus asked.

He giggled. “You have dove feathers on your mask,” he explained, reaching up a hand to touch one. His finger brushed the tip of Janus’s ear, “and I don’t know what else I am supposed to call you.”

 “My name is Lee,” he automatically lied.

“Is it?” he asked, sounding amused. “Doesn’t seem to fit you well. I like Dove better.”

“Oh?” asked Janus. “And what’s your name so I can not call you that?”

The man chuckled. “Call me Pat.”

“Hello Pat,” Janus said.

“I thought you didn’t want to call me by my name.”

“I changed my mind.”

“Hmmm,” Pat said, finger tracing idly across Janus’s forearm which was when Janus realized with a start that he was still holding the man in his arms. He quickly went to release him, which Pat allowed with clear amusement.

 Yet, instead of completely stepping away, Pat grabbed Janus’s arm. “What are you doing all the way over here by the way?” he asked. “Don’t you want to dance.”

“Oh,” Janus hesitated. “I don’t really dance.” Or at least not in the way the people around him were. He’d had basic training for this style, but it had been a while and he was a bit rusty.

“Everyone dances Dove,” Pat claimed. “At least if they know the steps and have the right partner.”

“But I don’t know the steps,” Janus said with an eyebrow raise.

He hummed. “Well, I know the dance pretty well by this point,” Pat said. “Why don’t I teach you how it goes.”

 He was agreeing with the soft beseeching tone before he even realized it. Pat pulled him into the middle of the throng of people. He seemed to think, bopping his head to the music playing for a moment, before looking back at Janus. “Heard of James Johnson?”

Janus inclined his head.

“Well, have you heard his new song? Because there’s a dance that goes with it.”

He took a few steps away from Janus and started to dance. Despite his claim to know the steps, he wasn’t particularly good, but he made up for any loss of rhythm with pure enthusiasm.

 Janus found himself smiling at the man, and after a few moments, joined in with the dance. Despite his lack of practice, he ended up having a better natural rhythm than Pat. Pat didn’t seem to mind that he was being outperformed, however. On the contrary, he giggled at himself the couple of times he stumbled.

When he fell into Janus’s arms for the second time that night, Janus decided he’d probably had enough dancing for the moment and pulled him off to the side to get something to drink and cool down a bit.

He watched the man take a snack and some punch from one of servers and thank him happily before turning back to Janus. Pat was easily able to keep Janus’s attention as they chatted. He was bubbly and soft, and Janus found himself enchanted as they talked.

 He was explaining the steps of a different dance, a couples one. “Knowing how to perform the tango will entrance any girl you want,” Pat said, something mischievous sparkling in his eyes. “Assuming you’re that type of fella.”

“As opposed to what?” Janus asked.

Pat leaned in a bit closer. Not too much, but enough that he was definitely in Janus’s space. “A different type of fella,” he said simply, before smiling and leaning back.

Janus let out a shaky exhale and took a sip of punch. He glanced over at Pat. “Tell me about yourself, Pat,” he said.

Pat hummed in contemplation. “Well, I went to France recently.”

 “You did?”

“Oui, c'était amusant, mais j'ai eu des ennuis”

“What kind of trouble?” Janus asked curiously.

“Oh, the kind with a pretty boy and crepes that were way too sweet. Anyway,” he continued. “Other than that, I mostly help out my friend. He’s an inventor.”

“And how do you help him.”

He shrugged, “Running errands mostly, and making sure he gets enough sleep, because otherwise he gets distracted and forgets. And you?”

“I’m a banker,” he said, remembering his cover, but felt compelled to add, “but I like to travel as well.”

“You do look the type?”

“And how is that?”

   Pat shrugged. “I can always tell a wandering spirt from the masses, and you are easy to spot.” Pat looked at him then with a secret smile on his face, and Janus felt suddenly known, like the man in front of him had known him for years even though they’d only just met. Looking at him then, he wanted suddenly for that to be fact and not a flight of fancy.

He was brought firmly back to reality in the next moment. “Lee,” a pointed and familiar voice said. Janus’s head snapped up to see Remus, staring at him. He tapped his wrist. Janus glanced at his own wrist: 10:58pm. He just barely managed not to curse.

 “I,” he said looking up at Pat. “I’m sorry, but I have to go.”

“That’s okay,” Pat said easily. “It is getting rather late.”

“Yes,” Janus agreed. “Well… goodbye.”

Pat, titled his head, a half smile on his face. “I’ll be seeing you around.”

Janus nodded, and turned away from him towards Remus. He didn’t look back as they excited the ballroom. They snuck into a small side closet for coats that wasn’t being used as it was summer.

“So,” Remus said when the door closed behind them.

“Don’t,” warned Janus.

“I’m not one to judge,” Remus said.

“Shut up.” He glanced at his watch. It was 11:02. “We’ll go in 5.”

 “I have to give it to you. He was very cute.”

“We’re not talking about it.”

Remus just laughed joyfully, and Janus did his best to halt the blood rushing to his cheeks.

At 11:07, well into their window, they slipped back out of the closet, and towards the stairs as the party raged on.

Despite how Remus usually never shut up, he was able to be quiet when it counted. They snuck to the master bedroom of the home’s owners in silence. The door was already wide open by the time they got there, and Janus didn’t think anything of it. At least, he didn’t until they entered the bedroom, and there was someone already there.

 He turned from the dresser he’d been standing in front of to face them, sending Janus the same smile he had down in the ballroom. Janus and Remus both froze. “Sorry, sweetie,” Pat said. “Were you here for this too?” he held up the necklace they’d been sent for. He closed his fist around the charm made out of time travel tech.

“What?” Janus said.

Pat giggled and winked. “Unfortunately, I need it a bit more than you at the moment. So, I’m gonna have to go.” Janus stepped forward, not really sure what he was intending to do, but Pat just smiled. “See you some other time, my Turtle Dove.” With a snap of his fingers and loud crack, he disappeared. The mask he’d been wearing fluttered to the ground.

[chaoskirin]

The Seven Seas--Chapter One

Fandom: Queen Genre: Sci-Fi/Gen Rating: PG Chapter 1 Word Count: 2379

I haven’t written any Queen fanfic in a while, but I’ve had this one in mind for about a year. Figured now was a good time to give it a go!

---

The morning started like any other: At quarter past noon, and with beer and potato chips for breakfast.

"Fred, I want to go home," Brian said, hand on his forehead, leaning back in his chair. Roger stretched his leg out and attempted to tip the chair over; the back collided with the wall and Brian shot him a grumbly look.

"No. We're staying right here 'til we're done," Freddie replied. "And I would say we've been productive thus far--except for all the complaining."

They wouldn't be done until Freddie said they were, which could be today, or tomorrow, or three weeks into the future. With his Mercurial temperament, he'd named himself well. That's something none of the four would ever argue over.

John, typically, said nothing.

Roger flipped over in his chair, reclining upside-down with his bleached hair splashed across the dusty floor. Out of all of them, Rog felt the crushing boredom the worst as they sat and sat and sat and thought about lyrics for a good chunk of the day. He just had a different way of dealing with it; while Brian complained and John entertained himself within the recesses of his own mind, Roger caused Trouble.

"Oh, Roger," Freddie said. "Do sit up."

"I'm gettin' the blood to my brain," he replied. "So I can think of your stupid songs."

"If they're stupid, we're not using them," Freddie said.

"You let the car song through," John muttered under his breath, after which Roger grabbed a handful of wood chips and attempted to launch them--while still upside-down--across the room. He performed an unintentional backflip out of the chair and crashed to the floor.

Where he remained for some reason.

"Entertaining," Brian observed. "I still want to go home. I've got things to do. My thesis--"

"Oh, your bloody thesis. You're a rock star now, Brian!" Freddie exclaimed. He stood, paced across the barn, stepped over Roger, flailed his hands for effect, then paced back. "You don't need a doctorate if you're a rock star!"

"I thought we were to be rock gods," Roger provided, insinuating that a god was somehow superior to a star.

Freddie supposed he had a point. "Yes, yes, we're getting there. Patience!"

Asking this lot to have patience was like asking an elephant to fly. Like asking a fire to burn cold. Like asking a monkey to type the full works of Shakespeare with both hands tied behind its back. All possible, when one considered how very exciting and unpredictable the universe was... But still vastly implausible.

Something very small and very loud crashed through the barn's roof, landing mere centimetres from Roger's outstretched arm. Roger jumped to his feet with the alacrity of a twelve-year-old non-smoker and stumbled away, knocking over stools, a bandstand, a whole table, and a random chicken as he went.

The chicken, perturbed, scuttled from the barn.

John sat up, his face perfectly passive as Freddie asked, "What the fuck was that?"

Brian stood, creeping toward the shimmering object. It appeared frictionless with all its sparkling silver splendor, and as aerodynamic as the most advanced American war devices. Oblong and saucer-shaped, it sat off-kilter within the barn's floor, its leading edge plunged clear through the rotting wood and stuck soundly within the dirt. It wiggled a bit as if to free itself, then seemed to deflate in defeat as if sighing.

It was no larger than a standard record.

"Aliens, probably," John said.

"Oh, aliens!" Freddie poo-pooed, swatting him with the back of his hand. "It's clearly a toy. A frisbee or somesuch. Roger, go outside and see if--"

The frisbee whirred and hissed, a door opening and consummately vanishing as it did so. A bright green light shone from within as steam and fog poured out of it like water.

"Is Spielberg here?" Roger said. "Is he having us on? He's making a movie, you know. Offered me a part--"

"Oh, he did not," Freddie said. "Hello in there? Hello? Is it aliens?"

"Well, they wouldn't be aliens to themselves," Brian griped. "We'd be the aliens to them."

"Bother your semantics," Freddie said, kneeling next to the oblong contraption. When he poked it (as he could think of nothing better to do with it), his finger slid off the surface as if it were made of particularly slippery ice.

"Well don't piss 'em off," Roger said, kneeling next to Freddie and poking the thing as well. "Whoa. I can't touch it."

Indeed, it was covered in some sort of shield, which reflected all attempts at poking, no matter how vehement. Whenever one of them thought to touch it, it shimmered with a glowing rainbow of energy before repelling the contact entirely. It was neither cold, nor warm, nor anything at all. However, Roger could make the shield wiggle with a sort of frustration if he touched it in two places, and when Freddie added his fingers to the mix, the whole saucer seemed to burble in scandalized protest.

"I can't help thinking that's a terrible idea," John said.

"We should kick it," Roger suggested.

"That's exactly what I meant," John replied.

As Roger stood and drew back his leg to give the thing a good kick, Brian said, "It's not a football."

Defeated, Roger stomped the ground with the very foot that had been just about to launch the thing back into the sky. "Then what's it doing in our barn?"

Brian opened his mouth to answer, then his eyes dulled with the abject inability to answer Roger's inane inquiry. "What kind of question is that? Do footballs inherently belong in barns where you're from? If something enters a barn, does it become a football?"

"Well... Kinda? If it can be kicked?"

Meanwhile, the little door on the saucer-object remained open. Freddie wondered how much more mist could pour out of the thing before it was empty. Or perhaps it contained its own mist generator and it would continue to spew forth a cloud of noxious green gas until evicted from the barn. "I actually think Roger may have the right of it," Freddie said, detecting the faintest hint of ozone. "Exciting as all this is, I don't want to be poisoned."

Roger reeled his foot back again.

Fortunately, the occupants of the saucer picked that moment to show themselves. A single moment later, and they might have been stepping out into earth's atmosphere, tumbling end over end in the worst result of first contact ever written about in any science fiction in history.

Thwarted again, Roger collapsed into his chair and crossed his arms.

The aliens--for that's the way Freddie had begun to think of them--appeared as silhouettes against the burning green light from inside the saucer. Unsurprisingly, they were tiny, each barely the size of a paperclip or perhaps even smaller. A walkway extended in front of them as they squirmed out into the barn's dim light; the creatures meandered down it, leaving a trail of slime behind them. Vaguely slug-like, they were nevertheless adorned with at least half a dozen tentacles each, which were in turn adorned by an incredibly ridiculous amount of jewelry. Enough to rile Freddie's jealousy at any rate. If only he had more places to put shiny things, he could be a much happier man!

There were three of them. The tallest one spoke:

"ARE YOU THE QUEEN?"

Freddie blinked. The alien repeated: "ARE YOU! THE QUEEN?"

"We're... Queen?" Freddie tried. "The band. Queen."

"HAIL QUEEN BAND. THROUGH THE RADIO CHATTER OF YOUR ILLUSTRIOUS PLANET, WE HAVE DETERMINED YOUR LOCATION AND SEEK AN AUDIENCE."

John muttered, "I'm sure this is going to go well."

"I'm not sure you understand," Brian said. "We're not the queen. Or any queen, really. We're just--"

The aliens seemed undeterred. The tallest one interrupted: "NONSENSE. YOU HAVE PRODUCED MORE RADIO CHATTER THAN ANY OTHER ENTITY CALLING THEMSELF A QUEEN ON THIS PLANET. WE DEEM YOU THE SUPERIOR OF ALL OF THEM. YOU WILL NEGOTIATE ON BEHALF OF YOUR PLANET."

One of the smaller ones, who seemed to be wearing glasses on his protuberating eyes, asked, "WHAT IS YOUR PLANET CALLED?"

"They've been listening to our radio chatter," John began, "and they don't know what the planet is called?"

"Er... This is earth," Brian supplied.

"OF COURSE IT IS EARTH," the smaller alien said. "ALL TERRESTRIAL OCCUPIED PLANETS ARE MADE OF EARTH. WHAT DO YOU CALL YOUR PLANET? WHAT NAME?" He pulled out a very tiny, very adorable starmap from one of the flaps in his skin. Freddie didn't know whether to be awed or disgusted.

"That's--" Brian tried. Puzzled again, he scratched his head, as if the aliens had made a perfectly reasonable point.

In the silence, Roger clarified. "The planet is called earth."

The three beings conferred with each other for some time, their slimy tails wriggling behind them like rain-saturated worms. Occasionally, their stalk-eyes would flick around to fix the quartet with a glare--at least, Freddie thought it was a glare. It was hard to tell when one didn't understand the intricacies of alien expression.

Finally, the visitors turned. The one holding the starmap said, "EARTH IS A TERRIBLE NAME FOR A PLANET. WE DEMAND TO KNOW WHICH IDIOT NAMED IT."

Never mind that none of this made any sense whatsoever... Brian still engaged in a heated argument with the aliens about the virtues of a planet named earth, and how no one had ever actually named it. That's just what it was called. Roger found that hard to believe, since the idea had to have come from somewhere--and after all, the people of earth hadn't always known there were other planets, which meant they had to discover earth was a planet at some point, which meant they would have had to name it. When asked why, Roger shrugged and said that if humans were presented with something to name, they would inject their opinion onto it without questioning whether or not they should.

Brian supposed that was logical, then he further supposed that the person who named earth would certainly be dead by now, which the aliens thought was probably better for everyone.

"And just what is your planet called?" Roger asked, once the argument exhausted itself. Freddie thought the whole point of the alien visit probably wasn't to discuss the names of their respective planets, but here they were.

The other shorter being stood up just a bit taller. He was wearing different colors than the other two, although those colors were so random and chaotic that no one in their right mind could describe them. He seemed for all intents and purposes to be a diplomat of sorts. After a wiggle of importance, he said, "DENMARK, OF COURSE."

No one said anything for quite a while, then everyone started speaking at once. Except for John, who was quite content to smile at the absurdity of it.

"You're just from Denmark?" Roger asked. "How are you so short? And slimy?"

"I'm sure it's lost in translation," Brian observed.

"They've come billions of kilometers all to tell us them come from a place called Denmark!" Freddie exclaimed.

"NO, NO, NO," the alien said. "IT'S WHAT ALL CIVILIZED ENTITIES CALL THEIR HOME PLANET ON A MAP! SHOW THEM, WOULD YOU?"

The other short alien--the one with the glasses--lay its starmap out on the floor and opened it to a rather obscene size. It shouldn't have been possible for so much paper to fit inside one pamphlet-sized document, but the creature continued to unfold it and unfold it and unfold it until it covered an enormous portion of the dirty floor. Moreover, the stars elevated themselves just above the paper in a spectacularly impossible three-dimensional layout. Freddie couldn't help an awed "Oooh," of admiration.

John, sarcastically, added "Ahhh!"

"YOU SEE?" the tallest alien said, pointing to an X on the map. As it poked the location with a tentacle, it lit up with a vast trove of information--exact location, atmosphere type, composition of the rocky surface, current radio traffic, and climate. Probably. Freddie didn't actually know, as he couldn't read their language.

"Okay, what's it really called?" Roger asked.

"OH, YOU COULDN'T POSSIBLY PRONOUNCE IT," the diplomat said.

"Don't tell me what I can't pronounce," Roger insisted.

The aliens conferred again, this time for quite a while. When they turned, the diplomat cleared his throat and announced something that no human would ever be able to pronounce: a cacophony of squeals and thisksks and clicks and sub-sonic whistles and grunts and whoops and probably a boat horn or two.

Roger narrowed his eyes, considered for a moment, then opened his mouth and screamed.

"IMPRESSIVELY CLOSE," the diplomat said, as one would comfort a toddler who also happened to be a horse.

"IN ANY CASE," the leader said, his eyes spiraling around in what might have been an eyeroll, "WE CANNOT EXCHANGE PLEASANTRIES WITH A PLANET NAMED EARTH. IT IS SIMPLY PREPOSTEROUS. WE DEMAND YOU RENAME IT."

"But as we've said before--" Brian tried, but the leader held up a remarkable number of tentacles to halt him.

"YOU ARE QUEEN BAND," the leader said. "CLEARLY IT IS YOUR RIGHT TO NAME THIS PLANET."

Freddie, rather half-asleep from the long day they'd already suffered (at his whim), imagined it would be easier to give the visitors a name now, then sort things out later. After all, nothing political could come about as a result of this visit. The aliens were far too tiny to be any sort of threat. And if he just gave them a name, he could get back to writing lyrics with the others and no harm would be done.

Without any sense of impending doom despite his foreshadowy thoughts, Freddie searched around the barn until his eyes fell upon an open, half-stale loaf of bread. "The planet is now called Rhye," he said, adding the H in his mind since it sounded more dignified. "Yes, Rhye. Has a nice ring to it, I think."

"The moon's called Chicken Shit," John said.

Brian elbowed him.

"THEN ON BEHALF OF DENMARK," the leader said, "WE DEMAND THE UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER OF RHYE AND ALL ITS INHABITANTS! IMMEDIATELY!"

[banashee]

Part 3/25 of my 2nd @badthingshappenbingo​

Prompt: Phantom Pain

Please mind the tags and warnings!

 The Feeling of your Skin

 Tony keeps falling in and out of consciousness, trapped under tons and tons of stone, glass and metal. He can’t move, because something is crushing his right arm in his Iron Man suit. Besides that, he is wedged in between pieces of rubble and there is nothing he can do about it.

 The metal armor has definitely gotten a few bad hits, because Tony can’t communicate with anyone and JARVIS voice is too faint, crackling in the distance as if he is being cut off and fighting to get through.

 Tony is feeling helpless, and he hates every second of it. He can deal with a lot - being unable in any way, shape or form to do something about the situation he’s stuck in isn’t one of those things.

 The pain in his arm is throbbing and it feels like his entire arm is slowly getting ripped off of his shoulder. His insides feel like they are on fire, and bile is rising up his throat.

 Breathing is getting harder and harder at this point, but Tony forces himself to keep going, even as he’s terrified and gasping for air.

 The commlink in his ear is crackling, but no one manages to get through. A shame, really. He would have loved to hear another person's voice in his ear if he’s so fucking unlucky to die alone under a collapsed building. No such luck.

 When the pain gets too overwhelming once again, Tony can feel himself drifting away, choking on blood in his airways and hoping desperately for either help or for all of this to be over quickly...

 How much time has passed, Tony doesn’t know. But the next time he wakes up, he does so in a white room that smells of antiseptic. Too many things beep and make all kinds of noises that feel like pins and needles in his already bursting head.  All of those machines are hooked up to him, he realizes belatedly.

 Tony tries to move, and a new wave of nauseating pain overwhelms him.

 He’s coughing, and it feels like his lungs are exploding - there is a tube stuck in his throat and nostrils, making all of the sensations feel like hell.

 Out of instinct more than anything, he tries to scratch or pull at it, but the movement doesn’t seem to register with his arm. Tony attempts to move it again, but nothing happens, all he can feel is pain, seething pain. It’s like the order to move gets lost on the way from his brain to the nerves. Either that, or he is restrained - but he can’t feel anything specific. Nothing but pain and panic that is rising up in his chest. He doesn’t know how bad things are exactly.

 Tony forces himself to move his head and look over, see the damage - but there is nothing - literally. In the spot where his right arm should be, nothing but the bedsheets is by his side. All that Tony can see is gauze on his shoulder and then it stops.

 His arm isn’t there.

 The machines around him are going crazy, and Tony is faintly aware that he is starting to panic.

 Voices and footsteps turn into a muddled mess around him. Somebody takes his left hand gently into their own and starts talking next to his ear. The voice is calm, quiet and familiar. Tony knows that voice, knows that touch and it’s slightly rough calluses, but he is so out of it, it doesn’t fully register with him.

 Someone must have sedated him, because Tony can feel himself fading away into unconsciousness again. The grip on his hand remains though, and Tony clings back with whatever little strength he’s got left and leans into the touch when the person gently brushes away a strand of hair from his forehead.

 *+~

 The doctors say that the pain he is experiencing is phantom pain, something that is quite common for people who have lost a part of their body. Tony listens without a word, nods along. He figured as much, but it helps to know that he isn’t imagining things, that he isn’t going crazy. That it is something to be expected, especially since he lost his arm in such a violent way.

 It still catches him off-guard, sometimes.

 One day, Tony is fine and living his life, even though that means “with a metal device in his chest that keeps him alive”. But then there comes a day, when he finishes breakfast in a rush because the alarm sounds and the Avengers make their way into battle.

 A few hours later, Tony finds himself trapped under a collapsed building, thinking he won’t make it out of there alive, only to wake up again. When he does, he is hooked up to too many machines and his entire right arm is missing.

 His right arm. The one arm he uses for everything - Tony is capable of doing many things with his left, no doubt, but it’s never been his dominant hand. Well - it is now, he thinks, trying not to be too bitter about it. It is no use.

 One thing he never thought about, but he notices now, is that he misses being able to hug someone with both arms wrapped around them as tightly as humanly possible.

 He’s never been especially close to a lot of people - he’s got way too many trust- and touch-issues for that. But the Avengers are the big exception of that rule, right next to Rhodey, Pepper and Happy.

 These people are his family, and he wants them close. Tony is protective over all of them, but even more so, he is a casually touchy person. Just walking by, touching arms, brushing shoulders, rubbing backs and ruffling hair, wrapping an arm around another person's waist to just keep walking. All of that while he gestures around or holds a coffee cup with the other hand.

 It doesn’t help that especially lately, since-before-the-accident-lately, he’s found himself craving for more contact with one person in particular. He can’t stop thinking of the day he woke up in the hospital though, and the calm and familiar voice beside him, holding his hand until he was under again.

 Although he is pretty sure, they don’t talk about it. But Tony knows those hands - and he damn well knows what Clint feels like.

 Maybe, just maybe they can get this sorted out. Later - but hopefully soon.

 Tony finds himself having to relearn everything from writing, building, interacting with human beings. It stresses him more than he wants to let on, and he doesn’t have the energy to focus on anything else.

 While Tony is in medical after the mission, there is almost always one of his friends around.

 At least one or two people from the team stay with him throughout day and night, and it is a relief - being alone down there, thinking he was about to die alone was horrifying. It’s almost as bad to relive it in his sleep.

 Waking up terrified and shaking from nightmares is bad - but waking up to the warm presence of another human being helps.

 Tony kind of expected the dreams, because being trapped under a collapsed building and feeling how a limb ends up getting severed would leave most people with vivid night terrors about it. And then there is the pain - seething, everlasting pain, shooting through his nervous system and painting the illusion of an arm that is no longer there.

 The others stay with him, even when he grows more and more tired and frustrated. They give him space, then, leaving the room for a bit, but never going far. Tony knows they’ll be back after a little while or as soon as he asks.

 He catches himself snapping at the people around him more and more. Guilt eats him up almost immediately after, but the anger and frustration need to go somewhere. Unfortunately, it ends up where it really shouldn’t - directed at the people he loves and who support him most.

 He always apologizes after, and they accept it every time, but he can’t help but think how long things can go on like this. Something needs to change.

 Maybe this is why, when Tony is back home, he starts drinking again.

 So some days, he just hides in his workshop and drinks until he is unable to get up from wherever he crashed. He’ll pass out and wake up in bed later, with a glass of water and painkillers by his side. Tony gets away with that 2 or 3 times, then he finds that there is always someone to keep him company, if only to stop him from drinking the entire bottle on his own.

 Part of him wants to snap and snarl until they leave, but he doesn’t - not always.

 Not anymore. They deserve better than that.

 None of them      needs     to be here - they could walk away any time and yet they stick around. Sometimes, he doesn’t know why they even still bother.

 Tony hopes they know how much he appreciates that, despite his troubles to say as much.

 Luckily though, they’ve known each other for years at this point. They know - or at least, he hopes they do.

     ‘I’ll have to do better.’     he thinks, and falls back into a restless sleep.

 One day at breakfast, he has had a bad night and ends up snapping at Steve, who is only trying to help him reach something.

 “Leave it! Just don’t. I don’t need help!” he snarls, and feels like his head is about to explode. His hand is throbbing, but it’s not even there anymore. The pain very much is.

 It’s a lie, too.

 Tony      does     need help, for some things. At least for now, while he is still healing and he is painfully aware of it. But he is sick of people assuming, especially when he is already about to do something himself.   It irritates him to no end.

 “I’m sorry.” Steve says quietly and gives him space - a small part of Tony is satisfied, but mostly, he just feels like a dick. He knows Steve meant well - all of them do. But he is too ashamed to say anything. Breakfast is really quiet after that, and one by one, people leave the kitchen when they’re done, giving him space to cool off.

 Tony sighs, drinks the rest of his coffee and thumps his head onto the kitchen table a few times.

 “Damn it.” He curses some more, thinking he’s alone in the kitchen and almost jumps out of his skin when a voice next to him says,

 “You know, I get that it’s frustrating when people assume what you need. How about instead, you tell us what kind of help really is necessary?”

 “Jesus, Fuck! Barton! I swear, I’ll make you wear a goddamn bell one of these days!”

 “I dare you to try it.” There is a smirk in his voice, but then he shrugs at Tony. “My point still stands though.”

 Clint leans back in his chair and produces another pot of coffee seemingly out of thin air. He fills up his own mug and places the pot on the table so that Tony can easily reach it himself.

 He recognizes it as both the peace offering and hint that it is - he’ll happily take it and huffs a small laugh at ‘I dare you to try it.’

 “Thanks.” Tony pours himself a cup and drinks about half of it in silence, thinking about what Clint told him.

 It’s not surprising that this kind of advice came from Clint - Tony knows that he’s speaking from experience. Not only from losing most of his hearing a few years back, but also countless injuries caused by missions gone sideways. Recovering from those must have been hell - he knows those files.

 It’s not hard at all to imagine Clint snapping and lashing out at people who crowded him in recovery, even when the help was well intended. Much like him, now.

 Tony knows that Clint understands, at least to some degree.

 “Different situations, same outcome, huh.” he says out loud, without really meaning to. A hum drowned out in a coffee cup is the answer he gets, followed by

 “Something like that. So, yeah, the situation sucks and you’ll have to find a way to deal with it. And you can. We’re all here and no one thinks any less of you. Just… Maybe instead of drinking the housebar dry, let any of us know what we can do to actually help you, huh?”

 “That’s rich, coming from you.” Tony grouches, even though he knows that Clint is right.

 “Duh. Why do you think I’m the one talking to you right now? You’re just as much of a stubborn ass. But we care a lot about you.      I     care a lot about you” Clint adds and looks him directly into the eyes. The steady stare that he fixes him with should be uncomfortable, but it’s not. It’s familiar, and quite a bit softer and more understanding than most days.

 Tony appreciates that a lot. He nods and delays his answer by drinking more coffee.

 Trying to deflate the seriousness of the situation, he’s aiming for a joke.

 “And here I thought we only keep you around for your good looks.”

 Clint bursts out laughing - he clearly didn’t expect that answer.

 “I know I should be offended, but I’m really not.” He’s still grinning, and Tony can’t help but laugh himself. It’s been a while since he did that, he realizes.

 “Good.” Tony says and just goes for the side hug so he can hide his face and the look of relief on it. Besides, he really needs this. The arms that wrap around him are warm and comfortable, holding on tightly enough to be reassuring, but still lose enough for him to pull away anytime - not that he wants to. Lucky for him, Clint doesn’t let go first - he just waits until Tony does so a while later.

 Quite a while, but it doesn’t matter - no one else is there to watch the private moment, after all.

 *+~

 “Hey. Clint. Hey. Wake up.”

 Tony prepares for flying hands and carefully keeps his distance when he pokes at Clint’s cheek one night. Talking to him is useless, since the purple BTE’s are clearly visible on the bedside table, but it doesn’t feel right to just creep up and poke someone quietly. Tony is well aware that his approach system could use some work, but whatever.

 Thankfully, all he gets in response is a pitiful groan and

 “What the fuuuck....”

 Clint peels out of the blankets, blindly reaches around for the light and curses once more when the small lamp illuminates the room and blinds him for a moment. His hair is sticking up in every direction and there are pillow lines on his face when he owlishly blinks at the man sitting on the end of his bed.

 “Tony? Are you okay?” he asks, rubbing one hand over his face in confusion and worry. Then he yawns hard enough to make his jaw crack.

 Tony nods, then points at his ears and Clint gets the hint, reaching for the hearing aids on the table.

 “What’s going on?” he asks, and to his utter surprise, Tony is smiling at him.

 He’s been doing that more and more lately, which is a good thing. But not a reason to raise him out of a deep sleep at fuck o clock in the morning.

 “I’ve finished it.” Tony says, and there is a shine in his eyes - he is clearly excited about something.

 “Finished -” Clint repeats, and then his sleepy brain catches up. “Oh.      Oh!     Your prosthetic?” he asks then, much more awake and excited now.  

 This one has been a long time coming - as soon as Tony had been out of medical and sober enough, he’d started developing plans for his future right arm. Even more so once he stopped drinking again.

 There is a lot of new and delicate technology involved, most of it an experiment. Working on it has taken a lot of time, and Clint is both happy for him and ridiculously giddy that Tony chose him out of all people to share this with, even though he poked him awake at an ungodly hour.

 But this is exciting. If all goes well and the arm doesn’t cause him any major problems in the long run, Tony is planning to make the technology available for anyone who needs it.

 “Yes! I just got it done and I’m ready to try it on but… Uhm. I didn’t want to do that alone.”

 Aw, feelings, no. He can definitely feel his heartbeat speed up.

 “Did you bring it here, or…?”

 Instead of an answer, Tony pulls a robotic looking arm onto his lap. It looks a lot like one of his suits, but the materials seem to be different. It’s beautiful and obviously high-tech, but the best thing is that Tony looks at it with so much pride.

 “It’s very much you.” Clint says, and waits for Tony to launch into a ramble about the technical details, but he doesn’t. Tony just smiles.

 Clint watches, as the arm lights up and positions itself so that Tony can easily put it on without assistance. Then it attaches itself around the stump on his shoulder, where he already put on a black glove. The whole process doesn’t take long at all, but it is fascinating - this arm seems to have  a life of its own.

 Tony moves it around a bit, twisting and turning. The fingers move effortlessly, and he looks more than happy about it. When he looks up at Clint again, he can’t help

 but smile back.

 “Wow.” he says, not sure what else would be appropriate.

 “Pretty good, huh?” There is a beat of silence before Tony continues,

 “There are touch sensors - they’re supposed to work like nerves, is the short version anyway.”

 He stretches the arm out, as if offering a hand to hold. Clint is pretty sure where this is going, but he still wants to ask permission - if only to keep his beating heart at least somewhat at bay.

 “Can I-?”

 “Go for it. How does it feel?”

 “It’s - warm. Soft. Holy shit! What do       you     feel?”

 “You.”

 For once in his life, Clint is at a loss for words. Tony just smiles at him with shining eyes. Then he gets a hold of Clint’s other hand with his own left and lets the new hand of his right brush over the skin on his arms, over the side of his head, lightly scratching his scalp and brushing through tangled strands of blond hair.

 “Feels just right. There is hardly any difference between the two hands - that’s - wow.”

 Somehow, this entire moment is way more intimate than if they were sleeping with each other.

 Neither of them talks much and they simply stay close.

 At some point, they end up laying down in bed, legs tangled and still touching. Holding hands, fingers running over skin and beard stubble, brushing through hair. This is probably the most relaxed either of them has been in a long time, and it shows. They’re close enough to share little bits of breath every now and then, close enough to inhale each other's scent.

 Tony is faintly aware that there is a loopy smile on his face. He is happy to be here, to be able to  use two arms again - happy that Clint is sharing this moment with him, and even more so that he seems to be just as happy to just hold him close.

 He’s wanted this for so long - then stuff happened, and he’d focused on other things. But he’s better now, happier.

 The phantom pain is still there, knocking the wind out of him whenever it comes. But it’s been less and less as time went on. Part of him hopes that it’ll fade away more over time, but there is no telling yet.

 For now, Tony is happy. He is also about to fall asleep.

 “Do you need to take this off for the night?” Clint asks him soon after that particular train of thought, rubbing small circles on the upper arm of the prosthetic. He sounds sleepy as well, but in the best way possible.

 Tony shakes his head. “No, this should be okay. Might as well test that now… Do you mind if I stay?” he asks then, making himself comfortable on the other man’s chest.

 “I’d be very upset if you leave now.”

 Clint is very blunt and honest about this - he blames it on the fact that a certain someone has woken him up from a deep sleep, but since that Someone is currently snuggled up in bed with him, he’s certainly not about to complain.

 Tony laughs quietly, and tightens his hold for a moment.

 “We should talk more often when we’re half asleep. Would have saved a whole lot of time before.”

 “Agreed. Let me just take my ears out.”

 Regretfully, Clint pulls away with one arm to remove the hearing aids. As nice as hushed conversations late at night, like this one, are - falling asleep with the aids in isn’t worth the gross feeling the next day - or the rapidly draining batteries.

 Once he’s done, the two of them rearrange them a bit until they’re comfortable again. If he imagines the feeling of lips pressing a kiss into his hair, he isn’t sure, but he falls asleep happy, warm and content.

 Tony doesn’t take long to fall asleep, either. He can’t stop smiling, because his world looks quite a bit brighter now - quite a bit warmer and happier in general.

 That night, he sleeps without a nightmare, which is rare for him. But sleeping peacefully is easier if you know that someone else is right there.

*+~

Square 3/25: Phantom Pain

                             Warnings:

- graphic injury, blood - near death experience - talking /thinking about death (not suicidal though) - amputation of an arm - alcohol, implied alcoholism - poor coping - misdirected anger

[strangerivy]

The Beginning - Five

Summary: Scott has a dream about hurting Allison and when they get to school they see his dream may have been reality. Warnings: Swearing | Violent Depictions Pairings: Stiles Stilinski x Original Character (Kacy) Genre: 18+ | Fluff Word Count: 3791 Author’s Note: I hope you all had a good first week of the New Year! Thank you for all the wonderful comments on the previous chapters, it’s really nice to hear what you guys think. I do have a tag list for this story so let me know if you want to be added! 

|| One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Masterlist ||

I nearly fell out of bed from flailing about when Scott burst into my room collapsing onto my bed on Monday morning. I wiped my eyes sitting up tiredly and slightly annoyed. I dropped my arms on the bed rolling my neck to crack it.

“What?” I grumbled staring down at him, his eyes were wide like he was freaked out by something, this woke me up a bit more sitting up straight folding my legs into me. “What is it?”

“I had a dream,” he muttered sitting up suddenly making me jump back hitting my head on the headboard, I groaned grabbing the back of my head squinting my eyes at Scott completely unaware of my current injury, “I had a dream I hurt Allison,”

“Well, did you kill her?” I yawned getting up from bed heading to the bathroom

“I don’t know, I just woke up,” he looked up at me worried. I sighed giving him a gentle smile.

“It was just a dream Scott,” I scrunched my nose up catching the scent of something that smelt like a rotting animal. I was able to pinpoint it to Scott. “You stink,” I pinched my nose jokingly at him, he grinned grabbing one of my pillows throwing it at me as I laughed going into the bathroom shutting the door to take a shower.

When we got to school, we met up with Stiles and Scott told him about his dream as we walked into the school. The two of them walking on either side of me.

“I was sweating like crazy and it was like I couldn’t breathe; I’ve never had a dream like that before,” Scott admitted as we walked down the hall to our lockers.

“Really? I have. Usually, it ends a little differently,” I smacked Stiles chest in disgust, and he chuckled a goofy grin on his face.

“Gross,” I stated as we continued walking

“A: I meant I never had a dream that felt that real and B: Never give me that much detail about you in bed again.” Scott shook his head probably trying to get the image out of his head.

“Okay, you two are gross. There are in fact, some things I don’t need to know,” I shuttered at the image running through my head of Stiles and his alone time, turning down the hall to my locker leaving them to their boy talk.

When I walked by a window, I looked out noticing a bus with its back door open and bent hanging on barely by its hinges. There were blood marks splattered all over the inside of the bus some in the shapes of handprints and a pool of blood on the bus floor right at the edge of the exit doorway. I could make out what looked to be claw marks on the bus door and inside on the seats.

My mouth dropped as I walked out a door and noticed Scott and Stiles with the same expression as they walked out another door. I walked over to them slowly not being able to take my eyes off the gruesome scene. Cops were around it, taking evidence photos and collecting samples.

“Scott,” I whispered in disbelief, still stunned by the sight in front of me. Stiles leaned over closing my mouth for me and I shook my head trying to pull myself together. The smell of the blood started to take over my sensitive sense of smell and quickly became the only thing I could smell. I covered my nose with my hand trying to dull out the scent.

“I think that the dream you had, happened,” Stiles muttered just loud enough for us to hear. Scott started to hyperventilate grabbing his phone texting Allison repeatedly but not getting any response back. Stiles and I quickly followed behind him trying to calm him down but failing.

“Scott I’m sure she’s fine!” I tried to reason with him, but he wasn’t listening only focused on searching the halls for her. “It could be just a coincidence!” I yelled he turned to face me his face full of panic.

“A coincidence? KAC ARE YOU SERIOUS!” He yelled turning back heading down the hall, I quickly grabbed Stiles by his arm as Scott went around a corner, stopping him.

“I have to get to class, tell me if she’s okay,” I whispered he nodded giving me a silent apology for Scott before going after Scott.

I stared at the clock in my first class bouncing my foot the entire time from my anxiety and impatience. I pulled my phone out periodically staring at the screen waiting for some sort of text from either Scott or Stiles or hell even Allison telling me that Scott didn’t accidentally kill her last night.

This went on for my first three-class and I quickly went to forth sitting down at my desk staring with an intense gaze at the door as kids filed in and I let out a sigh of relief when Allison walked in smiling over at me coming to sit down in the desk next to mine.

“Your brother scared the hell out of me this morning,” She laughed, and my heart picked up a little

“What do you mean?” I asked laughing a little nervously pulling out my books for the class from my backpack. I grabbed my phone sending a quick text to Stiles.

Thanks for letting me know! You ass!

“I ran into him this morning out of nowhere and dropped my books,” she answered I opened my mouth giving a silent ‘oh’ as the teacher started class. The teacher paired us up for an assignment. Allison and I mostly sat in silence as we worked on the assignment exchanging notes here and there. My phone buzzed on the desk I picked up looking at the screen seeing a response from Stiles.

Sorry! We saw the guy who was attacked. Wasn’t a rabbit.

“So uh, has Scott said anything about me?” She asked nervously breaking the silence pulling me out of my thoughts. I looked up at her confused raising an eyebrow at her, a small smirk tugging on my lips. I quickly locked my phone setting it back on the desk choosing to ignore Stiles's text and how a rabbit had to do with anything.

“Like what?” I asked playing it off as if I didn’t know what she was talking about. I saw a small blush creep onto her cheeks, I shook my head smiling over at her letting out a soft chuckle “All good things if that’s what you mean.”

“I can just never read what’s going on in that head of his,” She admitted sitting back in her chair, I laughed writing an answer down on my paper.

“Allison,” I looked up at her, “You’re like the first girl he’s ever, well he’s ever done anything with besides me. I’m pretty much the only girl that talks to him.” I said finishing up the worksheet, I glanced over at her and could tell she was deep in thought.

“Hey,” She looked up at me “It’s a good thing, Allison, he really likes you. Just don’t think about it too much, Scotts an honest guy,” I grabbed her hand giving it a squeeze and then the bell rang. I packed up my stuff leaving the room to the lunchroom.

Stiles, Scott and I walked over to our usual table over by the windows after grabbing our food. I sat down next to Stiles so Allison could sit next to Scott.

“Did Scott tell you his crazy idea?” Stiles asked looking over at me. I grabbed a piece of broccoli off my tray eating it.

“No,” I said my mouth full “What is it?”

“He wants Derek to teach him how to be a werewolf.” I looked between him and Scott and shrugged not seeing an issue with it. I had been thinking about it myself. It was better than stumbling in the dark with all this werewolf stuff.

“It’s not a bad idea,” Stiles's mouth opened in disbelief and he looked genuinely offended that I didn’t agree with him.

“Are you two forgetting we put him in jail?” he asked I shook my head setting my fork down

“First off, you two put him in jail. Second, he’s clearly been doing this a lot longer, he might have some good pointers.” I pointed out picking up my fork again eating another piece of broccoli

“Some good pointers? This isn’t some sport Kac,” Stiles said pulling out his phone, I rolled my eyes and then Lydia sat down next to Scott and then some kid that was part of Jackson’s group sat at the head of the table and Danny sat on the other side of Stiles. Mid-bite I looked at Stiles confused, and he had on the same confused expression.

“What are they doing?” I whispered only loud enough for Stiles to hear but knowing Scott would also be able to hear. Stiles was too stunned to care and Scott just shrugged. Jackson came up kicking the kid at the head of the table out. Allison came over sitting down on the other side of Scott and I smiled at her.

“So, I hear they're saying some type of animal attack, probably a cougar?” Danny asked looking over at Jackson, I looked down at my food trying to keep calm.

“I heard a mountain lion,” Jackson responded, I grabbed Stiles orange that he was still trying to peel and peeled it for him handing it back. I heard his phone buzz and he pulled it out.

“A mountain lion is a cougar.” Lydia responded quickly looking over at Jackson “Isn’t it?” she played off, I rolled my eyes at her. Lydia was actually really smart, and you could tell she played it down in front of Jackson.

“Who cares?” Jackson said a bit annoyed

“Maybe some of us with a brain,” I said giving him a fake smile and he narrowed his eyes at me.

“The guy is probably some homeless tweaker who’s going to die anyway,” Jackson spat ignoring my comment, I looked at Stiles's phone as he had a video pulled up.

“Actually, I just found out who it is,” Stiles said turning the video so they could see.

“The sheriff's department will inspect the details of the incident but confirmed that Gurus Myer, did survive the attack. Myers was taken to a local hospital where he remains in critical condition.” The newscaster reported

I looked at the photo of the guy and I recognized him, I looked up at Scott and he was looking at me. I pointed at Stiles’s phone.

“Isn’t that our old bus driver?” I asked him

“Yeah, when we used to live with dad,” he answered, my eyes widen and before I could say anything else Lydia spoke up.

“Can we talk about something more fun, please? Like,” I rolled my eyes grabbing my roll ripping a chunk out of it “Oh where are we going tomorrow?”

I nearly choked on my food opening my water bottle taking a sip, Lydia gave me a weird look before turning her attention back to Scott and Allison.

“You said you and Scott were hanging out tomorrow night, right?” She asked leaning over the table to look at Allison. I looked over at Stiles and he was sitting back in his chair annoyed. I took another bite out of my roll a little annoyed and Stiles raising his eyebrow at me in question.

“Um, we were thinking of what we were going to do,” Allison questioned looking at Scott and he looked bewildered. He clearly was not expecting Lydia and Jackson to be coming along. I gently hit Stiles's leg as his eyes went wide, he looked at me confused motioning his hands at them and I shook my head in response. He sighed folding his arms over his chest.

“Well, I’m not sitting home again watching lacrosse videos so if the four of us are hanging out, we are doing something fun.” Lydia looked between Scott and Allison waiting for a response.

“Hanging out?” Scott questioned turning to face Allison, I could tell she also was not expecting that either, “Like the fours of us? Do you want to hang out like all of us?” I scoffed and Stiles elbowed me, and I almost choked on my water glaring up at him.

“Yeah, I guess. Sounds fun.” Allison answered with a smile. I scoffed again getting another jab from Stiles, I gave him a look to stop that.

“Yeah Scott sounds fun,” I said sarcastically laughing to myself plopping another piece of bread into my mouth ignoring the glare I got from Lydia.

“How about bowling!” Lydia said excitedly “You love bowling!” Jackson rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, with actual competition.” He answered taking her hand giving it a squeeze.

“How do you know, we aren’t actual competition?” Allison gestured to her in Scott and when I went to answer I received a kick from Scott who shook his head at me.

“You can bowl right?” Allison asked Scott and I could see him start to panic and it was taking everything in me to not start laughing. Scott was a terrible bowler, our mom used to have birthday bowling parties and he hated it but always put on a good face for mom.

“Sort of,” he mumbled out

“Is it sort of? Or yes?” Jackson was starting to get cocky now and push his empty tray aside leaning against the table. Scott sat up a little straighter leaning more towards Jackson.

“Yes,” He responded my eyes widened a bit, you seriously cut the testosterone with a knife at this point. “In fact, I’m a great bowler.” Oh no.

After the final bell rang and school was done for the day, I walked with Scott and Stiles heading towards the student parking lot. I was laughing about Scott in the cafeteria and his newfound skill of being able to bowl.

“Kacy will you stop!” He yelled getting annoyed with me shoving my shoulder. I tried to apologize but couldn’t get the words out just a loud snort was all that came out as I tried to get air into my lung’s tears forming in my eyes.

“You’re a terrible bowler!” Stiles yelled just as panicked as Scott. As we walked down the stairs Stiles grabbed a hold of my arm pulling me down them while trying to keep me standing from me laughing so hard.

“I know!” Scott yelled turning to face us, I stood up straight stopping my laughter after seeing Scott was really upset about this. “I’m such an idiot!”

“Scott that was bad,” I said dragging out the bad.

“It was like watching a car wreck,” Stiles admitted, I winced a little but nodded in agreement. “I mean first it turned into the whole group date thing and then comes that phrase.”

“Hanging out?” Scott questioned turning to Stiles.

“You don’t hang out with hot girls,” He said putting his face in his hands “It’s like death!”

“Stiles don’t be so dramatic!” I said putting my hand on his shoulder he pushed it off looking back at Scott. He was clearly having a moment.

“If it’s hanging out, you might as well be her gay best friend.” I rolled my eyes at him “You and Danny can start hanging out.”

“How is this happening,” Scott whined clearly panicked by Stiles's words of wisdom.

“Scott it’s going to be fine!” I reassured “Think of it as a chance to get to know her more. You know, bond.”

“Bond? BOND! Kac!” Stiles freaked out throwing his hands up in the air, I shrugged still seeing nothing wrong with it.

“I either killed a guy or I didn’t and why isn’t this happening to you!” Scott turned pointing over at me and I threw my hands up questioning the same thing myself.

“I don’t think Danny likes me,” I hear Stiles mutter

“I don’t know Scott maybe it’s the stress your feeling. Or the anxiety of it all?” I questioned shrugging my shoulders. It hadn’t crossed my mind why some stuff was happening to him and not me. I made a mental note to check out my room to see if I had a midnight rendezvous last night

“Yeah, I’m feeling stressed Kac! I asked Allison on a date and now we're hanging out!” I sighed dropping my head a little in frustration.

“I’m telling you Scott; it isn’t a bad thing! Girls like to hang out!” I reassured

“Am I unattractive to gay guys?” Stiles asked but Scott and I continued with our conversation ignoring his question

“and now the team captain wants to destroy me,” Scott held out his phone checking the time, “and now I’m going to be late for work.”

“Wait, Scott!” Stiles yelled after him, but he was already out of the building. I patted Stiles's shoulder.

“Am I unattractive to gay guys?” He asked a little concerned, I scoffed shaking my head walking out of the school.

“Wait Kac! Am I?” He yelled after me and I just waved him off getting on my bike to head home. When I got home, I went up to my room to inspect it. I stood in the doorway dropping my bag inside it looking at every corner, but nothing seemed out of place. I sighed grabbing my bag pulling out my homework, I was almost done when Scott got home.

“Did mom let you have the car tomorrow?” I asked him when walked by my door, he stopped turning to come into my room. I looked up at him and he sat down on the bed sighing.

“No,” he answered disappointedly, “I even brought her dinner.”

“Ah she saw right through you, didn’t she?” I joked closing my book leaning back on the pillows. Scott sat up looking at me.

“Do you want to go to Derek’s?” he asked suddenly, I gave him a questioning look.

“Why?” I asked finally after a few minutes of silence. He groaned throwing his hands up not sure himself as to why or if he even should. I stood up slipping my shoes on. “Come on,” I said walking downstairs to our bikes making the decision for him.

We got to Derek’s and a cop was pulling out from the house. We stood at the edge of the property staring up at the half-burnt house. You would think he would find somewhere else to live. Somewhere maybe with a roof? But that’s just me.

“I know you can hear me,” Scott said speaking in a normal voice, I put my hands in pockets eyeing the old abandoned house that appeared to be vacant but it was the faint sound of a heartbeat that let us know Derek was there.

“We need your help,” I said, we walked up to the house onto the deck and the door opened and Derek stepped out onto the porch standing in front of Scott.

“I know I was part of getting you arrested and announced you here to the hunters and I don’t know what happened to your sister, but I think I did something last night,” Scott admitted, Derek looked between Scott and me. Holding his gaze on me, my body tensed up the hair on my arms standing up.

“And you didn’t?” He asked me curiously, I shook my head no and he raised his brow in question.

“Should I have?” I asked not understanding what he was getting at, he nodded his head.

“Yeah, you should have,” He answered, I frowned not liking that answer. Was something wrong with me? Why was all this bad stuff happening to Scott and not me? My eyes widened a little, but I tried to stay calm.

“I had a dream about someone, but someone else got hurt and it turns out that part of the dream might have actually happened.” Scott sounded defeated while telling the story to Derek. I stepped closer to Scott.

“You think you attacked the driver?” Derek asked staring at Scott very intensely.

“Did you see what I did last night?” Scott asked abruptly.

“No,” Derek said plainly, I looked at him confused.

“Derek, what are you getting at here?” I asked crossing my arms

“Just tell me the truth, am I-are we going to hurt someone?” Derek glanced over at me and then back to Scott.

“Yes,” I let out a breath that I didn’t know I was holding in.

“Kill someone?” I asked barely above a whisper looking at Derek directly in the eyes. He seemed hesitant to answer me.

“Probably,” He finally answered, my body began to heat up from annoyance to anger. I mean what did this guy know. He doesn’t know Scott and me.

“You know, what do you know Derek!” I spat angrily at him I turned to walk away but Scott grabbed my arm stopping me. I followed his gaze to my fingertips noticing the claws. Dammit.

“Look,” Derek sighed moving closer to us, we looked up at him defeated and he knew it. “I can show you how to remember. I can show you both how to control the shift, even on a full moon. But it’s not going to come for free.” He finally said I scoffed shaking my head.

“Of course, it isn’t,” I grumbled kicking a rock off the porch, I felt my phone vibrate and I looked at the screen and Stiles's name appeared on it. I shoved it back in my pocket choosing to read it later.

“What do you want?” Scott asked not looking up at Derek, I imagine Scott and I both had the same expression. Fear coursing through us at what Derek was saying.

“You’ll find out,” He glanced over at me and I looked away staring out in the forest. “But for now, I’m going to give you what you want. Go back to the bus, go inside. See it, feel it. Let your sense, remember for you.”

“That’s it? Just go back?” Scott asked disbelief in his voice we both looked back up at Derek.

“Do you want to know what happens?” He asked us, Scott looked over at me and then back at Derek.

“I just want to know if I hurt him,” Derek shook his head with a smirk.

“No, you don’t, you just want to know if you’ll hurt her or if you’ll hurt him.” Derek’s gaze landed on me and I quickly looked away, Scott looked over at me, but I kept my gaze at the floor focusing on my heart trying to keep it at a steady pace.

“Let’s go,” I muttered hoping off the deck going over to the bikes.

|| Previous | Next ||

Tags:

@criminalyetminimal @itshouldbe @sammypotato67

[ckret2]

Hand In Chelicera

Fandom: Transformers IDW, post-Requiem of the Wreckers Pairing: Prowl/Tarantulas Characters: Tarantulas, Prowl, brief appearances by Springer and Pharma Words: 4500 Summary: Tarantulas, on the verge of death, requests to be left in his lab in the past to die. He doesn’t expect to find Prowl there. He expects Prowl to save his life even less. And now—waking up on a hospital bed with Prowl, here, sitting beside him—he’s beginning to consider that maybe his plan to win Prowl back used the wrong strategy. Notes: I’ve owed @fiveboos this fic since TFCon last October. Never let it be said I don’t keep my promises. Eventually. Warnings: Remember how Tarantulas looks at the end of Requiem? He still looks like that.

###

"One—" Tarantulas grasped pleadingly at Springer's arm. "One last request. I don't—want to—die, here."

Springer nodded, optics warm and focused on Tarantulas, giving him his full attention. He was so good, such a good person, and Tarantulas had made him. "Where?"

"M-my lab," he said. "On Cybertron. Where—where you were born." He smiled, and only felt half his face move. "After my last visit, but... before Thunderwing. I'll g-give you the date and coordinates." He'd lived in his lab; it was fitting for him to die there, to be entombed until Cybertron was reborn.

Springer nodded. "Okay," he said. "Your lab."

###

The pain increased as Springer worked out the controls and put in Tarantulas's coordinates, until it was dazzling in how excruciating it was; and then it faded, rapidly, to nothing. And that was more alarming. "I—h-haven't got much—"

"I know," Springer said grimly. Tarantulas could hear the time machine powering up, and the shadows on the ceiling above him shifted in the light of the portal. "Okay, got it. Let's go."

Tarantulas felt Springer's arms under his shoulders and legs. "N-no..." He pushed weakly against Springer's chest. "My lab, is—irradiated. And, c-corrosive gasses. If you come through— I don't want to h-harm you."

Springer paused; Tarantulas's one working optic kept focusing and unfocusing on his face, and the optic band over it periodically flickered out. "Okay. I'll carry you as far as the gate. Then what, you want me to throw you through?" He smiled.

Tarantulas laughed; it wasn't a full cackle, but it was enough to rattle something in his chest that shouldn't be rattling. "Set me on the floor. I can—manage a few feet myself."

"All right." He settled Tarantulas sitting upright, leaning against the frame of the portal. It hurt far more than laying down—he could feel the weight of his remaining spider legs pulling down on his back, ripping at already-damaged armor and struts in his blasted shoulder—but it would make it easier to get through the portal.

"Goodbye—S-Springer. Ostaros."

"Goodbye, Mesothulas. And... thank you."

Tarantulas smiled at Springer—or tried to, with his face shattered and half his mandibles missing—and for a moment, he was tempted to stay here, spend his remaining seconds with his creation.

But somehow he didn't want to force Springer to watch his maker die. And so, laboriously, he turned toward the portal, and dragged himself through with one arm and the awkward help of four spider legs.

The portal turned off.

Wounds already stinging from radiation, Tarantulas collapsed to the floor of his old abandoned lab and waited to die.

###

Except, the second he collapsed, a very close, very familiar voice said, "What the hell?!"

Tarantulas forced his fading optic band back on. There was someone in his lab. His abandoned lab, millennia after his own final visit to it. His vision swam, trying to focus on the hulking figure next to him—and then all at once it was crystal clear: a mech covered head to foot in the Autobots' preferred anti-rad armor. It was impossible to see who was inside it. But Tarantulas knew. He'd heard his voice. He'd know his voice anywhere.

"Pr—" he wheezed. "Pr—o—"

Prowl stepped back, slinging a gun off his back that, even with the added bulk of his anti-rad armor, looked ill-suited in his hands. "What the hell are you? How did you get in here?" He sounded angry, the same way millennia in the future he would sound angry to be trapped in Tarantulas's web, angry to be manhandled and blackmailed and bargained with; and only now did Tarantulas realize that the anger was actually fear.

Tarantulas realized with a jolt that Prowl had no way to recognize him. This was so long ago, Prowl undoubtedly still thought Mesothulas consigned to the Noisemaze. He hadn't seen Tarantulas's new body—or a natural tarantula, for that matter—hell, for all Tarantulas knew, Prowl had never seen an organic in the flesh before. And now here was a massive technorganic in front of him, mangled so badly he was probably hard to identify even as bipedal, who had tumbled out of a mysterious glowing portal in an abandoned radioactive lab—

"It's m-me," he wheezed. "Don't shoot, P-Prowl, please—I can'tzz h-harm..." He hacked up a mouthful of green energon, rapidly congealing. "Please."

The last time Prowl had seen him, he'd tried to murder him, and surely nothing about Tarantulas's appearance looked less worthy of being murdered now; and yet, Prowl lowered his gun. "...Mesothulas?"

"Zzyes. I'm... s-zztso sorry to... die in front of you, like this—" He laughed, coughed, and choked at the same time. "It's n-not what I zzzt wanted... you to..."

Prowl took a step toward Tarantulas, knees bending like he wanted to kneel next to him; but then he stopped, and backed up. And without a word, he turned and ran away from him. Sprinting at top speed, fighting against the clunky suit to move as fast as possible.

Tarantulas tried to call to him to stay—please, Prowl, don't leave him again—but all that came out was a dispirited, staticky hiss. Tarantulas's optic froze a moment, and when it rebooted, Prowl was gone.

Well, he'd come here to die alone, hadn't he? But it was worse now. Merely being alone was far different from contemplating the Prowl-shaped void in his life. He wished Prowl hadn't been here. He hated Prowl for being here.

He stared dully down the path Prowl had taken away from him, and listened as his systems shut down one by one.

And then there was Prowl, sprinting back for Tarantulas as fast as he'd left.

Tarantulas's spark surged joyously; he felt himself die a little faster. "Przzkl... Y-you came b..."

Prowl shoved him roughly onto his back, ripped Tarantulas's chest open wider—the metal screamed—and shoved a rusty, clawed weapon into the gap. Tarantulas tried to grab Prowl's wrist, but couldn't lift his arm. Why? Why?

Tarantulas dimly recognized the weapon as his own prototype spark extractor.

He felt his soul sucked inside-out.

Then nothing.

###

The first thing Tarantulas was aware of was the bright lights on the ceiling above him.

No. No, that wasn't the ceiling.

That was a face.

It was grinning at him.

It wasn't Overlord's face, and Overlord's was the only face he expected to be within five miles of him. Where was he? What was going on? He'd been dying, hadn't he?

Tarantulas stared at the face, blearily, as it swam into focus. And then croaked, "Primus?"

"Close!" the face said. "Pharma. And I am delighted to meet you, Mesothulas. I've got so many questions to ask about your body."

Tarantulas stared in fuzzy befuddlement at Pharma. "Ah?"

"I want to know all about where you got it and how it works," Pharma said. "It's so unusual, I was barely able to patch you up! Me! And the flesh that's grafted onto the surface—it's ingenious. Disgusting, but ingenious. Who made it? I'm convinced someone did make it—Prowl thinks you were somehow mutated in, oh, some parallel dimension, he wouldn't explain it, kept saying 'classified information'—"

It took longer than it should have for Tarantulas to register the name. And then he bolted up—or tried to. He was still missing half his arms and spider legs, apparently, and ended up instead sort of sliding sideways. "Prowl!"

"Pharma," the mech over him corrected.

"No! Where's— Where's Prowl? He was with me, where did he..."

"Ah." Pharma pointed across Tarantulas's berth. "On your blind side."

Tarantulas's head whipped around ("Careful," Pharma scolded), and there Prowl was. Sitting there, looking at Tarantulas, as though that was a perfectly natural place for him to be. By Tarantulas's side. On a chair. Looking at him. By his side.

Tarantulas stared at him.

Prowl looked away.

"Spark rpm kicked up," Pharma muttered. "I told you you'd make him anxious, Prowl. Out the door, I won't have you disturbing my patient."

"No!" Tarantulas cried, twisting to give Pharma a pleading look. "No, please, let—let him stay. I want to talk to him."

Pharma stared at Tarantulas. "I did plug your brain module back in right, didn't I?"

"Pharma," Prowl said crossly. "I told you I'd need an opportunity to debrief Mesothulas once he was conscious and stable. Is he medically stable to your satisfaction?"

Pharma sighed, and circled around to Prowl's side of the berth, so he could lean in and... Tarantulas presumed he was examining his wounds, although he was still blind on that side. He could see the edge of a hole still gaping on the left side of his chest, but couldn't quite bend his neck enough to see how much of him was still missing.

"Welds still holding," Pharma said. "For now. If you absolutely must interrogate him immediately..."

"Welds," Tarantulas said dumbly, as if it had only just occurred to him that he must have had some repairs done to him in order for him not to be dead. "How—how am I still—? I was dying. How in the world—"

"Prowl hauled you in with your frame already going gray and your spark preserved in the most jury-rigged excuse for a spark extractor I've ever seen," Pharma said. "Your spark decayed slowly enough in the extractor that I was able to repair enough damage to your body to get your spark home and reignite it."

Tarantulas's gaze jerked back to Prowl, who was looking somewhere past him. He'd saved Tarantulas's life. He'd saved Tarantulas's life? He'd snapped to save him the moment he recognized the damage he was in, the moment he recognized who he was. He'd run to save him.

And with a spark extractor, of all things! Tarantulas breathed, "Ingenious."

"Yes, I know," Pharma said smugly.

Prowl glanced up at Pharma. "If you don't mind..."

"Yes, yes, I'll get out of your way." Pharma fixed Tarantulas with a sharp look. "Don't let him force you to do anything strenuous."

"Don't worry, doctor. I'm not going to do anything more strenuous than talk."

"Talk with Prowl," Pharma said pointedly. Looking at Prowl, he said, like it was a threat, "I'm going to be monitoring his vitals remotely."

Prowl nodded. "Of course."

Pharma gave Tarantulas one last critical look, then turned to leave the room. The door swung shut behind him. His footsteps disappeared down the hall. Tarantulas simply looked at Prowl, reveling in the knowledge that he was here, at Tarantulas's sick bed; and Prowl looked back at him. For several seconds, they were silent.

Then they both started talking at once.

"How did you get out of the Noisemaze?!"

"What were you doing in my lab?!"

"What did the maze do to you?!"

"Why did you save my life?!"

"I'm sorry."

"Where in the universe did you take— Wait. What?"

Prowl couldn't look at Tarantulas. He looked down at his hands, laced in front of him, elbows on his knees.

"Repeat that," Tarantulas commanded.

"I asked you a question first," Prowl said. "And, as you pointed out, I saved your life. Answer my questions first."

"Saved it?! You tried to end my life," Tarantulas snapped. Prowl half-shrugged, grimaced, and tilted his head, as though to say, fair point. "Answer to me, Prowl. Repeat what you just said. I want to hear it clearly."

Prowl frowned. "I'm not—"

"Say it!"

Prowl flinched. For most people, flinching was a sharp cringe back, submissive and avoidant. Prowl's flinch made his expression harden and his back straighten.

"I'm sorry," he said. "For locking you in an experimental torture prison without a trial and leaving you there to die."

"And?"

"'And'?"

"And 'I'm sorry for kidnapping'...?"

"Oh. I wouldn't call it a kidnapping. He was incapable of any autonomous activity, much less of taking care of himself. If I hadn't taken him along—"

"Prowl."

Prowl huffed. "All right. From the perspective of, say, the beginning of the day, it’s understandable that my actions might have been construable as a kidnapping; and on those grounds, I apologize for the perceived—“

“Prowl."

He fell silent for a moment. Then looked down again. "I'm sorry for kidnapping Ostaros."

"Sorry," Tarantulas muttered. "Sorry. Everything I went through—everything you put me through—and all you have to say is sorry."

"Sincere question," Prowl said. "Is there anything else I could say that would help you?"

And there wasn't. So Tarantulas said nothing.

In truth, it was a marvel he had even gotten that much out of Prowl. He certainly hadn't gotten that from Prowl in the future, millions of years later, when he descended upon him with the evidence of what Prowl had turned him into—what he'd turned himself into for Prowl. What was the difference? Had Prowl lost his remorse over Mesothulas in the intervening millennia? Had Tarantulas been fortunate to jump into the past at one of Prowl's periodic dips into higher morality?

No—Tarantulas doubted it. Something else had to be different. What had changed—or would change, as the case may be—between this meeting and the one in which Tarantulas had kidnapped Prowl?

... Well. "Kidnapping Prowl" was a rather large detail, wasn't it. Kidnapping him and blackmailing them. In retrospect, Tarantulas supposed that would rather keep Prowl out of any sort of reconciliatory, remorseful state of mind, wouldn't it.

Is that all it would have took? God—did he waste all that time, all those years preparing the perfect trap to dazzle and intimidate Prowl, when all along, all he had to do to receive an apology was—was—was nothing? Just turn up? Just show up with a hole blown through his spark and collapse at his feet?

It burned to think that he had—that he'd wasted all of that, for nothing.

And for a moment, he wanted to make Prowl burn too. Just a little. "I'm surprised you bothered to save me," he snipped. "When you could have far more easily just left me to die—and ensure that your little secret about you-know-where would no longer have anyone left who could spill it."

He'd expected—he'd hoped—that Prowl would look scared, or hurt, or guilty. Prowl looked none of those things. What he didn't expect was for Prowl to look confused. Was he more callous than even Tarantulas had thought? To have forgotten Carpessa? To have forgotten which secret he'd thrown Tarantulas into hell to keep?

Then something clicked on. "You think I locked you up as a—as a cover-up? To keep a secret? You weren't going to tell, you didn't have anybody to tell." (It was so true that Tarantulas couldn't even be offended.) "That's—all these years, that's what you've believed?"

Tarantulas stared at him. "... Well, I did."

"That wasn't my objective," Prowl said hotly. "I was—" He paused; and there was the guilt and shame that Tarantulas had hoped to see. Now that he had it, he wasn't so sure he wanted it after all. "I—my objective was to... to remove the thing that... caused me to make decisions like that."

Tarantulas gaped at him. "You tried to kill me because you thought I was a bad influence?" He laughed harshly, angrily. It hurt to laugh, pained the parts of him that were missing. Prowl didn't look at him. "Why would—Why not kill me again, then? If my presence is so very terrible for your decision-making capabilities? Why did you save me this time."

"Because—you weren't what was causing me to do the wrong thing." Prowl's already guilty face twisted further, into something that looked uncomfortably close to self-loathing. Somewhere in Prowl's mind must have been self-reproaches compounded upon self-reproaches: the knowledge of the crimes he'd committed—and the knowledge that he'd martyred Mesothulas for those crimes, for no reason.

Tarantulas could have told Prowl that Tarantulas was never the one making Prowl's decisions. No one had ever guided Prowl's decisions except for himself. He was too stubborn, too proud, too beautifully distant and independent. Hearing Prowl admit it, Tarantulas should have wanted to gloat. It was what he'd always wanted to hear Prowl confess: that regardless of whatever high ideals he tried to serve, his stabs at performing morality were a sham; that he could be just as wicked as Tarantulas; that he was just as wicked. Tarantulas was never the one who dragged Prowl off his pedestal of moral purity and down into the dirt: no, they had each inspired the other to dig. Tarantulas should get to gloat over this.

Instead—to his surprise—he found his anger toward Prowl softening in empathy.

Since he'd started lurking in Ostaros's—Springer's—life, Tarantulas had found himself aching inside, like acid softly eating him from the spark out, whenever he thought on all the little things he'd done to help make the world Springer lived in worse—and all the much larger things he might do yet. It was one of the reasons that, even though he'd agreed, eagerly, to collaborate with Overlord, he'd decided that they would only dissect the specimen with a time machine: any incisions they made to the past could be effortlessly sewn back shut once they'd made their observations. Springer wouldn't have to suffer for the changes Tarantulas made. Tarantulas had changed; he thought he understood what guilt felt like, now. And now he couldn't mock Prowl for feeling it. Of course he felt vile for having done little things to help make the world a little worse. He understood.

Maybe, he'd considered, guilt wasn't the weakness he'd thought it as, but a warning sign—a signpost to help guide you away from doing something you ought not do again. A defense against stupidity.

Tarantulas was beginning to fear he had been very stupid.

It was no wonder Prowl hat shot him down when he'd tried to offer the power to conquer the galaxy.

"I'm—for what it's worth," Tarantulas said, "I'm no longer interested in—trying to talk you into doing things you'd rather not. Or, trying to convince you that you want to do something you don't think you do." Was that true? Tarantulas didn't know; but he thought Prowl would probably like for it to be true.

He didn't look like he liked it. Bitterly, he said, "I don't need your help to make decisions I don't want to." And then sat up straighter, smoothed his face from guilty to professionally neutral, visibly changing the topic. "I don't know how you got out of the Noisemaze. But, whatever your trick was—I'm—glad that you did."

Tarantulas perked up. "Oh? Did you miss me?"

"Do I have to have missed you to be glad you didn't die?"

That wasn't a no. "Did you miss me?"

Prowl harrumphed. "I wouldn't say that."

Tarantulas tilted his head toward him, smiling. The gesture hurt. "What would you say?"

"That..." Prowl tipped his head back, looking up at the ceiling, choosing his words carefully. "That—I have—been unsuccessful in finding an inventor to collaborate with who has—been as... responsive to my requests as you were. Do not mistake me, the Autobots have a plethora of scientists, engineers, and inventors more than competent enough to meet any requests I make—but they don't tend to innovate on my proposals the way you did. That's all."

Which was clearly, blatantly intended as a brush-off. I didn't miss you; all I missed was the things you made for me. But Tarantulas's spark spun faster anyway; his spark monitor undoubtedly would indicate an increase in the rpm again. Millennia in the future, Tarantulas would say to Prowl, I miss the way that you inspired me; and here, now, millennia in the past, Prowl had said to Tarantulas, I miss the way that you were inspired by me. The statements made a Möbius strip out of their mutual longing, each infinitely flowing into and looping back around to each other. Each the muse to the other.

And with that realization, he wondered, suddenly, what this strange new Prowl that paralleled Tarantulas's words and didn't cringe away from him would do if Tarantulas touched him. If Tarantulas reached out, took his hand, or cupped his face and pulled him in...

He tried to roll onto his side to stretch his one functioning arm toward Prowl; but doing so rolled him onto the wounded ruin of his shoulder and chest, and he curled in on himself, hissing in pain.

"Mesothulas!" Prowl's hands were on him, on his chest and shoulder, pushing him to roll flat on his back. "Don't do that." Prowl was standing to lean over Tarantulas, frowning down at him—annoyed or worried? It must be worried. Please, let him be worried. "Haven't you seen how bad your wounds are?"

In wonder, Tarantulas said, "You're touching me."

Prowl paused. "Of course I am." As if there were anything "of course" about this.

"Tell me again," Tarantulas said, "that you didn't miss me."

Prowl didn't. He looked away, lifting his hands off of Tarantulas's body. Tarantulas grabbed the wrist of the hand leaving his chest and pulled it back into place. Prowl didn't try to withdraw again.

"I missed you, Prowl."

"I can't imagine why."

"Can't you?" Tarantulas ran the fang at the tip of his chelicera-thumb in the gap between Prowl's wrist and hand.

Tarantulas wasn't sure whether Prowl shivered or shuddered. "That—whatever is protruding from your armor—"

"It's called setae."

"Does it—spread? Is it contagious?"

Tarantulas chuckled wheezily, at the same time as he found himself wondering whether Prowl, this Prowl, this younger Prowl had yet to set foot on an alien world and see organics for himself. "It is wholly contained to my own body, never fear."

"We can remove it while you're here getting all your other repairs."

"No, no." Tarantulas started to shake his head and immediately regretted it. "It's supposed to be there. I'm keeping it."

"Why? What's—What is it for?"

They were drifting frustratingly far from their original topic, and just when Tarantulas felt he was on the verge of persuading Prowl to admit something—something Tarantulas hadn't thought was there—something he so desperately needed to have confirmed. "If you don't like how it feels, then touch me somewhere else." He let go of Prowl's wrist, allowing him to withdraw completely if he wanted to. He felt like he was taking a deadly risk—but he'd already tried to force Prowl into choosing him, and see how that had all fallen apart. See how he'd said I want you, I want us, and Prowl had said you're asking if I'm frightened to face the repercussions of my terrible judgment: no. What he needed now was to see whether Prowl would choose him if he was free to make the choice, free of fear and blackmail and hostages and kidnapping.

For a moment, Tarantulas was terrified he wouldn't. Prowl bristled at the dare, pulling his hand back quickly; but then leaned back in, and closer, and cupped Tarantulas's face in his hand. His fingers fit perfectly in the corrugated grooves of Tarantulas's cheek. Tarantulas felt light enough to float.

"I shouldn't be doing this," Prowl said. Tarantulas had never heard him speak so softly before. "You're so injured."

"I'd be even more gravely injured if you pulled away from me now."

"Difficult to imagine. I can see your exposed brain module."

"Then I'm glad you get to see my best assets."

Tarantulas could have sworn that Prowl's face almost shifted, like he wanted to smile. "Stop that." He bent closer to Tarantulas, optics dimming—Tarantulas's vents hitched—Prowl's lips ghosted softly over the tips of Tarantulas's outstretched mandibles—

Footsteps pounded down the hallway. "I don't know what kind of torture you normally put your agents through, Prowl. But as long as this one is my patient, I will not stand idly by while his spark RPMs give off readings better suited to pulsars than to—" Pharma opened the door, took one step in, immediately backpedaled, and slammed the door.

Prowl jerked back, and when his lips left Tarantulas's face it felt like being paralyzed with a rush of icy wind. For a moment, there was silence.

"I'll check in on Mesothulas later," Pharma said through the closed door. His footsteps hurriedly vanished down the hall.

Tarantulas gave Prowl the best pleading look he could with half a visor and a broken optic. Prowl shook his head, and sank back into his seat. "You're injured," he said, yet again. "I shouldn't risk exacerbating it."

"I won't always be injured," Tarantulas said hopefully. "Then...? Or, when that day comes, will this be—just another mistake you've made with me?"

Tarantulas tried his best to keep the question gentle. Prowl winced anyway. "I hope not. But I don't know," he said. "I'm tired of making mistakes. It's going to keep happening, I know, that's life, but—I don't want you to be one again."

"What do you want me to be to you, then?"

Tarantulas was disappointed but he supposed he wasn't surprised when Prowl didn't answer.

"We can figure that out," Tarantulas offered. "Together, with time." Prowl at least nodded in agreement to that—oh, the relief. Tarantulas was getting a second chance. This one he wouldn't squander. He'd do anything Prowl asked, make anything Prowl wanted—that was all Tarantulas had desired in the first place, after all. He had knowledge of technologies that wouldn't exist for millions of years—he could become their inventor, dazzle Prowl with designs he'd never dreamed of. He had just enough knowledge of the war that he could steer Prowl away from the actions Tarantulas knew he would regret, oh, how grateful Prowl would be to Tarantulas for that—imagine! Tarantulas playing the part of Prowl's conscience! And soon enough the war would end—

The very fuel in Tarantulas's lines froze.

The war would end. And then the other Tarantulas would storm in, brimming with blackmail and greed.

He was out there already, no doubt. At this point in history he'd already escaped the Noisemaze, begun his long pilgrimage across the universe to learn from the luminaries of science. How long was it yet until he turned his attentions back to Prowl? If Tarantulas went through with his plan to provide Prowl with the wonders of the future, how long until his younger self deduced that Prowl had adopted a new pet scientist, and became fiercely jealous?

"Prowl—" Tarantulas reached for him, chelicera weakly pointed toward Prowl's hands. By now, Tarantulas had no idea whether or not to expect Prowl to take it.

But he did. Prowl scooted to the edge of his seat, and took Tarantulas's hand in both of his. He even ran his thumb, lightly, over the back of his chelicera, as though studying the way his setae bent under the pressure and then snapped back into place.

He'd deal with his younger self. Perhaps he'd teach him how to make a time machine of his own, and let him shunt himself off to another branch timeline where he could claim a Prowl for his own. But he'd kill him if he had to. He could do that. He was sure he could.

Tarantulas squeezed Prowl's hands, looked in his optics, and said, softly, "I'm not going to lose you again. I refuse to lose you again."

The look Prowl gave Tarantulas said that he was thinking the same words.

###

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[vulpinmusings]

Ski’tar and Friends part 10: Aliens vs. Starfinders

This week, our intrepid trio of Starfinder initiates complete their final competency tests.

Back to Start

Last time on...

Vemir, Sixer, and I arrived at the warehouse to find it surrounded by members of the local security force intent on keeping the Feather Stalker from breaking out into the station streets.  We showed them our Starfinder credentials and they let us into the quarantine area with a warning not to get separated.  The officer in charge also told us that the individual who had been killed by the Stalker was likely trying to smuggle the thing onto Absalom Station, which explained a few things and raised other questions we didn’t have time to pursue.

I noticed as we entered the warehouse that the main door refused to close fully behind us.  I filed that fact away as something to keep in mind while hunting the Stalker; the last thing anyone wanted was the Feather Stalker running loose.

The lights in the warehouse were in bad shape, and there signs of damage on the stacked crates and barrels around us.  With utmost caution to keep one another in sight at all times, we slowly made our way down the middle of the warehouse, occasionally poking into opened crates to find only basic, everyday items, while I sent my drone to check things out a little farther afield.  Eventually, we came up to the back of the warehouse, where we found the crate the Stalker had broken out of, near a raised platform holding several large crates and a worryingly large hole in the floor.

Sixer stepped up to give the broken crate a closer look, and the Feather Stalker chose that moment to strike.  An ugly, vaguely insectoid thing covered in feather-like quills, the Stalker leaped out of the shadows under the raised platform and by luck alone failed to actually hit Sixer.  I tossed a frag grenade immediately, taking out one of the supports of the platform and half-burying the Stalker in heavy crates.  My drone rolled up and proved that my fixes to its aiming had worked, but the laser did nothing to the Stalker whatsoever.

Vemir pulled back to a safer distance to use his sniper rifle, scoring a decent hit before the Stalker withdrew into the rubble and launched one of its quills at Sixer, hitting him in the shoulder.  I lobbed another grenade, and this time the blast hit the Stalker directly.  It lost some feathers, but stayed alive and very angry. Leaping back out, it tried to catch me and Sixer in a single sweep of its arm, but we narrowly avoided the attack.  I told my Drone to fire again, just to make sure the first shot hadn’t been a fluke.  It was another hit, but the laser was again absorbed harmlessly.  

I took a second to consider my options.  Sixer was already engaging the Stalker at melee range, so further grenades were out of the question.  My only ranged weapon was the same kind of laser pistol my drone had equipped, so I’d be equally useless if I didn’t swallow my fear and stay close to the Stalker and use my tactical knife.  My drone was worthless for dealing damage, but it was a sturdy thing that could take a few hits, if I could just entice the Stalker to go after it instead of me.

A moment of brilliance came.  My copy of the Strawberry Machine Cake album was currently uploaded into the custom rig in my augmentic arm, and that same rig was what I used to control my drone.  It was a simple matter to transmit some song data to the drone and instruct it to play the music at full volume.  The warehouse was soon filled with thumping sugar-pop beats, and the Feather Stalker’s reaction was everything I could have hoped for.  It froze for a few beats, and then hissed and turned to throw a couple quills at my drone.  It hit, but the drone was plenty tough enough to take the damage and keep on pumping out the tunes.  Sixer and I tried to take advantage of the Stalker’s distraction, but our blades only met the air between the quills.

Then Vemir pulled off the shot of the day, landing a sniper round in precisely the right place to blow half of the monster’s head off. I swooped in for the kill, driving my knife into the gory remnants and severing its brain from the rest of the body.  The Feather Stalker collapsed, and nobody except my drone had taken any serious damage.  Sixer shook off the quill in his shoulder like it was nothing, and we headed back outside to bask in the wonder of the security forces.

Everyone was impressed that we had made such short work of the Feather Stalker, and even more impressed that Strawberry Machine Cake had been the key to our victory.  The security chief gave us leave to take whatever we had scrounged from the warehouse, and then set his men to clean the place out for the refit into an Exo-guardian headquarters.

Ziggy met up with us on the way back to where we’d first met him. He seemed a little upset that I’d caused a small bit of easily repairable property damage, but overall he was overjoyed with out success and gifted us a couple of incendiary grenades, which I kept, and a set of armor, which we decided to just sell.  Ziggy then asked us to take the music album to Historia-7 before we reported to Guidance for our last initiation test.

Historia and Old Hacker Lady were still chumming about in the archives when we arrived.  When we gave her the Strawberry Machine Cake album and explained who it was from and why Ziggy was gifting it to her, she actually showed a little emotion, and didn’t hesitate to upload the album for later listening.  It seems Ziggy was on the money about the android needing a pick-me-up after the passing of her predecessor.

Our final task for the initiation was to provide assistance to Fitch, the Ysoki in charge of the Wayfinders.  He was currently aboard the Master of Stars, the flagship of the Wayfinder fleet, doing repairs.  We had to wait a couple hours for the shuttle that would take us out to the ship, so I patched up my Drone and replenished my grenades while Vemir acquired an auto-CPR module for his armor.

I was eager to be working for a fellow Ysoki, especially since the last of my kind that we’d dealt with had been Rat-rod.  When we got to the Master of Stars, however, my hopes for a friendly chit-chat were quickly squashed.  The ship was undergoing extensive repairs, to the point that magic spells had to be employed to keep the atmosphere from leaking out of the thing.  Fitch didn’t greet us personally; he was so overwhelmed trying to keep his cadre of less-than-sensible engineers in line that just sent a hover drone to act as a comms unit between him and us, and he wasted no time in giving us our orders.

His task for us was simple: among all the myriad things going wrong on the ship, Deck E was experiencing mass blackouts and computer failures that couldn’t be explained away as simple short-circuits. Worried about possible sabotage, Fitch wanted somebody with combat experience to look around the deck and see what was up.  Itching for a chance to show off my engineering skills and maybe get into Fitch’s good graces by taking a load off his plate, I lead the way to Deck E.

We got off the lift and went straight into the maintenance corridors, where I set to work getting the lights back on.  As I worked, I noticed that the walls and power conduits appeared to have been chewed on, of all things, and as soon as I got the lights up we heard something inside one of the barrels in the room.  I sent my drone to check out the noise, and it uncovered a pair of small, frightened human children.  They cried about not wanting to be in trouble for sneaking off to play hide-and-seek.  I tried to calm them down with my cute ratty charm, but for some reason it didn’t work.  It was Vemir, of all people, who managed to soothe the kids enough to get their story from them.  Their father was part of the ship’s engineering crew, and the kids were supposed to stay in a designated play area, not wander off to hide in maintenance rooms on damaged decks.  They also mentioned a pet that had a large mouth.  Vemir reported what we’d found to Fitch, who was understandably frustrated at the news of unaccompanied minors wandering about, and when told about the “pet” instructed us to capture the thing without harming it.

Figuring Vemir had things in hand with the kids, I decided to head to the next room to continue my repairs and investigations.  The moment I crossed the threshold, however, the fire suppression system kicked in for no reason and doused me in flame-retardant foam, much to the children’s amusement.  With much grumbling, I dug myself out and set to work getting the lights up.

This second room was much larger and seemed to be some sort of laboratory or specimen storage room, judging by the capsules containing various strange artifacts.  One of the capsules was broken open, and the signs of chewing on the walls were much greater. Within one of the holes, we spotted what was presumably the kids’ “pet” and the culprit of the deck’s power issues.  It was an alien creature I can only describe as a large, floating mouth.  None of us wanted to risk losing a hand in an attempt to just grab the thing, so we looked around for something we could use to get it out of the wall and something to put it in.  Sixer found a net, and I decided to try and smoke the mouth out with a smoke grenade.  I rolled the ‘nade into the hole while Sixer stood ready, but the mouth just swallowed the grenade whole and seemed unperturbed by the smoke that began to issue from its belly.

I decided to consult Fitch on the problem, in case he knew how the mouth had been acquired originally.  He told me the capture had been simple: just lure it into a box with something it likes to eat.  And it seems to like eating just about anything.  So, we got a good-sized crate and Vemir put a flare inside, after igniting the flare to make it seem more enticing.  Or something.  In any case, the plan worked perfectly.  Mouth-thing floated into the crate, we slammed the lid shut, and mission accomplished.

Just as soon as we got the mouth boxed up, the life support system went a bit haywire.  The temperature in the room started rising quickly and steam started pouring from the vents.  We searched quickly for the nearest life support controls, and Sixer was the one to locate them and reset the parameters to normal.  We reported everything to Fitch as we headed out, because it’s not good to be surprised by new problems on a starship that’s already in bad shape.  Fitch thanked us for our hard work and sent us a Ring of Resistance.

And so, having solved a problem for each of the sub-factions, Vemir, 6, and I were declared to be official Starfinders, proven capable of handling high-stakes missions.  And our first task, according to Guidance, was to start dealing with the aftermath of the Scored Stars Disaster.

[italicwatches]

GAMERS! Episode 03

Okay, sliding back towards center. It’s GAMERS!, episode 03! Here we GO!

-Opening! And what comes with an opening? Why, game references out the complicated love shape, of course! Number two on our list, a wild looking side scrolling shooter, can only be one thing… Gradius? No, Parodius! Konami’s long-running shmup series, it is a literal parody of their main shooters and other such franchises, notably Gradius and to some degree its chief competition in the market, R-Type. Gradius, and thus Parodius, are known well for the power-up bar system, where each power-up item you get moves the selector one section up the bar. You can get things like speed-ups and options and powerful weaponry, but be careful, because one wrong move and you might lose it all…And one bad combination, or one too many Speed Ups, could spell your doom! Also they haven’t made a new one that’s an actual game and not pachislot since, uhhhh…1997! Congratulations, Parodius, your newest actual game is old enough to drink the pain away. Konami: Ruining childhood dreams they themselves built, since 1969.

-DAY 03: Hoshinomori Chiaki and StreetPass Communication

-We begin in the morning, with a young lady having to keep her short skirt from showing her panties to us the viewer. Gotta be careful, lass. Then it’s to Keita, switching to his inside shoes, when Tasuku comes up…And he’s not super happy. The hell was that free-to-play game, man?! It sucks and just wants his money! And how the hell does a horror game turn into a fishing game exactly? And the ending was shit! Tasuku even slams his hand into the wall next to Keita’s head…

-They’re parodies, Tasuku, parodies! That’s the joke! Also all the girls are seeing stylish tough guy Tasuku having scrawny small nerd boy Keita pinned to the wall and are starting to ogle. And the farce continues to build.

-Once they’re in class, Keita admits that yeah, the games that guy makes are kind of…a mess, looked at straightforwardly. They’re fun because the bad parodies are funny, like mocking a crappy movie, you know? It’s like a matter of the heart! A single virgin does not get to compare things to matters of the heart with a guy who’s actively dating. …Harsh, Tasuku. Very harsh. And have you even done anything with her?!

-Um er well you see THAT’S NOT THE POINT how are things with you and Karen? Because she wants you bad. He’s…Not really had the chance to get into any real contact with her…Are you dumb or just stupid, Keita? Reach out you damned fool. Don’t just keep passing her by…

-Passing her by…You mean like StreetPass on his 3DS? Is this a comedy routine or are you just that dense?! And then Keita’s got another assistance request from Mono-san. Hold that thought he’s gotta bail out his comrade. Fine. Fine, but think about what he said.

-And so back to MMOs, as Tasuku notices that Keita’s username is “Tsucchie”, which has no connection to anything but sounds like a real-person nickname, not a username…Yeah, it’s actually from his mother’s maiden name, Tsuchiyama. He doesn’t like using anything connected to his real name, but didn’t want something too chuuni, so he just took that and simplified it down to Tsucchie, or Yama-san when they want something less cutesy. So who’s Mono there?

-Longtime MMO friend. They’ve been guild bros since practically his first day in the game! Uh huh. Well, Tasuku’s gonna have to work on this if he wants to get to watch a farce…You’ve got a lot of work to do if you’re gonna get anywhere with Karen. You’re right, he does suck. …Okay quit that. You just need to get out of this loner mode of thinking. YOU ARE SO KIND TASUKU!

-So, first way to start is by learning how to be more comfortable around young ladies…And their best in for that is gonna be what you’re passionate about! Which means they need a girl who’s into RPGs and weird parody games and shit…

-But, BAM! Right after school, Tasuku takes Keita over to another class…And bam, Hoshinomori Chiaki. Another loner who needs a friend. Keita protests, not liking the idea of sorta hitting on this girl. Too bad, Tasuku decided already. Now GET YO ASS IN THERE.

-And that’s when Aguri finds them and Tasuku you were going to spend time with her today, not your uke! Right. So he’s got to go, and you’d better make it happen, Keita! Fare thee well~

-Which is about when Keita realizes he’s been standing in the doorway long enough that people are noticing. And then his stomach lets out an unpleasant rumble. Oh dear.

-And then we’re where we left off with yesterday’s after credits scene. With Karen having a giddy haze, and then Eiichi from the club spotting Keita and hey, what’s up? Did you need Karen? Karen’s head pops up because KEITA WHAT WHERE, but Keita awkwardly claims he’s got no business with her and Karen just turns to stone. Oh, that is painful. This whole scene is gonna be rocky, isn’t it? (OH GOD THE PUNS ARE COMING OUUUUUT)

-So she crumbles to dust, and is blown away by a mournful wind, as Keita admits he’s here to talk to that girl over there…Oh, and he steps in the dust that once was Karen, for a scene that makes absolutely zero literal sense but tons of metaphorical logic, as he makes it over to Chiaki’s desk, and she…Has no idea he’s there. She’s too busy playing her PZ Vivio with her headphones in.

-Karen, recovering from her brief time as a symbol of the folly of man and the decaying powers of time immemorial, tries to get Keita’s attention…And hears it right from him that he’s here to see a girl. Ouch. B-But knowing you, it’s something managerial, some class business or something, surely! Right? TELL HER SHE’S RIGHT KEITA SHE NEEDS THIS.

-Nope he’s here to…Fuck it, all in. To work up the courage to come here and make friends with this girl as a fellow RPG lover!

-Guys I think Karen just died.

-And then Keita catches her when she collapses and EVERYONE GOES WILD, as Karen tries to get out a word, any word, and finally calls him a sleaze ball before fleeing at top speed!

-And Chiaki finally looks up and realizes things have happened and oh god there’s a strange boy looking at her what to do what to do?! She shrinks away as small as she can, in raw unyielding fear of the unknown…And that’s when he sees that she’s playing Aegis VIII. Aegis Vee plus Aegis Three equals…Aegis Eight! Aegis In Space! (Did I stretch for that Simpsons reference? Yes! Do I care? No.)

-But she realizes that he knows the game and that short-circuits the fear of Boys into just plain old confusion…Which soon leads to them at the bus stop. At far, opposite ends of the bench, as he finally introduces himself properly. And she’s…Oh she’s a nervous wreck and this conversation is totally dead, but she can only assume that he’s in the game club and is here to recruit her like Karen and Eiichi!

-Wait wait wait, he’s not in the game club! You’re not? He’s not. Oh. She, she went to watch one day when Karen invited her, but…

-But it wasn’t what you wanted at all? It was the same for him! They’re cool, but way too intense, right? Yes! She doesn’t want to be the best at anything, she just wants to have fun! YES! And Chiaki’s face finally comes out of shadow, as the two clasp hands, realizing they have finally found kindred spirits…!

-Over the next few days, the two became close friends, exchanging numbers and hanging out. They even got on a first-name basis, which isn’t nothing. They were even secretly texting in class…All as Karen watched, turning more and more into a horrifying little goblin of misery and woe…

-But then, THEN! They had a moment, of shared gushing over the Aegis series. And the best part of that series is, same time now…

-The music!

-The characters!

-A rift has opened between them. As they both suddenly feel so deeply, deeply betrayed.

-Commercial break!

-And we’re back! It’s after class and Tasuku is hearing how Keita got into a huge argument with Chiaki. Over games. Over philosophies! Shut the hell up with that overwrought bullshit. And he admits that she was far more of an actual friend than him…Oh don’t give him that. What happened?

-She…She said games don’t need appealing moe characters to be good! Are you stupid or just an idiot, Keita? He doesn’t care if she’s a cute girl who kind of looks like the Curse Freak from the much-beloved Satchél Creatures series, he will never compromise on this! So idiot, then. But fine, fine, take a few deep breaths and you two can talk it over calmly later. Okay? Don’t let a good friendship go because of this one little—

-Hard cut to the argument staring anew! Keita think of how the industry has already taken moe too far! There’s lolicon and imoutos in what were once mainstream games now! The foreign game industries are running laps around them with cinematic stories and tightly polished gameplay! The force of moe is stifling Japanese game development, you narrow-minded shrimp!

-Hold on there! Haven’t you ever played a foreign game and wished it had cute girls, instead of roid-chomping muscle men working for the military?! You…You seaweed head!

-WHAT DID YOU JUST CALL HER YOU MOTHERFU—

-Tasuku cuts in, argument stops now or he starts cracking skulls. How is it that Tasuku now feels like the only sane man? I assume we are only two, maybe three episodes tops from Gakuto being the only person with a rational thought in his FPS-addled brain. The only question in my mind is whether it’ll be because of actual logic, or because things have devolved so far that “teabag them all and let God sort it out” becomes a sensible approach to the situation.

-Anyways Tasuku wants these two idiots to just chill the fuck out and get along, they clearly care about each other…And Chiaki gets all blushy about the idea and Keita thinks she’s getting a crush on Tasuku like all the other girls. So you’ll fawn over a stylish, handsome guy like Tasuku here, but won’t accept moe?! What kind of hypocrite are you?!

-Hey. HEY. Tasuku cuts that all down. Everyone cool your fuckin’ jets. And don’t go making shit personal. …Even if Keita really is a shrimp.

-But soon he’s making them both sit down and, hey, Chiaki, weren’t you talking about where you were in the new Aegis game? …She was in the elven hideout…

-That’s where Keita just got to this morning! It’s one of the best maps yet! The look, the layout, the way they show off the elvish hatred for humanity! Yeah, yeah! Chiaki gets all hype again as her anger fizzles in the wake of getting to talk about her new favorite game with someone who gets it…

-But the best part for Keita and the worst part for Chiaki is the downright lewd pose of the elf girl in the center! Everyone else in the room promptly takes their chance to run like hell, as the argument starts right back up…! But Tasuku is on the ball this time, and cuts it right off, and can’t you both just fucking let this shit go?!

-You don’t get it! Actual quote: “We’re lonely gamers with nothing but our inflated egos.” Okay first of all Keita I fucking saw you just subtweet me right there, and second

-Of course, both of them consider this compromise simply UNACCEPTABLE…But for Tasuku, the worst part is that Aguri is on the other side of the locked door, giving him the horrifying-little-goblin face. Damn, she’s got an intense aura. Okay, time to call it short. You two have good hearts, don’t let one disagreement wreck a good thing. And Chiaki, don’t let Keita’s shit get to you. You’re cute in your own way. The messy-hair thing works for you. And now Chiaki doesn’t know what to do and Aguri is about to shatter this door with her sheet wrath and fury.

-So, okay, they’re all gamer buddies now, right? They should enjoy it. And Keita realizes how much this looks like a romance between these two, as Tasuku idly comments that if Chiaki does want a change, maybe she could try the short-haired look? She’s got the face for it, and she’d look cute as hell with it! Oh god that damned idiot…Because over at the door, Aguri has collapsed much like Karen earlier.

-Speaking of Karen, she and Eiichi are over at the window, watching this whole proceeding…And she needs to know what kind of relationship those two have! Eiichi has no idea but they seem to get along really well. OH GOD THEY GET ALONG REALLY WELL?! WHAT DOES THAT MEAN! He has no idea please quit shaking him.

-Cut to Tasuku and Aguri walking home, and Tasuku notices how quiet Aguri is…And has to try and figure out how to explain what she saw. He was mediating a fight between two friends, is all. And Aguri gets all down, because she feels she’s being lied to, and the only thing she doesn’t know is if her boyfriend is leaving her for a weird nerdy girl, or a weird nerdy guy. Oh dear…

-Cut over to Keita writing up a post on that least parody game. Which was fun, but maybe played it a bit too safe…Still, he posts a positive comment. One that gets noticed by the creator and gets a thanks sent his way! But something seems off for him…

-The next day after class, Tasuku’s more stylish friends are wanting to figure out this rumor of this really cute girl that just showed up in school out of nowhere, and Tasuku’s trying to figure out who the hell it could be…He didn’t hear about any transfers, so did someone pull off a weekend makeover…? Keita comes up and hey, want to go hang out? He would, but he’s waiting for Aguri. …Is something up, Keita?

-He’s…Worried about Tasuku and Aguri. What? Why? Tasuku doesn’t even think Keita knows Aguri…But before that subject can go any further, up come footsteps, and a very nervous Chiaki who has gotten a redo into being the bluenette from the OP and ED! And Tasuku stares, as a crowd starts forming, and Keita is the one who realizes it. That specific way it curls, like dried seaweed. WHAT DID YOU SAY YOU MOTHERFUCKER

-And Tasuku realizes oh shit it’s Chiaki. And she suddenly looks…Really cute. And oh jeez. He just got himself into a mess, didn’t he. If Aguri finds out what he said led to this…

-Of course Aguri hears it and has a freakout so bad she turns into a sketch. And Keita quietly realizes he’s in hell…But also he sees Aguri stagger off and oh jeez, as he steps away to go make sure she’s okay. And Tasuku realizes several seconds later, as Keita is off looking for Aguri who managed to pull a runner…When he runs into Karen! Karen great timing! OH GOD KEITA um er that is hi. S-She’s sorry for her misunderstanding about the other day and, um…

-Huh? Never mind that, time is of the essence. Have you seen Aguri?

-Do you just like making her suffer? Are you into S&M, is that it? Should she get one of those masks with the zippers?

-But, she saw a ditzy, cute pink-haired girl looking deeply depressed and heading for the entrance and wait tell her, exactly, why you’re looking for this girl! Relationship drama thanks bye! And Karen collapses in Keita’s absence…

-When Keita catches up to Aguri at her locker and oh, it’s the weird guy who wants to fuck Tasuku. Wait WHAT that’s not…Okay. Okay never mind. Listen. …Do you want to go have tea?! And Aguri is very, very confused, even as they end up at a little cafe, and Keita wonders when the hell this became his life, hitting on every girl around him… (YOU DAMNED FOOL CAN’T YOU SEE WHAT WAS RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU)

-Of course, it’s VERY awkward at this cafe, as Aguri is down in the dumps and just making bubbles in her drink. And Keita tries to talk to her about what she saw and what happened. But her Tasuku said that bluenette was super cute! If he’s even her Tasuku anymore…Yeah, but that wasn’t…It’s not…He’s not into her like that. Besides, he was just talking about you and how cute you are. He definitely has strong feelings for you! just give him a chance to explain and clear the air, and Keita promises you, it’ll work out…

-And Aguri starts to perk up, as she decides to go get a fresh drink, feeling all warm and bubbly again…And Keita just relaxes at last, as he pops out his phone and sees an MMO event. Well, maybe he’ll jump into some battles, invite Mono-san, and just be able to clear his head, let everything go back to normal…When he hears the sound of a tray hitting the ground.

-And finds Aguri just standing there, locked up. Because across the street, Tasuku and Chiaki are all cuddled up WHAT THE FFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUU

-Credits!

UUUUUUUUUUUU

[beatricethecat2]

one step forward, two steps back (v2.0) - 1

Way back when, last December, to be exact, I gifted a fic to @apparitionism for the B&W Secret Santa extravaganza. I'd threatened a second part, which is nearly ready to go, but before that I needed to do some housecleaning on the first story (thank you appy for pointing out issues.) So I'm starting over by posting an edited version of this story then moving on to a six chapter "part two" that fixes everything. I’ll be posting new chapters regularly, maybe every other day if I can mange, just to get this out of my system. 

NOTE: This story is an inbetweener - set after episode 4.8 “Second Chance” (the one when Mrs. F tells Helena to disappear with the astrolabe) but before 4.9 “The Ones We Love.”

/////////////////

As the loudspeaker crackles to life, Myka pushes herself up into sitting position and snuggles further into her coat. She glances to the side at Pete, still lying next to her, sprawled across three whole seats. He hasn’t moved an inch since she dozed off.

“Pete,” she says, more as a puff of air than a name.

No response.

“Pete,” she repeats, louder, adding a poke to the arm.

“Ggnah,” he grunts, flinching but holding his position.

“Get up. Our gate’s moved.”

“Fivemoreminutes,” he mumbles, pulling the hood of his jacket over his eyes.

“Fine,” she says through a yawn and stretches her neck to the left then right. “I’m going to go clean up. Be ready when I get back.” She shoots Pete a stern eye, but he’s already dozed off. She’ll wake him for real when she gets back.

She navigates out of the waiting area, past the meager breakfast options, thinking there better be better coffee by their new gate. Spying signs for the facilities, she strides towards the ladies but is thrown off by a hand grabbing her elbow. She's swept into the family restroom, and as the door slams shut, she spins around and pins her abductor to its back. She’s not in the mood for detour, nor a new mystery to solve, she really, really just wants to get home.

“We must stop meeting like this,” the woman chokes out, one hand tugging at Myka’s forearm, the other clicking the lock closed.

“H.G.?” Myka says, lowering her arm. “What are you doing here?"

Helena holds Myka’s gaze as she rubs her neck. Myka’s unsettled by the anxious look in her eyes.

“Are you ok? Where have you been? Why were you following us—“

Helena’s lips halt Myka's words, one hand tangling into thick curls, tugging her close. Seconds later, Helena pulls back, and Myka lists forward but is met by Helena’s forehead instead of her mouth.

"I’m meant to trust no one. No one at all. You cannot tell a soul you've seen me," Helena says, looking down at her hands, turning them over, flexing her fingers repeatedly. "Irene will be livid.”

Myka stiffens at the mention of Mrs. Frederic, her eyes following Helena as she paces the tiny room.

“I tried, you see, tried, but I can’t fix this on my own,” Helena says, muttering almost to herself.

“Fix what?” Myka asks but gets no response.

Helena examines her hands again as her steps become erratic.

"Fix what?" Myka repeats and steps into Helena's path.

Helena bumps into Myka and looks up, her eyes round and wild. Acting on impulse, Myka leans forward and presses her lips to Helena’s, just as Helena did before.

This time, the kiss lingers, and Myka's libido thrums awake. Helena soft, warm lips are full of everything she’s been missing since their glorious night together after Sykes. Her hands rise to circle Helena’s biceps, then skim down to her elbows, but Helena gently pushes her away.

“You got stuck. In your head. I thought kissing you might help.”

“If only that were the remedy,” Helena says, her lips curling up slowly at the ends. “One more for good measure couldn't hurt."

Myka smirks, crookedly, and walks Helena back, pinning her to the wall, palms pressing into tiles on either side of her head. She dips forward and kisses Helena, properly, lips squarely aligned, her arousal soaring as Helena presses their bodies together.

“Mykes, you in there?” Pete bellows, too few moments later.

Helena growls at the interruption and as Myka looks away, presses her lips into the twist of Myka's neck. Myka gasps at the pressure, head tilting instinctively towards Helena, Pete already forgotten about at the door.

“Mykes?”

“Don’t answer,” Helena grumbles, her breath exciting already sensitized skin.

“I know you're in there because I already checked the ladies.“

Myka looks towards the door, but Helena cups her jaw and guides her back, pressing her lips into tender spot behind Myka's ear.

“Listen, Artie’s on the line. We got a ping. He wants to talk to both of us—“

“Ow!” Myka yelps, her body collapsing forward, temple hitting the wall. “Why’d you do that?” she says, rubbing brow while looking around the room for Helena.

“You talkin' to me?” Pete asks.

"No," Myka answers, grimacing at Helena, now standing next to her scowling, arms crossed over her chest.

“Maybe I should come in there to, you know, avoid prying eyes?”

“Gimme a minute,” Myka says, taking a step back, squinting Helena. “How hard did I hit my head? You’re kinda...glowing.”

Helena clasps her hands in front of her and straightens her spine while breathing out a heavy sigh.

Myka's eyes widen as the gravity of the situation dawns on her.

“You see the issue—"

“Artie's getting waaay testy out here!” Pete says, rattling the door handle.

“I must go.”

“Helena, wait!” Myka lunges as Helena steps away, but her hand passes completely through her.

“Once this is resolved, I’ll look forward to further pleasantries, but for now..." Helena says, spinning around to face Myka. She bows humbly, then disappears through a solid wall.

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

After a grouchier than usual talk with Artie, Myka and Pete are rerouted to Schenectady to meet with a curator from the Museum of Science and Innovation. Myka half-listens as Pete takes the investigative lead; her mind caught up in solving Helena's predicament.

How can she fix an after-effect from the coin? Her first priority is to locate it, then neutralize it, because maybe it wasn't neutralized properly in the first place...

“So this Photophone,” she interjects when she senses Pete faltering, "it was a donation?”

“Yes. We think it's the original GE prototype, from the twenties,” the curator says and hands Myka a photo.

Myka glances at the image, then at the item in front of her. She stares at it for a long moment as if concentrating, but her thoughts slip back to the orb. What if it’s not at the Warehouse? What if the coin's being used again?

“Was it, like, missing stuff, when you stuck it together?” Pete says, elbowing Myka when she doesn’t continue.

“We recreated several parts.”

Myka raises a brow and Pete smiles.

“Can you show us the schematics and identify which pieces?”

“Sure. Follow me.”

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

After a lengthy pow wow with Claudia and a swift interview with the donor of the machine, it’s determined several boxes from the donation went in error to a charity shop instead of the museum. A quick visit to the drop off location reveals the boxes were sent to a sorting center, so after obtaining directions, Pete drives to a warehouse just off the highway.

"This place is massive,” Pete says as he pulls into the parking lot. "How are we going to find anything in there?”

“Maybe donations are sorted by date?” Myka says while exiting the car. Her confidence fades as she passes lumps of tarped goods lining the walkway to the building.

They flash their badges at the front desk, and the guard waves them through.

"Is there someone else we can ask for help?” Myka says.

"Nope. Weekend," he says, eyes barely leaving the moving image on his phone. "Place is yours. Knock yourselves out.”

They walk through a wide doorway lined with vertical plastic strips then out onto the main floor.

"This place is in-sane," Pete says as he scans the sea of boxes, bags, and furniture before them.

"Yeah," Myka says.

"At least we know it's a vase."

“It’s a horn."

"But the old lady kept flowers in it."

"It shapes sound, Pete. Here take the picture."

“Brass funnel?" Pete says, with a wink.

Myka rolls her eyes and gives him a push. “Let's split up. Yell if you find anything."

Pete gives a two finger salute then marches to the other side of the room.

Myka meanders in the opposite direction, sifting lightly through piles and jumps as her coat pocket vibrates. Her cell and her Farnsworth are in her jeans pockets, so she’s unsure of what it possibly could be.

She maneuvers the pocket, so it opens toward the floor and shakes it until something falls out. Recognizing the shape, she bends down to inspect it and sees a post-it attached, reading “Give to Claudia” in flowing script.

Her stomach sinks a little because of course, the kiss was for this…then again Helena probably panicked when she felt herself fading. But Helena’s lips against her neck, her hand resting on the small of her back, that was out of want for a real connection. The flutter in her heart tells her so.

The phone vibrates again, and the screen lights up as text appears under the post-it. She picks up the device and peels off the note.

- Hello? the screen reads.

No caller ID, but it must be Helena.

- Are you ok?

- I think so

- Where are you?

- I’m not sure

- What do you see?

- Books, movies, CDs. The Fly on DVD, but no Metamorphosis?

- You’re in a store?

- An apartment

- There must be a reason you’re there

- I see a note

A note? Helena said she trusted no one, so who would leave a note? She scans the room for Pete to ensure he's otherwise occupied and wracks her brain for people Helena might trust. She begins to worry when no new text appears.

- What does it say?

Still no response. Maybe Helena's a hologram again? She did dematerialize rather suddenly earlier. As she scrolls through, reviewing their short conversation, something dawns on her. Helena's phrasing is off, and the book and movie comparisons are odd, both date from after she was bronzed.

- Emily?

Myka holds her breath, praying she’s wrong.

- To whom am I speaking?

Myka closes her eyes and rubs the bridge of her nose. This is getting more complicated than it needs to be.

- Agent Bering. Do you remember me?

- The secret service agent?

- Yes

- Am I hiding from that evil man?

- No. He’s gone. You’re safe

- Oh thank goodness. He frightened me

- I know. I’m sorry. What does the note say?

Myka flicks her eyes around the room as dots animate in a speech bubble, noting Pete’s new location.

- Under no circumstances may you use the phone nor leave the flat. Wait here for my return. Food is available in the refrigerator

- That sounds like Helena

- Helena? The person those evil men thought I was?

- Yes

- She has lovely penmanship

Myka smiles. Emily's a schoolteacher no matter the circumstances.

- Why am I here?

- It sounds like you’re safe. Do what Helena says

- I don’t understand

- Hang tight. I’ll figure out where you are and meet you. Don’t call or text anyone except me

- Could you bring Dickens?

Myka grimaces; of course, she’d want her cat.

- I’ll see what I can do

- Do you know where he is?

- I’ll look into it

When no new message appears, she slips the phone into her pocket, but it vibrates again.

- I’m scared.

- You’re safe. Please stay put. Do what Helena says

- You’ll take care of me, won’t you?

- I will. Leave a note for Helena. Tell her what we talked about

- Why? Can’t I tell her in person?

- You might be asleep when she gets back

It’s a weak answer, but she hopes it works.

- I am tired

- Everything’s going to be ok. Ok?

- Thank you Agent Bering.

- Call me Myka

- Thank you Myka

Myka chews her lip as she waits for further response, not trusting Emily to be done just yet. It's terrifying to be alone in an unfamiliar place and Emily’s searching for a connection, she gets that. After a few moments of silence, she tucks the phone away and turns her attention back to the search.

—————————

First thing in the B&B, Myka hunts for Claudia and finds her, hunkered down in the living room, in the midst of an all-night movie marathon with Steve. Instead of approaching her, she stands in the doorway, mulling over options, not wanting to raise suspicions, as the Brother Adrian situation has everyone on high alert. But she needs to pull Claudia out of there, pronto, as Helena's situation's only going to get worse—

She startles as a hand touches her shoulder.

“Everything ok?”

“Hey, Leena, hi,” Myka says, spinning around to greet Leena. "Yep. All good."

“Can I get you anything?” Leena's smile dims as she takes in Myka’s aura.

“Thanks, but…I’m, uh, beat. I’m going to turn in." Myka stumbles over her words as her pocket vibrates.

“Let me know if you need anything. Even just to talk.”

“Thanks,” Myka says. She tempers her gait as she walks towards the stairs then rushes up, running head first into Pete at the top.

“Wheres the fire?” Pete says, bending back, waving his hands.

“Shower. Now," Myka replies, pointing to her door.

“Movie time de-nied.”

“I need today to be over. And yesterday. The past few days.”

“But you’re missing out on some sweeeet—"

“Don’t,” Myka snaps, thrusting her hand over Pete's lips, squeezing them shut with her fingers.

Pete peels her hand off his mouth. “You're just sore because I won. I found the funnel.”

“Horn, Pete. For the millionth time, it was a horn.”

“Whatevs. I scored, and you flopped. So there.” He leans forward, hands on hips, and sticks out his tongue.

“A guilt trip’s not going to work."

“Party pooper,” Pete says, index fingers pointed toward Myka, thumbs moving as if shooting a gun. He then jumps down the stairs.

Myka sighs tiredly then enters her room. She closes the door and locks it, then slips Helena’s phone out of her pocket.

- I apologize for that woman earlier

Myka collapses on the bed, relieved it’s Helena and not Emily.

- How long has this been happening?

- Since shortly after I was released. It began as a mere suggestion but lately has taken a turn for the worst

- Can I call you?

- Is the area secure?

- I think so. I’m in my room

- Not there. Outside

- It’s 1AM

- Sneak out

- Everyone's watching movies downstairs

- Have you spoken with Claudia?

- No. We literally just got back

As she waits for a reply, Myka scoots back on the bed. When none comes, she pushes on.

- Where are you?

- Safe. If that woman stays put. She's a menace to society

- She’s scared. She doesn’t know what's going on

- I understand, but she's a security risk

- I'll talk to Claudia as soon as I can. We’ll find the coin and fix this

- Do you know where it is?

- No. Do you?

- I’ve looked, but I’m afraid not

- You said Mrs. F would be angry. Why?

Seconds pass with no reply. That must have flipped the off switch. Is she not answering on purpose? If so, why?

- I don't know a Mrs. F and who's Claudia? Is she the menace to society?

Emily. Myka grits her teeth and closes her eyes, rubbing circles in her temple with her fingers.

- These texts say something’s happening. What's happening? Why am I holding the phone?

Myka hesitates, tumbling through possible explanations.

- And why am I wearing skinny jeans?

Myka smirks at that.

- Helena was just there

- I didn’t see her. Should I look for her outside?

- NO. Stay there

- No need to yell

- Sorry. How are you feeling?

- Blurry

- Eat something. Rest. Helena will be back soon

Myka's stomach twists at the lie, but it came out unthinkingly. Then again Helena will be back, just occupying her body, or rather Helena’s body.

- I’d like to meet her if she’s no longer endangering my life

- She's not

- Will you be coming soon?

Her fingers hover over the keyboard; Helena’s right, she is a security risk, so whatever it takes to keep her there, she’s game.

- I will. Hang tight

- Thank you

- Get some rest

Myka drops the phone onto her pillow and closes her eyes. She needs to talk with Claudia, now, which means movie time is no longer de-nied.

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

Myka showers to keep up appearances, her mind toggling between heated kisses and Helena’s dire situation. As she emerges, she lunges towards her vibrating phone and hits accept as she attempts a one-handed towel wrap.

“Helena?”

“Did I wake you?”

“You said this wasn’t secure."

“I’ll call later if—“

“Don’t hang up.”

Myka’s stomach flutters the line quiets, thrilled to hear Helena’s voice, but fearful of what she might say next.

"I’ve no control over whatever this is.”

“It’s getting worse, isn’t it."

“I’m afraid so."

"I’ll go get Claudia. We have to fix this before…"

The thought withers as neither party jumps complete it.

“Do you remember being Emily?”

“Not a thing. Though she is quite the pain in my arse."

“Why?”

“She acts like a petulant child, notes littered everywhere: why this, why that, ad nauseam. And can you please tell me why she's so offended by my attire?”

Myka snickers. “She likes cardigans. And floral prints. Bright colors. Her tastes are...different from yours.”

Helena doesn’t respond, but her disdain seeps through the line.

“Where are you?”

“A rental.”

“I told Emily I’d meet her.”

“Don't. It’s best you stay away.”

“But—"

"Once this rigamarole is sorted, I’d very much like to see you. But now..."

“I’d like to see you, too,” Myka says, her pulse quickening at the thought. “Try to stay solid and, um…yourself. I’ll be in touch, soon.”

-TBC-

[storminormins]

Attachments and Sleep

AO3

Blinky had recently become a sort of trollish professional on humans in the eyes of the trollmarket dwellers. The average troll left their knowledge of the topland dwellers at the basics, leaving the nuances of human society quite lost on them; and they had been content with that -until they had gained a human trollhunter, that is.

Suddenly Blinky, (who knew two whole humans as opposed to the average of zero) had become the most knowledgeable troll on the subject of their topside neighbors. He took great pride in this, and given his acquaintances, believed he was best suited for the job.

Yes, he knew a lot about humans, but he had absolutely no idea what this was about.

“Master Jim, do you make a habit of sleeping in bookcases?”

Jim blinked groggily up at him, the trollhunter’s hair looking like the victim of an unexpected gnome attack.

“hhwatymean?” He managed, trying -and failing, to twist around and find a handhold to get himself out from behind what his sleep deprived brain had selected as ‘safe spot to collapse in‘. Commonly known as one of Blinky’s bookshelves. A few days ago he had discovered that there was a weird space behind this particular one, almost like someone had just shoved a shelf in front of a leaning wall -hmm- to hide the unevenness, leaving about a foot and a half of space between the wall and the shelf. It may not have looked like much to a troll, but for Jim it made a tent-like shape that blocked most of the light and kept any nearby voices at a calming murmur. Maybe sleep deprived Jim was onto something here, Jim thought.

“What I mean is,” Blinky said, offering Jim a hand after he seemed to be struggling with how exactly to get out of the small hole, “Is it common for you to crawl underneath my bookshelves for rest? I’ve heard of loosing yourself in books, but this is ridiculous.”

Jim groaned but took the offered hand and pulled himself out. He was covered head-to-toe in dust bunnies, and running a hand through his hair just sent them down to his shirt or flurrying around him like a haunted cloud, so he gave up trying to look like (A) he hadn’t been asleep, and (B) that it hadn’t been under Blinky’s furniture.

“Or is it common for humans to sleep in small secluded places?” Blinky thought out loud, tapping a hand on his chin, looking to be seriously considering Jim’s sleeping choices.

“Nah… I usually crash if I get tired enough, but normally I make it to my bed.” The dust bunnies weren’t coming off his shirt without a fight, smudging and sticking and making a general nuisance. Arrrgh came to find the source of Blinky’s chatter, looming over Jim and sniffing him curiously, getting a nose full of dust. He violently snorted, nearly blowing Jim over with the force of it, but getting most of the offending flurries off of his shirt.

“Ah, well,“ Blinky said, completely unfazed by the small gale that had just blown through his library. He shook off his inquiries and began moving books around with all four of his arms, a process that was still mesmerizing for Jim to watch. “You needed to read some of these anyway.” He pulled three heavy tomes from different shelves and piled them into Jim’s hands.

“OHf- Oh goody, more reading.” Jim grunted, his balance wavering to one side. Arrrgh nudged him back upright before he toppled over

Blinky gave him a sidling look over his shoulder that suggested he was about to launch into a long capitulation of the importance of knowledge and books, but just as he turned to properly convey his true feelings on the matter, Toby interrupted.

“Hey Jimbo, you in here?”

“Yeah, I was just on my way out.” He gave a ’what can ya do?’ shrug at Blinky as he edged further away from the possibility of a lecture, and -heaven forbid- more reading material.

Blinky avoided rolling his eyes at the trollhunter’s antics, but sighed, “At least attempt to comprehend what you read this time, Master Jim.”

Happy at being let off so easy, Jim grinned and ran towards the entrance, yelling a, “Will do Blinky!” over his shoulder as he escaped, eliciting a yelp from Toby as he shot past him. Toby had to jog to catch up.

“Thanks for that Tobes, I thought I was about to be stuck in there all night.” They made their way up the stairway, trollmarket stretching out behind them, glowing warmly against the grey stone walls.

“Ah, no problem Jimbo, but to me it looks like you’ll be up all night anyway.” Toby tapped the books Jim was hauling with the horngazle as he walked to the hidden doorway.

“Uuggh, I know, and I still haven’t studied for that test…”

“At least you did okay on that Spanish presentation-”

Their voices faded out as they walked back into their normal lives, and the underside of the bridge went back to being a normal canal.

As Blinky arranged the books back into their well-memorized chaos, he wondered why the troll hunter had been all the way in the back of the library. Even in the short time frame Blinky had known the boy he knew it was too much to hope that he had been reading on his own accord.

Was he seeking solace? Blinky was aware of how taxing the job of trollhunter could be, and honestly the amount of frivolous tasks always seemed to increase anytime the trollhunter was in proximity to trollmarket. He thought back to the many times that Kanjigar, tired of gnome problems and running errands to no end, would duck in ‘to study’ while Blinky and Arrrgh kept a lookout for any well-meaning but unwelcome trolls.

Blinky knew Master Jim’s relations with the trolls in trollmarket wasn’t the best, and while it made sense that he might want to avoid certain trolls -mainly Draal-, the trolls didn’t need -moreso Jim didn’t need- to be avoided. Maybe the animosity between them could be forgotten, with a little time and care.

Blinky finished arranging the books, but shelved the bottom corner books up higher, just in case. He was curious if this little quirk was common for humans or a just a habit of Master Jim himself.

                                                        ooo0ooo

The next evening he found the boy sitting at the table -or partially at least, as he was quite literally face-planted in one of the books Blinky had given him yesterday. He must have fallen asleep waiting for Blinky to come question him on his reading. As odd as it was seeing someone who was usually attentive so very unattentive, the trollhunter had also fallen asleep during his brief summarization on troll history. Blinky was beginning to wonder…

Jim startled awake when Blinky took a few steps into the room, looking around dazedly, possibly for another gnome ambush.

“Tired, Master Jim?” Blinky asked.

“Uhh. No, no I- I’m good” He managed, going a bit red, realizing he had done it again. “Sorry, I just- It was quiet and uh… Sorry.”

Blinky shrugged it off with a chuckle. “It is no matter, on to the subject at hand!” He immediately set to pacing as he got into his ‘teaching stance’. Two hands behind his back, one at his side, and one to gesture with. “Now, in chapter fourteen, we left as the Conundrum tribe….

                                                  Ooo0ooo

To say he was a little concerned about the trollhunter’s sleep schedule would be an accurate statement. But with the flurry of the fight with Draal, the discovery of the bridge and the changeling spies within Arcadia, and then convincing Vendel of the changeling spies, Blinky had been distracted as of late. It seemed that quite suddenly, very many things had decided that now, of all times, was the best time possible to break, explode, or draw as much attention to itself as possible. It was almost uncanny, and he had a feeling it was more than just a coincidence.

He was deep in the paranoia of that particular train of thought when Toby rushed in.

Blinky wasn’t even able to open his mouth in greeting before Toby shouted in a rapid-fire panic. “-Jim was supposed to meet me at my house tonight but he never came and he won’t answer any of my texts and I’m really worried cause what if Bular got him-or one of those changelings snuck into my house before I got there and-”

“Tobias calm yourself!” Blinky said, grabbing the boy’s shoulders and halting his panic-induced gush of words. “I am certain that the trollhunter is fine. We will go out, and we are going to look for him, and we will do it in an orderly fashion. Yes?”

Toby nodded, his mouth shut, but his eyes still wide.

“Good. Let’s find Arrrgh and split up, cover more ground, he must be within trollmarket somewhere, but we’ll send Arrrgh topside just in case.”

He wasn’t going to worry. He was certain that the trollhunter had gotten distracted or gotten pulled into some charitable act and forgotten the time. This was nothing to worry about.

They had only searched for ten minutes before Blinky accepted that the gnawing ache in his gut was most certainly worry. If word got out that the trollhunter was missing there would be a mass panic, and not to diminish the seriousness of their situation, but -combined with the problems on the surface threatening life as both trolls and humans knew it- Blinky simply did not have the time.

“Think Tobias, does he have anywhere unusual he likes to visit? A certain tree, a graveyard, anything?”

“URG- I’m thinking but nothing’s coming up! Jim never runs off without telling someone- not after that time when we were seven…”

“Is there anyplace, any at all where he’s ever gone for solace-” Blinky jerked to a sudden stop and did an abrupt about-face, narrowly avoiding crashing into Toby, and started running back the way they came. “Waitwaitwaitwait- Of course! I should have checked there before running off on this wild duck chase!”

“What- where?” Toby yelled as he turned around as well. “Okay, -huff- I’m right behind you! -wheeze- how the heck are you so fast with those legs-”

Blinky made it there within five minutes. Rushing to the back of the library, he crouched next to the hidey hole, removing the books from the second shelf to peer into the darkness behind them. Sure enough, the trollhunter was curled up, his back to the wall, a still-lit flashlight was laying next to him, and “A Brief Capitulation of Troll History, Volume 11” was being smushed into his face in part of what, as a whole, seemed like an extremely uncomfortable sleeping position. He could tell from the slow rise and fall of his chest that the boy was sound asleep, his shoulders unusually relaxed in this state. Blinky didn’t have the heart to wake him up.

Toby rushed in a moment later, the some of the tenseness leaving him when he saw Jim under the shelf. “Uuh, man, what are we gonna do with you Jimbo?”

“If I may Tobias,” Blinky said, keeping his voice low for Jim‘s sake, “I would suggest letting him sleep here for tonight, he seems to need it and I am… a bit reluctant to wake him up.”

“Yeah, I could come and get him up early tomorrow. We have a class we really don‘t need to miss.” He took off his backpack and scrambled under the shelf briefly, returning with the book and the flashlight, setting them on a higher shelf. He dug through his backpack, procuring a pen and piece of paper, and scribbled a quick message, sticking it next to Jim.

“He keeps falling asleep in class.” Toby said suddenly, looking up at Blinky, open and honest, stark against his usual colorful cheer. “I’m worried about him Blinky.” He turned back to Jim. “I’ve tried talking to him, but he just says he’s fine. He isn’t though.”

Blinky swallowed. Toby looked at him straight in the eyes. “Will you talk to him if you get the chance?”

“I will.” He replied, a bit intimidated by the intense eye contact.

“Thanks. If anyone asks, he’s at my house.” Toby chuckled, returning to his normal self, shoving his supplies back into his pack. “Not that anyone will ask, but still. Keep a few eyes on him for me.”

“I will. Make sure you get Arrrgh to walk you home, I’ve had enough worry for one day.”

“Will do.”

Blinky settled himself against the bookshelf. He had a lot to think on. He sat, watching the young trollhunter murmur and burrow further into his balled up jacket, the action bringing a small smile to his face, and he wondered just how on earth had he ever let himself get so attached, so quickly. To both of them, he thought to himself. Toby’s loyalty to Jim knew no bounds, even if it meant following him into a magical world filled with trolls. He was impressed with how both of them had taken it in stride. Though not completely it would seem, he thought, glancing at Jim.

Not yet sixteen. A mere whelp in comparison to his kind’s age. Practically defenseless without the trollhunter armor, untrained in any survival skills, and so very easy to kill.

Blinky really did pick the worst ones to favor.

Kanjigar’s death had been a heavy blow, to both him and Arrrgh. He’d lost too many to attach himself willy-nilly to every being that passed his way.

The bookshelf wood creaked desperately and he released the death grip he’d taken on it.

And yet he couldn’t help himself. The thought of distancing himself had never crossed his mind, and now he couldn’t imagine forcing it; Draal and Kanjigar’s relationship drove the thought from him entirely. They’d wormed their way close to him without him noticing.

As if sensing his thoughts, Jim muttered and stretched in his sleep, his hand coming to rest near Blinky’s.

It was all worth it, he thought with a smile, just knowing those crazy, amazing, tenacious humans; it was worth so much, and he wouldn’t give it up for the world.

He picked up a book to read while he waited for the trollhunter to wake up. Willing to wait all night to talk to him, if need be; he’d promised after all.

About an hour later Blinky heard what sounded like a whine coming from the hole. Blinky glanced over to see the trollhunter stiffen in his sleep, his face pained as he tried to reach something, grabbing air and making a sort of low keen in the back of his throat.

It was somewhat expected of a warrior to experience night terrors and the sort, but still… Blinky sighed heavily, but waited before intervening. Unless it persisted, the best thing to do would be to let him come out of it on his own.

And he did scarcely ten seconds later, jerking up and banging his head on the bookshelf. Blinky winced sympathetically. That would leave a mark.

A few mild human swears were mumbled along with some choice trollish ones before Blinky heard a soft, “….oh not again….”

Yes, he was going to have a little chat with the trollhunter about his sleeping habits.

Blinky kept his tone casual, “So. How long have you been having nightmares?”

Jim jumped at his sudden voice, smacking his head again, eliciting another trollish swear (Blinky was going to either have to cut back on his own swearing or enforce an age limit).

He poked his head out, looking groggy, irritated, exhausted, and still a bit spooked, yet managing to convey both small and ready to fight in all of these; The post-gnome-attack hair was back -Blinky was starting to believe that this was its natural state- and his shirt was clinging to his chest, damp with sweat.

Jim squinted, then shivered in the cool, underground library, his eyes drooped closed for a brief second before snapping back open and focusing on Blinky.

Blinky took this as close enough to attention as he was going to get out of the sleep-deprived whelp and continued. “Master Jim, I understand you want to do this the brawl-hard way and deny help, but there are full-grown trolls out there who simply couldn’t take what you have seen and done, and Groncus knows they never stop complaining about anything. In the very least you could tell us when something is bothering you.” He punctuated the sentence with a stern glare, both sets of arms crossed as he tried to convey his disappointment.

Jim leveled a very long, blinking look at him, seeming to gather words to himself, and energy to speak, then said, his voice low and scratchy, “Look, I understand this is an important conversation, but I’m literally so tired I can only understand like half the words you’re saying.”

It took Blinky a few seconds to translate the sentence into something intelligible, but once he did he looked the boy up and down with scrutiny, taking in the half-lidded squint and the bags under his eyes and how he kept closing them and listing off to the side before bobbing back up like a cork. The boy was practically dead on his feet.

“Case in point.” Blinky said, putting a hand under the boy’s chin to help focus his eyes on him. “You. Are. Sleep deprived. This is unacceptable. A trollhunter needs to be in peak condition at all times.” He used his lower arms to pull the boy out of his hidey hole and set him down next to the shelf, provoking a sleepy grumbling noise from him. Blinky continued, “So you are going to sleep. Here. Now.”

Jim’s eyes shot open at the word sleep. “Wh-NO!” He yelped, pulling back from Blinky like he might put him to sleep then and there. Blinky leveled a look at him, waiting for what truly would need to be a brilliant explanation to prevent him from doing just that.

Jim squirmed a bit under the glare, looking down at the floor. “I can’t sleep, I just keep having nightmares every time I try. I’m exhausted.” He admitted, leaning against the stiff bookshelf again. “But sleeping just… isn’t working.”

He looked quite pitiful.

Blinky didn‘t even try to quell the feeling that rose in his chest at the sight. The boy was much too young to be dealing with this. Blinky had no idea what Merlin was thinking, picking a whelp for a warriors job. At a loss of what to do, he began nervously gathering Jim’s things into his backpack, giving the amulet an extra hard stare just in case Merlin could see him. But an idea came to him as he picked up the rolled up jacket.

“Master Jim, would you be willing to try something?”

Jim didn’t even move, but replied. “Anything at this point.”

Blinky stood, and then paused, reluctant to leave the boy here. He had promised Toby to watch him. After a moment of indecisiveness, then rolling all six of his eyes at his own hesitancy, he decided to just do it.

He scooped Jim up with his lower two arms, walking briskly to the front, unsure if he was breaking some kind of personal boundary but determined to see his idea through.

To his credit, the trollhunter only startled for a moment, then leaned back against him. Blinky could feel Jim’s eyes on him briefly before he started nodding off, his scrawny body jerking against him every time his head began dipping down.

Blinky had to set him down for a minute as he trotted around, gathering everything he needed, the actions old but familiar from Arrrgh‘s earlier days. Jim curled up under his jacket that Blinky had set over his shoulders, arms around his knees and his head on his forearms, trying to watch Blinky as he bustled around.

He tapped Jim’s shoulder as he deposited the last few sheets into the pile.

Jim said something that sounded like thanks and appreciatively collapsed into the makeshift bed.

“Not a problem Master Jim.” Blinky said with a smile, picking up the last blanket and dropping it over the trollhunter’s head.

He grumbled and glared at Blinky from underneath the faded blue comforter. “So this supposed to help…. How?” His sentence broken by a yawn.

Blinky hummed as he turned to a shelf and browsed for another book. “Well, it isn’t a tried and true method, but believe it or not Arrrgh used to have troubles similar to yours, and we tried several things -he tried many on his own before he told me he was having trouble, of course- but eventually we discovered that having someone else nearby, and having a little light helped quite a bit. I will be here reading if you need anything, so please, do try to get some sleep.”

Blinky turned from the shelf to see Jim curled up, dead to the world. Blinky’s short speech had put him to sleep immediately, and Blinky couldn’t help the fond smile that crossed his face. He chuckled quietly to himself, “Goodnight then, Master Jim.” and settled down to a nice book.

Jim woke up only once, and it was to the sound of Arrrgh’s heartbeat and breathing (the large troll had apparently returned in the night and curled himself all around Jim like some kind of giant protective guard dog). That, combined with the sound of Blinky turning the pages of his book now and again, tuned out whatever throes his dreams had conjured up, leaving him in a warm, sleepy calm.

 It was nice.

Jim decided that sleep-deprived Jim definitely had the right idea, then promptly went back to sleep.

[snowdice]

Finding the Time to Study Fic 2 [Day 3]

Here is my starting post for today’s study break stories session. See this post for more details and feel free to send me asks to keep me going! It’s been a lot of fun so far! I will reblog this post with the story as I write them today.

If you are a new follower or just don’t want all of these posts clogging your dash, please feel free to block the tag “study break stories” as all posts and voting about it will go there. You can still see the finished product of the story even if you are blocking that tag as I will not tag the edited chapters with “study break stories” but with the (TBD) name of the fic.

Chapter 1 and what I have finished of chapter 2 are under the cut.

I probably won’t be studying too much today, but I wanted to get a bit done. I’ll be constantly looking for ideas of times and places for Janus to have missions, so feel free to send in any you can think of at any point!

Chapter 1

The words in front of him seemed to squirm back and forth across the screen as he watched, despite the fact that he’d bought this screen to prevent that exact thing from happening. The ‘d’s and ‘p’s and ‘b’s seemed to blur together into a sludge of incomprehensible nonsense, just like the voices around him seemed to. He wasn’t quite sure how long he’d sat there staring at this report. Time itself seemed almost like the words and the people, it swirled past him in a blur of sounds and colors, but he never could quite grab ahold of it.

 Something smacked him in the forehead, and he startled, looking up. “Remus,” Janus sighed. He picked up the projectile that had just been lobbed at him. “Did you steal paper from the 20th century supply again?” he asked, staring at the folded-up piece of white paper in the shape of a crane. It was one of Remus’s favorite designs. “That’s not what it’s for.”

“There’s a message inside!” Remus replied, happily.

Janus glared at him and carefully unfolded the paper. He squinted at it, and yeah, that was way worse than the screen. Maybe it was worth his money. Or maybe Remus’s handwriting was just horrendous.

 He squinted at it for a few moments and then looked back up. He blinked at his surroundings. The note had said ‘Go home. Work ended three hours ago.’ and that certainly seemed accurate considering he and Remus were the only people left in the office.

“I still have to finish this report about the New Easter Island mission,” he said to Remus.

“I’ll do it,” Remus said. “You’ve been working without a break for hours, and I probably owe the agency some time since I took a coffee break to 22nd century France this afternoon.”

“You what?” Janus asked.

 ”They have the best coffee,” Remus said, and then grinned wolfishly, “and the best guys.”

“Stop doing that stuff,” Janus hissed. “Your lucky I haven’t reported you already.”

“You wouldn’t,” Remus said, very sure of himself. “You like me too much. Plus, without me, you’ll forget to go home and sleep every night. So, it’d be a loose-loose. Now up! It’s time for you to go home.”

Janus sighed and stood. “Fine,” he said. “I’m going, but that report better be done like you said or I will report you for your coffee excursions.”

“Sure, you will,” Remus said. “Now shoo.”

 Janus spared him one more glare before standing from his desk and waving his hand through the air. The machine at his wrist buzzed softly and the display screen lit up around him. He jabbed a finger at the last of the three pre-set locations and, with a feeling like he’d just stepped into a pool of softened butter, he was home.

He groaned and fell back onto his couch immediately. “Time?” he asked.

“1:57am,” a soft voice said from his ceiling. He groaned. Considering the agency liked to keep their schedules aligned even though his house sat almost 2 millennia before the agency even existed, he’d have to be up in 4 hours to head back to work. They said it was to ‘stop them from experiencing time jet lag’ and ‘maintain their circadian rhythm,’ but with Janus it usually just ended up with him ‘not getting enough sleep’ and ‘suffering greatly.’

 Sure, he had been fine with it, encouraged the policy even, when the agency was created, but that had been before he’d had to live it.

His stomach suddenly grumbled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten since before the mission he’d been on earlier that day. He was exhausted, but he also knew trying to go to bed this hungry would result in him not being able to sleep at all. He dragged himself to his feet and into one of the barstools at the kitchen island. He didn’t want to wait for the auto cook feature to cook him something and he especially didn’t want to cook something himself, so he pressed a few buttons on the side of the counter and a protein infused, still cold pop tart popped out of the table.

 He thought it might be a Hot Fudge Sunday one, but he honestly couldn’t tell. The protein infusion made all of them taste rather horrible. For all he knew, it was one of the Burnt Rubber pop tarts Remus had once snuck into his pantry. To be fair, he hadn’t even noticed until he’d went to go stock his pantry and realized that there was half a box of those things. It was just another example of Remus using time travel for things he shouldn’t. They were a year 2513 delicacy.

The 2510s were an odd set of years.

 He chewed on the possibly chocolate, possibly rubber flavored pastry and glanced out the window. Though it was dark, one could still see the water of the man-made lake his home sat on thanks to the floating lights that hovered above it. Each agent working for the TPI received a home and alternate identity in a time and location of their choice. (Within reason, that is. Remus’s request to live among the dinosaurs was quickly denied and new rules were put into place immediately after.) Janus had chosen the late 24th century with a moderately sized home on Lake BlueBox. He didn’t have many close neighbors, but the ones he did know thought he was an accountant who went by the name of Declan Banks.

 No, he had not chosen the last name. Yes, everyone got those types of names. The Agent Management Office had a sense of humor or were just not creative. Janus only knew one employee in the AMO and he’d been avoiding him for the past three years as much as possible. Cowardly, maybe, but he knew if he gave the man too much information about his general lifestyle, he’d be dragged into the AMO to talk about his mental state and feelings, and honestly, that would make everything worse.

 As soon as he finished the poptart, a glass of water popped up from the table making him jump despite the fact that he had been the one to set it to do that automatically years ago. He downed half of the water and picked up the glass to take it to his bedroom. He should probably clean himself off before bed, but he couldn’t be bothered today, and just stripped off his uniform and collapsed into bed in his underwear. The morning was going to come far too soon, he knew. Yet, his mind would not quiet. His brain kept filling out the report he trusted (well, hoped he could trust) Remus had already finished by now.

 He eventually groaned and rolled over in bed. “Play something,” he requested. The screen by the side of his bed lit up.

“Randomizing the ‘Something’ video playlist,” the soft voice said from the ceiling.

A dance recital which he knew had been recorded in 2033 started playing. The images moved on the screen in front of him, but the sound drifted from all around him. He let his eyes linger over the way the dancers’ bodies moved as the sounds washed over him. The image of elegantly twisting limbs remained in his head long after his eyelids drifted shut and he finally fell asleep.

 Chapter 2

The morning was just as torturous as Janus had expected it would be. He chewed through another poptart, this time bothering to actually check and see that it was a cinnamon-sugar one and drank three cups of caffeinated orange juice. Then, he waved his hand through the air and selected the 1st saved location on his device. He popped up directly behind his desk where he’d been standing the night morning before.

Someone, probably Remus, had shut his integrator down. He swiped a finger across the power button, and it flickered back on, scrolling through its morning start up routine.

 The machine scanned through all of the data in the three main system it was connected to and sorted all information into things that concerned him, could concern him, and did not before then sorting the first two categories into order of importance. As it did, he set up his screen reader so he would hopefully not start the day with more of a migraine than he already had. It took about 3 seconds for everything to turn on and settle.

Sitting down in his desk, he dismissed the notification that Remus had finished and submitted the report from their mission the day before.

 A mission had been scheduled for him today, and the details were in his inbox. A piece time travel technology had been accidently dropped by an archology student in the 1890s during a trip. It was an earlier model of emergency time travel given to time travels that would dump them back into the Registration Office in the year they originated. It wasn’t extremely dangerous, but could pose some problems, especially if someone who didn’t know what it was activated it.

Surveillance agents had tracked it down and found that it had been picked up by a local and sold. Though no one from that time had known what it was, they had identified that it was made out of a precious metal and it had been crafted into an expensive necklace. Janus and Remus were supposed to retrieve it today. It had been pinpointed that the most opportune time for the extraction was 1923 during a masquerade ball held by those who had bought the necklace.

[satireknight]

TMNT S01E04 - Hot Rodding Teenagers from Dimension X

AND... just like that, the titles started getting silly.

So the Turtles are planning to turn Baxter’s van into a mobile tracking station, using the equipment in Baxter’s lab. Is this legal? This doesn’t seem legal. I know technically they’re vigilantes, but this seems a little thefty.

So they do what anyone would do: they push the entire van up the stairs, and then Donatello rips the entire side of the van off like he was peeling an orange. Explain to me again why Michelangelo couldn’t get out of ropes in the last episode.

It also turns out that Baxter’s been arrested offscreen because “the authorities didn’t appreciate it when he tried to take over the city with his Mouser robots.” Well, that happens when you print your name on your murderous metallic T-rexes. Wait, take over the city? They didn’t do that! They just tried to kill Splinter and ate an apartment building!

Since Donatello is modifying an entire van all by himself while everyone else stands around chatting, he inevitably starts asking why THEY have to do ALL the work of stopping Shredder. I’d be asking why I have to do all the technical stuff, since presumably one of the others can work a wrench.

How has the Technodrome not completely hollowed out the area under New York, causing a catastrophic collapse?

Krang has finally had enough and is refusing to give Shredder any more new toys until Shredder ponies up a pair of opposable thumbs. Shredder acts high and mighty by saying that the body is just one of several experiments he’s doing... which includes more mutants.

I can see the benefits of a bat, since they presumably would have sonar or something like that. But why a lizard? Or a mole? How are those better than the ones you already have?

Shredder then remembers that oh yeah, Krang is from another dimension, and since that dimension is full of nonstop war, he can just get weapons from THAT place. Of course, since Krang also has an army sitting on the other side, he might end up with angry soldiers ripping his face off. Krang is somehow horrified by the idea of what might come through the portal.

In “Donatello is underappreciated” news, Donatello has just managed to whip up a personalized, highly-decorated, weaponized vehicle in mere hours. How do his bros respond to this? They want more shit like higher ceilings and pizza ovens so they can mess around while driving. Amazingly he doesn’t kill them all with his wrench set, and they careen down the stairs and straight into a fire hydrant. 

Shredder is apparently expecting to just open the portal right into an armory, but instead two flying cars come zooming through. These are the Neutrinos.

And I don’t know if people will agree or not, but I’ve always hated the Neutrinos, the futuristic alien elf people, even when I was a little kid. Part of it was their voices; they always sounded like they had a sore throat. Another was the antiquated slang that they used, which... I never understood the reasons for and is kinda cringey.

But the most glaring reason for me was that they never felt like complete characters. Think about it: when you strip away the weird way they talk, what are you left with? Who are they? What shapes them as people? Answer: we don’t know, because they’re not really developed. They are all basically the same bland empty character. Kala is particularly bad, because her only narrative function is for Michelangelo to occasionally crush on her. She’s not a real character on her own.

Let’s just say I prefer the Neutrinos in the IDW comic, where they actually have some character and function instead of “we’re fun-loving teenagers and the grown-ups oppress us!”

sigh

So they’re chased by a pair of rock warriors in a flying tank, and that sounded so much more metal in my head.

Rocksteady and Bebop blow up the tank, and a firefight breaks out as the Neutrinos escape. The Rock soldiers encounter Krang, who is upset that they’re seeing him naked.... and by naked, I mean just a brain on a little wheelie stand. Apparently he “lost” his body when he was banished to Earth... although I’m not sure how or why.

And then the awkward writing kicks in: Krang and the warriors talk with horror about how the Neutrinos hate war, won’t fight, and “encourage people to have fun.” Perish the thought. Oh Lord, the heavy-handedness is making my brain hurt.

Oh hai World Trade Center. You’re making me feel awkward and a little depressed.

So the Neutrinos drive right out of a subway entrance, and the Turtles immediately start chasing them, ultimately leaping right into their cars and forcing them to land. But then they find out that the Neutrinos have no idea who Shredder is, and are just a group of shrill-voiced tiny elves who unironically use terms like “daddio.”

So the Turtles do what any person would do with alien visitors: they take ‘em to... an arcade. Why? I have no idea. 

April sparks off a conversation about Dimension X, and another silly “all the grown-ups don’t want young kids like us to have fun!” conversation takes place. Look, is there any child with six brain cells who won’t feel pandered to by that sort of thing? Especially with idiotic ideas like them being chased because they trespassed on a battlefield.... um, getting onto a battlefield is its own punishment, because... you are going to die. Nobody’s going to stop fighting just to kill YOU.

Just then the Rock Warriors torpedo the building and put the scene out of my misery. By coincidence, all the humans in the building suddenly evaporate... so I’m going to assume they’re dead.

So the Neutrinos finally do something useful and start firing at the Rock Warriors, and Leonardo manages to wreck their vehicle with his amazing insta-growing sword.

That’s easily twelve feet long.

Just then the explosions, energy blasts and probable deaths of multiple people cause the police to show up. I wonder why.

Just then Leonardo mentions how weird it is that Shredder is able to connect to a different dimension.... NOW? YOU’RE GOING TO ASK THAT NOW? Shouldn’t you have asked that back before you were playing pinball and listening to the Neutrinos bitch about how mommy and daddy won’t let them zoom around in circles being obnoxious?

So yes, the Turtles finally break out of their “fun” brainfog and realize that they could be facing a global invasion, which is kind of important. It’s about time that tenuous plot finally reared its head.

���This is my Magic 8 Ball!” 

No, it’s actually a weather-making device. And then they’re attacked by the NYPD, who must be really fucking jaded if they don’t react to a couple of guys apparently made out of rock.

The Neutrinos tell the Turtles and Splinter about Krang, which explains the whole talking brain thing that came up in the last episode. Wow, that might have been good information to get from them BEFORE YOU WENT TO A FUCKING ARCADE. Sorry, these characters really piss me off.

Oh, and Michelangelo is crushing in Kala. Why? Dunno, because they’ve barely interacted at ALL, so I’m going to assume it’s because she’s the only girl he’s ever encountered who isn’t way taller than him. Also, her only defining trait is that she cries.

Wait, since when did they have a hydraulic platform inside a phone booth?! How do you even instal that without people noticing?

So the Technodrome that they previously spent hours or days searching for is now something they can just drive up to, and they are able to fly those flying cars right inside with no resistance whatsoever. Of course, while Donatello is diddling with the portal, the mook squad comes in and causes trouble for them, while the other Turtles encounter Shredder, Krang and the Rock Warriors.

I have no idea why Krang is bouncing with joy. It seems premature.

Also the Technodrome has a giant floor section with vanishing panels. Why? 

Finally the dimensional portal opens, which means the Neutrinos and their bad writing are going as well.

“There’s a barrel of silicone lubricant over there!” How did you know that? And why do I not want to know WHY it’s there?

“We want to stay with you, and have FUN!” Can you see why I hate this character with a passion?

The Neutrino with the gray hair says that they have to keep fighting Krang in Dimension X... which seems to go against two things we’ve been told. One is that Krang hasn’t been involved in the fighting since being banished, and the other is that the Neutrinos just mess around and don’t participate in any kind of conflict because it isn’t fuuuuuuuuuun.

So they zoom through the portal, and Michelangelo gets teary-eyed over the departure of someone he’s exchanged maybe ten words with over the span of a single day. I care sooooo much right now.

But unfortunately the weather-maker is still causing sufficiently bad weather that the ground is actually shaking. Right now there’s a friggin’ tornado in the streets.Leonardo handles it the way you’d expect - he leaps out of a flying car and almost dies so he can slice the thing in half.

And having pussed out epicly during the fight, Shredder finally throws a fit and declares that he’ll make Krang’s new body for him if Krang kills the Turtles.

And back in the Turtles’ lair, for some reason they’re back to sleeping in a quadruple bunk, while April reads them the same children’s story over and over again.

VERDICT:

This story is a big step down from the previous three, partly because it feels so schizophrenic. Parts of it, like that bedtime-story ending and the Neutrinos whining, feel incredibly juvenile and pandering to the child audience. But the other half is an actual threat of alien invasion and a dangerous weapon. 

And the two don’t mesh very well, which often makes it feel like the important plot is being sidelined for kiddie antics. It really just sticks out, especially since the characters we’ve been shown are not really the kind to respond to serious new developments by just kicking back in an arcade.

I already ranted about the Neutrinos and what shallow half-characters they are, but I gotta say again, they don’t really add much of anything to the story beyond a shallow insta-crush, infodumpage and some aerial action scenes. 

One thing that was much better in this episode is the animation, which has stepped back up from the last episode. And it has some nice moments like the police and military taking on the Rock Warriors, which gave us some good conflict and a sense that the world outside is bigger than just the Turtles and their issues.

Speaking of their issues, despite my bitching it was kinda fun to see the origins of their van, even if poor Donatello remains horribly underappreciated. He’s the kind of guy who could build a particle accelerator out of toaster parts, and people would complain because it doesn’t have an embedded clock.

Grade: C-