#this is long overdue I promise I didn’t just do this because season 2 is upon us (though that would be a good excuse!)

[mandalora]

A stab at an Arcane-style Ahsoka to pair with this Maul

[chastiefoul]

stood up.

characters: ayato & alhaitham

summary:

Your boyfriend promised a long overdue date on the winter season—albeit how busy he was.

But as you waited and waited for him on the agreed spot, why does it look like he’s not coming?

tags: a lil angsty, comfort would be on part 2

Alhaitham

You were giddy as you woke up, immediately getting ready for the long awaited date you both have today. Amidst the research he’s been busy working with at the time, he finally managed to take a brief break and told you he missed you wanted to spend time with you which you couldn’t possibly refuse since you missed him just as much.

It was heavily snowing outside—you took a mental note as you pick a warm outfit for today. You were very excited about the date that you had arrived fifteen minutes early, silently hoping maybe your boyfriend would come a little early too since it’s been a while that you both spend a quality time.

☘

“I need coffee,” Alhaitham groaned as he went out from his room, completely exhausted and sleep-deprived. Kaveh who coincidentally was in the dining room just stared at him as if saying ‘then pour it yourself tf?’. Alhaitham made a cup for himself and took a sip. “It’s noon, and you’re just waking up?” the blond said disapprovingly while the grey-haired man only sighed. “It can’t be helped that I needed to sleep late every day for the past week. Also mind your own business, don’t you have that presentation you’ve deemed all week as important today?” He asked, annoyed. “Huh? That was yesterday.” Kaveh said, confused. Alhaitham widened his eyes. “What?” Panic rises inside Alhaitham’s chest as he asked.

“What date is it today?” His stomach dropped, refusing to believe that he had mixed up such an important date only because he was dwelled to deep on his research, even though he promised to meet you. He looked at the clock, 12 p.m, you both agreed to meet at 9 a.m.

 “Seventeenth.” Kaveh confirmed, quickly snapping Alhaitham’s useless idle thought.

The scribe cursed out loud then went to grab the first coat he saw and swiftly go out.

Please still be there, please still be there.

He ran full speed at the agreed spot. He so wanted you to still be there but perhaps it would be too cruel at your side since you’d be standing still at the same spot waiting in the cold for three whole hours.

Then he saw you there, standing as you had your hands deep on your pocket, your nose red from the cold.

“(y/n)!” Alhaitham called out, but you didn’t budge at the noise. He approached you, overwhelmed with guilt. “I’m sor-“

“I told you before that we didn’t have to meet if you’re busy, I told you I could wait.” You said, uncharacteristically slow that it was unnerving. “But I didn’t mean it like this,” you whispered, finally losing it. Alhaitham’s heart broke at the tone, but he knew he didn’t have the right. “Waiting here for three whole hours that people from shop nearby talked to me and said I should warm myself up for a moment and I stupidly refuse, scared that you’d come while I was gone and you’d think I forgot about today..” you paused.

“I looked like a fool—no, I was an utter fool.”

“Please. I can explain-“

“Gosh what an interesting way to apologize,” your eyes hot with tears that were threatening to spill. “Seeing you now, clearly just waking up with no effort whatsoever to get yourself ready.. just how pathetic do you want me to feel, Alhaitham?” you sniffled, feeling uncomfortable and heartbroken. The fact that you were looking forward to today for days and he did not even bother to remember. That fact cuts deep.

The man’s heart ached more by the sudden call of his full name, not the usual endearing nickname of ‘haitham’.

You walked away, wiping your tears. Alhaitham who witness your back getting smaller as you take a step after another could only stand still, quietly searching for the words he could find to first and foremost apologize, then to find a way to make it all up to you.

Ayato

It was definitely not easy, being by Ayato’s side, but you made it work—you always do. And Ayato couldn’t hope for more of an understanding partner—and he didn’t let you forget that, but this made you reluctant to voice your worries, scared that he would picture you as this selfish person. But if you were given a wish, perhaps you’d want to be able to spend a little more time with your boyfriend. Just a little.

☘

When there’s patience, there’s too, a limit.

You’re currently waiting for Ayato at the meeting spot you both agreed on the day before. You wouldn’t mind a ten or fifteen minutes tardiness, anyone could’ve make such mistake, but feeling how stiff your fingers were and seeing the sun position, it’s safe to say you’ve been waiting for more than four hours. There are strangers who passed by earlier, and when the same people witnessed you still glued in the same spot they saw you, you couldn’t help but look down.

A quiet but incisive sense of shame overwhelmed you, that you had such faith in this man that you were willing to wait even hours on such weather, not even knowing that if Ayato had felt the same anticipation—clearly not, since him or even his retainer that usually gave you news about his well-being was nowhere in sight. You couldn’t help but laugh self-deprecatingly at your foolishness as you finally decided to give up and go home, not even thinking about the reason why he had forgotten about the date. The bottom line was that he stood you up, whether it was unintentional at the end of the day, you were hurt. And it was finally time to tell him that he would not get away with it.

☘

The next day, your body had to pay up the price of waiting on such a snowy weather that you caught a fever. It wasn’t worth it in the slightest but at least this way you don’t have to face him for a while, since you don’t really have anything nice to say if forced to see his face.

That thought was short-lived however, seeing that Ayato had decided to come, on a day where you both didn’t agree to meet up on. You were laying down, even with the thick layers of clothing you still felt somewhat cold.

“You didn’t come this morning as you usually do, so I got worried,” he explained the sudden visit. Your head hurt, but truly it was incomparable to the ache you’re experiencing on your chest. Ayato seemed to had completely forgotten the fact that he was supposed to meet you yesterday. “What were you doing that you’ve become this ill, love?” There was nothing but pure concern in his voice but this made you more spiteful, more infuriated.

“I was waiting for someone for hours out in the cold yesterday.” You said, still burying yourself in the blanket, not bothering to make eye contact with the man. At this he was thinking back that perhaps you had tell him about this engagement, but his expression quickly drop, as he remembered. You wanted to laugh at it since you’ve never seen such face on him, but that was a luxury you had to postpone until a later date where you had felt a little better.

“Sweethe-“ He quickly said but you cut him off. “Don’t call me that. And don’t even think about touching me.” You said sternly, as he swiftly retracted the hand that was about to touch your head.

“(y/n), I apologize but I-“

And you’ve had about enough of his exuses—no matter how important, you don’t even care anymore, you just wanted Ayato out of your sight.

“It’s always something with you, isn’t it? I’m tired, Ayato.” You said meekly, truly exhausted by the way he always had something to say, a ­­way to get out of being berated, reasons that you had to understand even though it was the same as saying that he had put you second—or maybe below that yet again. “I don’t want to understand it anymore, I give up.” You finally said, and only at this point Ayato had realized just how much he had hurt you over the course of you dating him.

“I’m done being your loyal dog that you can treat however you please, Ayato. Leave.”

“(y/n)-“

“I said, leave.” You repeated.

Ayato could only stand up and got out as guilt was eating him away slowly. It wouldn’t be an understatement to say that he had taken advantage of your kindness and took you for granted. The regrets tasted bitter on his tongue. As he went out from your haven there was only one thing running through his mind. How could he possibly fix this?

[superleeleehipster]

Theories on Season 11

Hey! So, as I’m sure you all are very aware, Find Me is out, and I can honestly say that I’m somewhat relieved it did. I was tired of all the theories and anxieties I was feeling about it. At least now we know what we’re working with officially.

I don’t want to make a review, as most blogs have already done their own. For this post, I’m going to jot down some theories on what Leah’s role will be in Season 11. Some of these theories I’ve thought of and others I’ve seen from other bloggers, but I just wanted to get my thoughts down. 

Of course, it’s just my opinion, and if you don’t agree, that’s perfectly fine.

Spoilers and theories under the cut... 

So is everyone ok after 10x18? Yes? No? No worries on whatever your answer is; your emotions are valid.

Anyways, even though the episode was a bit painful to watch as Caryl shippers, I really don’t think it sunk the Caryl ship. If anything, the subtle (not really) parallels between Caryl and Daryl and Leah just showed that Caryl could very possibly happen despite all the naysayers saying they could never sleep together. 

Also, can I say that the whole fish scene was freaking hilarious.

But I digress... I have a few predictions on how Leah’s going to fit into the storyline for season 11. I might hit the nail on the head, or I might be so off that I break my thumb instead, but that’s ok. It’s what makes it fun.

1) I’ve made this first part into a group of theories instead of just one. These are theories that I’ve heard about or read, but I really don’t think are going to happen. They’re just interesting enough for me to list them, but they’re unlikely in my opinion:

- Leah is in Season 11 but in flashbacks - I don’t think they would go this route, because it would be even lazier writing than what we’ve gotten, and it would be more interesting to have her in person instead of being in flashbacks. If they went that way, it would be incredibly obvious that she is a plotpoint for Daryl and that’s it, and that’s pretty crappy writing even for TWD.

- Leah is in Season 11 but she isn’t real - Now this one is an interesting concept admittedly. What if Daryl was in such a crappy mood in the woods, and is thirsting for companionship, so he makes someone up in his head that is pretty similar to Carol, but doesn’t look like her b/c he wouldn’t want to be that kind of creepy friend. Then in Season 11, the viewer realizes one way or another that she was made up, that he made her up in his head to help with his woes, but now that he’s better and with Carol he doesn’t need her anymore. Really neat theory from a mentality standpoint, but I highly doubt that’s where the writers would go.

- Leah is in Season 11, but she dies - I know some folks have said this before, and I get it. Some of us are so done with the drama, we’re just thinking the worst case scenario at this point. What if Leah comes back and Daryl’s all happy and thinks that he’ll spend the rest of his life with her but then Leah dies somehow and he decides to go on a roadtrip with Carol to help with his man pain. I know some peeps feel like that would happen, but in my opinion, I really don’t think so. Angela Kang does have a lot of respect for Daryl and Carol (I know we don’t feel that way right now b/c of 10x18 but bear with me), as she’s said that this is about their story and their journey I really don’t think she would have the story go as low and as misogynistic as that. I honestly don’t.

Now these next two theories are the ones that I believe have a much higher chance of happening in season 11:

2). Leah is in Season 11, and is a part of the new antagonist group (Reapers) - So it wouldn’t be a season of the walking dead without some sort of antagonist being around. The Reapers have already made their presence known with the first extra episode, and I’m sure is going to cause issues throughout the season. An interesting theory that I’m a fan of that people have thought up already is that Leah is part of the Reapers. Whether she’s the leader or one of the followers, it doesn’t really matter, for she’s still a plot device for Daryl. 

The current fantasy I’m having is that Leah comes back and tries to get close to Daryl, which Daryl isn’t necessarily against but is still wary. But then Carol notices things about Leah and catches her doing stuff and she’s like “wtf?” and she tells Daryl her concerns but he brushes her off because he doesn’t trust her judgment very much right now. Most ASZ peeps think Leah is a good person but Carol’s like “mehhh something’s off”. Then the reveal happens where Leah is a double agent of sorts and betrays them all by having the Reapers infiltrating Alexandria or some crazy shit like that. Then it looks like she kills Carol in some way and Daryl’s absolutely gut wrenched because his Carol just died at the hands of his crazy ex girlfriend that he believed more than his best friend and what the fuck is wrong with him?? But then Carol comes back and butchers the Reapers cause she’s a goddamn queen and Daryl looks at her like she could fart fairy dust and gives the biggest smile we’ve ever seen him give on the show. Then he hugs her fiercely and starts sobbing, telling her how sorry he was and how relieved he was at her being alive and... same old story that’s happened on MULTIPLE occasions with other shows and books.

Now considering how Leah is made out to be in 10x18, I would say this theory is ‘less likely’ than what I thought it would be originally, but there’s still a decent chance. I don’t think Leah’s a cold blooded/narcissist, but it’s possible she could get roped up with the Reapers... and lets face it, Daryl isn’t the same person from who he was in the woods, so there’s a good chance she won’t be either when she comes back.

3). Leah is in Season 11, and pushes for a relationship with Daryl - Admittedly, this one would hurt to watch, but I think it’s a fair possibility we can’t rule out. Daryl is arguably at a better headspace now than he was way back when in the woods, and he knows he belongs with his family. But then Leah shows up and wants to start things over with him, and it could go multiple ways. He could realize right away that he doesn’t want that, and maybe he and Leah both get closer together. Or maybe he will give it a try for old times sake, but then he realizes that she’s not the person she was, or whom he thought she was, and they’re not actually a good pairing, and then he realizes “you know who I really want? That grey haired queen”... it would probably more emotional than that though.

I mean, we’ve all been there. We break up from a long term partner and it hurts like hell but we heal and we’re stronger for it. But then the ex comes back and is wanting to be with you again, and you’re at the very least tempted to give it a go b/c you were happy with them at one point. But then you’re with them and you realize that maybe this wasn’t a good idea, and maybe you should’ve listened to your goddamn gut all along b/c it was warning you that there’s a reason why it didn’t work out the first time.

Arguably, this theory would be more satisfying than the last one, because it would be Daryl who would choose who he would want to be with in the end. Think about it. We were initially bummed that Ezekiel wasn’t going to get his comic death in season 9 (and of course we were pissed about Henry), but then it turned out for the better because Carol willingly chose to leave him instead of being forced out of the relationship via death. So for Daryl to choose Carol over Leah in the end would be incredibly satisfying, albeit looooong overdue...

I still very much think Caryl is endgame despite the tough road we’re facing. I know folks are taking this last hurdle really hard because it’s been ingrained in our heads that Daryl is a “one woman kind of guy”, but... maybe that’s still the case. Maybe his heart is a “one woman kind of organ”, but Daryl’s been able to move past his traumas enough to be physical with more than one person. At least that’s how I’m seeing things at the moment. Obviously, it’s not good taste to go completely backwards on what is “known” about a character and assume that the audience would catch on as to why it would happen (like how Daryl reading the “children of abuse” book was never addressed in the show, but we’re having to assume he did b/c Norman said he did). Hoping the audience assumes the things that the writers are thinking of has always been an ongoing issue with TWD, so this whole shindig wasn’t necessarily surprising to me.

Anyways, that’s my two cents on things. I still think they’ll happen, and I still trust Kang. I’m just thinking of this as just the angsty part of a fanfic that I love and adore, and I just have to grit my teeth and wait for the author to finish writing the next chapter before hauling ass to my computer to see the update and breaking my desktop in the process. We’ll get to the healing part, I promise.

And if the spin is anything like the playful banter between them in this episode (albeit more mutual and fun), then sign me the fuck up and let me be a voyeur in their passionate travels.

Cheers my loves! 

[elizabeethan]

Walk With Me (I Think We’ll Find A Way)- Chapter 7/8

Killian Jones travels across realms to find Emma and Henry in New York after receiving an anonymous message about a new curse. When he finally tracks her down, he makes a bold move and greets her at her front door, but before he can even attempt to convince her to come back to Storybrooke with him, he’s met with a surprise that will change his life.

Season 3B AU

Prologue, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6

Read on Ao3

It’s here friends :) One chapter to go!!

The most beautiful header on the planet was made by @xhookswenchx, in case you were wondering

Tagging: @courtorderedcake @kmomof4 @stahlop @klynn-stormz @laschatzi @emelizabeth88 @lfh1226-linda @kday426 @profdanglaisstuff @elisethewritingbeast @timeless-love-story @captain-emmajones @gingerpolyglot @ebcaver @ilovemesomekillianjones @teamhook @superchocovian @itsfabianadocarmo @tiganasummertree @gingerchangeling @jrob64 @onceratheart18 @xhookswenchx @winterbaby89​ @swampmedusa​ @ultraluckycatnd @dancingnancyy @love-with-you-i-have-everything @shireness-says​ @snowbellewells​ @hollyethecurious​ @ouatpost​

If you want to be added or removed from my tag list please tell me because i’m bad at social cues on the internet

“Because I commanded you not to.”

The words tore a hole through Emma’s chest. Her foolish son somehow found his way to the woods and was standing off to the side with the Dark One’s dagger, holding it in front of himself and facing it towards Gold.

“Henry,” Neal starts, and she wants to scream at him to run, get out of here! but she can’t. Her brain has stopped working and her lips won't move. She feels Killian squeezing her arm but she can’t turn away from her child putting himself between her and the fucking Dark One.

“Get out of here, Henry,” Gold says.

“We’re not going anywhere, Rumple.”

Belle materializes behind Henry and Emma wants to explode. Where the hell is Corrine, if the two of them are here?!

“Belle, what are you doing?”

“You know why I’m here, Rumple. I’m not letting you steal this town’s memories just because you think it would bring me back to you.”

“No, no. That's not what I'm doing. I’m doing this for my son.”

She shakes her head and steps in front of Henry, who’s still wielding the dagger threateningly. He refuses to turn around towards Emma, which means she’s unable to reach out and grab for him. She’s worried that if she moves from this spot, Neal just might kill her.

“I left you, in the Enchanted Forest. I didn’t remember doing it, but I did it. And now you're here, doing the exact thing that I left you for doing!”

“Belle,” Neal tries, but she shoots him a threatening look.

“What you’re doing is selfish and dangerous. Neal, Emma’s clearly made her choice, and you need to accept that. If you truly love her like you say you do, you’d accept that.”

“I’m doing this for her; for us!”

“You’re endangering your son and her daughter. That’s not love, Neal. I should’ve seen a long time ago that wanting to control and manipulate someone isn’t the same as loving someone.”

“You’ve got it all wrong, Belle!” Gold tries.

“I can’t believe I was wrong about you all this time, Rumple. Your heart really is rotten, isn’t it?” He doesn't have a chance to answer. “Henry, the dagger, if you please,” she says, taking it from him as Emma breathes a sigh of relief. “Rumple, I want you to transport Neal to a cell in the sheriff’s station, and then you’re going to take us to the town line. We need to be alone for what comes next.”

They disappear in a cloud of red smoke. Emma’s hesitant to believe that this is all over, but the three of them are gone and Henry is standing safe and dagger-less a few feet away from her. “Henry,” she says, hating the worry laced through her tone.

“Mom,” he calls with a smile as he runs for her, throwing himself into her waiting arms.

“What the hell were you thinking?! You could’ve been seriously hurt! Where’s your sister?”

“With grandma—”

“Henry,” Regina interrupts. Emma sighs, wanting nothing more than to continue to hug her son but accepting the fact that her life isn’t that simple. He turns towards her voice and his face is alight once again.

“Mom!” he calls, running towards her for an emotional reunion.

Rather than watch the two of them together, she turns towards Killian and smiles. He looks down to her and takes her hand in his, squeezing gently.

“Well, Swan, I do believe—”

“We’ve gotta go,” David calls as he tucks his phone into his back pocket. “Robin, can you make sure Neal is where he’s supposed to be? Emma, you’ve gotta come with me. Mary Margaret just went to the hospital and had to bring Corrine with her.”

“The baby?” she asks, pulling Killian along with her toward her father’s truck.

“He or she is on their way.”

~~~~

Henry rides to the hospital with Regina in Gold’s car. Emma’s honestly a bit surprised that Regina is even bothering coming to the hospital, until she pulls up to the doors, drops Henry off, and pulls away again. Typical.

“Your mom didn’t want to come in?” Emma asks him, and he shrugs.

“Something about family bonding or whatever. It’s okay.”

They walk into the lobby and see Corrine sitting happily with Ruby, Tink on the other side of the coffee table and rolling a small ball towards her as she squeals with laughter. She hears Ruby gasp who’s that? before Corrine whips around and starts running towards her parents and brother as fast as her fat little legs can carry her.

“Hello, my love,” Killian says as he scoops her up, making a grunt as if his body is protesting. What a dad.

“Hi,” she says once she’s up. “Ball.” She holds up the small green ball in Killian’s face, making him back away with a laugh.

“You’re playing ball with Ruby? And…” he turns, cocking his head, “Tink.”

“Hi, Hook.”

“Curse is broken,” Ruby says by way of explanation. “Turns out you two weren’t the only ones getting it on after Neverland.”

“Ah,” he says with a blush, and Emma’s smiling until she hears Henry speak up.

“What does that mean?”

Ruby shoots them all a wolfish grin.

Prince Oliver Leopold is born mere hours after they arrived at the hospital; a healthy, happy boy who somewhat resembles his niece and nephew but has his mother’s bright green eyes.

Emma holds her baby brother and swoons at his plump lips and swollen eyes and rosy cheeks and before she knows it, she has baby fever, dammit. It’s worse when Killian takes the baby from her at David’s insistence and starts cooing. Captain Hook is cooing at a newborn.

Corrine won’t stop saying baby. It’s so adorable. She wants to hold her new uncle (Emma won’t ever get used to that), but refuses any help and would definitely forget to support his head, so a tantrum ensues, naturally. Killian hands the baby back to his mother and takes Corrine out to the hall, because apparently he’s already become an expert parent and handles tantrums flawlessly.

When she leaves the room a few minutes later to check on things, she finds them in the waiting room, Corrine on Killian’s lap with her thumb shoved in her mouth while he holds his phone in front of her. Emma rolls her eyes.

“We should probably try something aside from handing her a phone whenever she freaks out,” she reasons to him with a smile.

“Probably, but this always works so well. Plus, it’s rather catchy.”

When she gets closer, she sees that he’s playing a One Direction music video. Corrine is so fully engrossed that she’s barely dancing, just staring into the screen and bopping her free fist up and down slightly. “You're whipped,” she says to him with a snort as he smiles softly.

“Not since I was a lad.” Shit, she thinks, her face dropping. Poor choice of words.

“I’m sorry,” she says hesitantly. “I didn’t think before I said that, I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, love,” he says with the same smile.

“Yuh you, yuh you momma,” Corrine says with a cheeky grin shot Emma’s way.

“I love you, too,” she returns.

“Yuh you, duddy.”

He leans down to her and kisses her cheek tenderly, chuckling lightly. “I love you, too, darling.”

She tries to say darling but it doesn’t come out quite right as she struggles with her Ls. It’s cute either way, and she’s still the smartest baby around.

“I think this one is overdue for a nap. Care to tag along?” she asks as Corrine reaches up for her and she scoops her up. They’ve barely eaten or slept today, so she’s surprised Corrine is even still functioning.

“Sure.” Killian stands, locking his phone and tucking it into the back pocket of his jeans like a real twenty first century man.

~~~~

Henry asks to go to the sheriff’s station on their way back to Granny’s. Emma isn’t sure what he’s going to say to his father, but she assumes he’s about to get an earful from a rightfully angry thirteen-year-old.

Henry gained his memories back, but his old, cursed ones remained. This means that, while he finally remembers who he really is, he also remembers the story Emma gave him about his father. The reason he was abandoned is clear in his head, along with the betrayal that comes with almost having his memories wiped again and his sister removed from his life at the hands of the same man.

Safe to say, Henry is pissed.

Killian offers to go into the station with him and he accepts, as long as Killian promises not to listen in. Emma’s heart is racing the entire time they’re gone, but Corrine’s soft snores and gentle kicks to the seat in front of her keep her mind somewhat at ease for the ten minutes that they’re inside.

When they emerge from the building, she notes that they're both looking down as they walk to the car with somber looks on their faces. She wants to ask what they talked about, but she knows Henry would rather not talk about it, so when they get into the car, she drives towards the inn silently.

Henry decides to take a nap as well, so Emma puts Corrine in her crib and shoots him a gentle smile before grabbing the monitor and leaving the room to cross the hall towards Killian’s door.

“Hi,” he says as she enters, glancing up from the book he was reading on his bed.

“Hey.”

“Alright?” she shrugs, contemplatively standing before him before crossing the room and taking a seat on the other side of the bed. He closes his book and crosses his ankles before shifting so that he can face her.

“Weird day.”

“I’ll say,” he chuckles. “Would you like to lie down, Swan?”

She shrugs again. “I would, but I'm scared to go to sleep. We still haven’t seen Belle, so we don't know what happened to Gold.”

“Aye,” he agrees with a sigh. “But I think I trust her to make the right decision in that regard.”

“She’s taken him back countless times before, though.”

“It’s a complicated relationship, love. She said something about having left him when they were in the Enchanted Forest, and she’s obviously still angry.”

“Yeah.” She sighs deeply, sinking a bit further into the mattress as he places his arm on a pillow behind her back.

“Lie down, love. You're exhausted; I’ll stay up and make sure nothing goes awry.”

She sticks her lips out in a pout of contemplation, but the heat of his arm behind her neck is tempting along with the memory of his body shaped around hers during the night. “You’ll stay here the entire time? Unless Corrine wakes up?”

“Promise.” She nods at him, scooting herself down so that she’s lying with her head on his chest and her arm slung across his waist. She takes a moment before she hitches her ankle up and over his own, breathing heavily as she feels her body begin to relax. “Swan?” he says softly.

“Hmm?”

“Can you tell me what Baelfire did to you? What were your parents talking about?”

She tenses in his arms, squeezing her fist around his shirt until her knuckles are white. “He, uh, he left me. He betrayed me. Before we were together, he stole some watches and hid them, and then I went to go get them because he had wanted posters floating around. He went to fence the watches and when I met him afterwards, the police picked me up. He had given me a watch as a gift, and that was all the evidence they needed. Turns out he was the one who called the cops.”

“Bloody hell.” His hand runs along her spine with a comforting pressure as she relives one of her worst moments.

“Turns out August told him I was destined to be the Savior and he had to leave me, but the decision to call the cops was all him. So I went to jail for eleven months and that’s where I had Henry.”

“I’m sorry, Swan. That’s awful.” His voice is soft as it rumbles through the soft afternoon light in the room

“I’ve had a lot of time to get past it,” she shrugs

He nods against her hair and she revels in the gentle squeeze he gives her, the compression against her chest soothing her nerves.

“Swan,” he says again, and she lets out a breathy chuckle.

“Yeah?”

“What does whipped mean, in that context?”

She wants to groan, still disgusted with herself for even saying it, but she answers anyway. “It means she has you wrapped around her tiny little finger. I’m pretty sure she could convince you to do anything for her without so much as blinking.”

He laughs. “You’re probably right.”

They’re quiet for a few minutes, and she thinks she might fall asleep, but something stops her and makes her speak.

“She loves you so much,” she says after a few moments.

“Aye, I love her as well.”

“She needs you in her life, you know.”

He intakes a breath and she thinks she may feel the ghost of his lips pressing into her hair. “I need her, too,” he says softly.

She nods her head against his chest and takes in the scent of leather and sea and rum. He may have traded in his leather slacks for jeans, but he still smells the same, and she’s relieved. “That’s why… that’s why we’re staying here.”

She feels his body freeze as his arm tightens around her and his breath hitches in his throat. “Aye?”

“Mhmm. After everything, I just… I want to be close to my family. I almost lost them again today, even though a part of me still doesn't believe that Neal would do that, but… still.”

“I have trouble believing it myself.”

“Yeah. But Corrine likes it here. Henry obviously does too, and as much as it pains me to say, his mother is here. And... you're here.”

He rolls them over so that she’s on her side and he’s facing her before he takes his hand and runs it along her cheek gently. “I would've gone with her. With you.”

“I would've let you. But I'd rather stay put.”

He hums out a soft laugh, one that says I can’t believe this is happening, then touches his index finger along her brow and down the side of her face before he reaches his hand behind her head and pulls the two of them together in a soft, warm kiss.

She kisses him back instantaneously, swiping her tongue out against his soft lips as a sigh escapes her mouth. She feels so relaxed in his arms, and the feeling of him gently massaging her lips with his own and his fingers stroking against her scalp with gentle pressure is lulling her back into the sense of calm that she’s been missing. She thinks she could get really turned on if she lets herself, but for now, the chaste, gentle kisses relax her into a state of bliss.

She pulls away from the unexpected kiss after a few moments and sighs through her nose, pressing their foreheads together and biting her bottom lip. “I’m glad you have your heart back,” she says after a moment. “It probably wouldn't have been very fun kissing a heartless Killian.”

“I think I still would have had fun kissing you even without a heart.”

She hums out a laugh. “Yeah, but this is much better. Are you okay? After the whole heart thing?”

“Aye, I’ve been through dire straits before, nothing I couldn’t handle.”

“Right,” she laughs before pressing her body close to his and snuggling her head into his chest. “Can you tell me what happened?”

He clears his throat. “Neal must've knocked me out. Or it was the Crocodile, I'm not sure. But I woke up in the cabin surrounded by potions and spells and other nefarious things and knew something was wrong.”

“That’s where they were making the memory potion.”

“Aye,” he confirms. “Neal told me his plan, then he sent me back to the loft for dinner without my heart so that he could control me. He wanted to see me suffer and lose everything I hold dear. I believe the Dark One must've enchanted his hand somehow and that’s how he was able to control me.”

“What a bastard. I can't wrap my head about it.” He hums softly in agreement. “What was it like? Not having it, I mean.”

He’s still and quiet as he takes in a breath, then answers, “it’s like I was dead. I was so numb and empty, I couldn’t feel anything but pain and fear. But when you put it back, love, I’ve never felt better.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. Picturing the way he must have felt causes Emma near-physical pain “That sounds awful.”

He changes the subject away from his suffering easily. “May I ask you something else?” she nods against him. “When did you know? That it wasn’t me?”

She shrugs, the painful memories of last night flooding back into her mind. “Before you even got there I knew something was wrong. Henry said you left him alone at Gold’s and I knew you wouldn’t do that. And during dinner, Corrine refused to even look at you because she’s a smart baby and she even knew something wasn’t right. But it was really clear after dinner when you said you were leaving.” She nearly chokes on the words as they leave her lips.

“You have to know how hard I tried to not say it.”

She nods, thinking back to the tears in his eyes and the tight grip he had on her wrist. “I do know, I saw it. You were fighting him.”

“Aye, I was,” he whispers.

“You were doing it for your family.”

His grip on her tightens still and he presses another kiss to the crown of her head before he says, “that I was, love.”

~~~~

Despite no longer living in a magical forest over which he reigns as king, Emma’s father chooses to have a small ceremony to celebrate the birth of his son. As strange as it is to be 30 years older than her brother, and for his niece and nephew to be older than him, Emma happily attends the small gathering hosted at Granny’s once everyone has finally woken up from their naps. Their sleep schedules are going to be completely messed up for the rest of the week, but that’s something she’ll just have to deal with.

When Corrine, Henry, Killian, and Emma finally find their way down to the diner, the party is in full swing. Emma doesn’t miss Killian playfully swiping a donut from Ruby’s tray, giving a little piece to Corrine and finishing the rest himself. She could scold him for feeding her sweets before dinner, but seeing them together and seeing her back to her normal playful self with him makes her heart swell.

She catches Belle at the counter and hops into a stool beside her. “Thanks for your help today.”

“Oh, of course.”

“What, uh,” she starts again, contemplating whether or not it’s logical to start this conversation. “What happened to Gold?”

She purses her lips and looks down. “I sent him over the town line. He won't be back.”

“I’m sorry.” No matter how much she can’t stand Gold, she couldn’t imagine being in Belle’s position; loving someone so evil and having to make such a hard choice.

“Don’t be. I did leave him, you know, in the Enchanted Forest. He started working with Neal and… I was just unhappy with the changes I was seeing with him. He was starting to show his true self. So I left, and he seemed to just snap. I knew they were going to do something drastic when I found out that Neal spoke with your parents, so that’s when I stole the memory potion and sent that message to Killian.”

Emma draws her brows close together as she spins in the stool to face Belle. “Wait, you sent the message?”

“Yeah, you didn’t know?”

Emma shakes her head; the information is making more and more sense the more she learns. “Thank you. Seriously, thank you. You probably saved everyone in Storybrooke. You definitely saved my family.”

She smiles up at Emma. “It was the right thing to do,” she says, before she becomes distracted by whomever has just entered the diner. When Emma turns, she sees Robin’s friend Will waving at her and making his way towards them. She excuses herself when he kisses Belle’s temple softly and wiggles his eyebrows at Emma.

When she gets to the booth that Henry’s sitting at, she takes a seat enthusiastically and bumps his shoulder with his, making a comment about his new uncle to which he barely responds.

“I’m sorry, kid. I know this sucks,” she says after a moment of pointless small talk.

“Yeah.”

“You spent two years thinking your life was one thing and now it’s something completely different.”

He nods. He’s silent for a few moments and she sits with him, knowing that he may need time to ponder through his thoughts. “Why did he do it?” he finally asks.

She sighs and puts an arm around him. “I don't really know, Henry. Your dad… something happened to him and he just couldn’t handle not having his family with him.”

“We weren’t ever a family, though, not really. I mean, sure, we hung out, but it wasn’t anything like what you and I have, or even what me and Regina have.” She nods. “It was only a few months that I knew him. And he left you in jail.”

“I know. I’m sorry that you had to see your dad like that.” He shrugs. “You know I wouldn’t have let anything happen to you, right?”

With a nod, he says, “I know. That’s not what I'm worried about.”

“Can I ask you something?” He nods. “What made you come to the woods? What happened with you and Belle that made you do that?”

He shrugs again. “I don't know, really. We were messing around at Granny’s and I was talking about how mad I was, and that I wanted to just take the dagger and give both of them a piece of my mind. Then Belle said ‘if only we had the dagger,’ and I told her we did have it. And she said we had to go and put an end to this. You guys probably should have just brought it with you.”

Emma nods in response, laughing lightly at his logic. She was expecting some type of grand revelation between the two of them, but the reality was much more simply: Belle knew that Neal and Gold were up to no good, and she decided that she had the power to put a stop to it. “You’re right, we should have. Luckily, we had you to save our butts.”

“My dad…” he starts, ignoring her lightheartedness. “I just can't believe he would do something like this.”

She makes a bold move and says, “is that what you told him? When you went to the sheriff’s station?”

Henry chuckles sadly and rolls his eyes. “You mean Killian didn’t tell you?”

She bumps his shoulder again and responds, “I don’t think he would even if I begged. He respects you too much.”

He nods back at her, still looking down at his glass of water and plate of cake. “I guess I told him that. I told him I was done with him. I said he could’ve had a chance but he ruined it by doing this.” Emma nods softly. As much as it hurts to hear her son say these things about his father, a part of her must admit that she’s relieved to hear that he’s made this decision. She isn’t exactly psyched at the concept of giving Neal visitation rights after this. “I told him he’s a selfish dick for trying to keep my mom away from the guy she loves.”

She freezes at that, and not because her kid is using the unsavory language that he probably learned from her. Henry has always been a smart, perceptive kid, but has he always been this perceptive? To the point where he knows she loves Killian before she does? “Henry...” she tries to speak but can’t.

“It’s okay mom. Maybe two years ago I would’ve wanted you to be with my dad, but… I don’t know. Hook has only been here for a few weeks and he’s been more of a dad to me than Neal ever has.”

~~~~

Corrine is put to bed by her father several hours later after a tantrum over not being able to put her hand in a bowl of hot soup. She wanted to grab the floating crackers as Tink dropped them into the dish, and each time Killian stopped her hand she screamed no at him. At one point, it started to get out of hand and Emma called, “Corrine Alice Swan, you get your hand away from that bowl, right now,” as if the child could understand full sentences. She understood the tone, though, and boy, did she respond with a vengeance.

Killian took her upstairs to her crib once she started screaming so loudly that Emma’s sure the entire town heard. Now that she can’t hear the blood curdling screech anymore, she’s about 98% certain that Killian is in the bedroom playing a One Direction music video, but that’s alright. The two of them dancing along together is quite possibly the cutest thing she’s ever seen, so she thinks she’ll let it slide as she ascends the stairs and opens the door slowly.

What she’s met with is not a pair of One Direction fans, but rather, a swaying Killian holding a tearful but relatively calm Corrine as he hums lowly in her ear and rubs up and down along her back. Emma swoons, again overtaken by the image of dad-Killian in all his glory.

He’s only known his daughter for about five weeks, but in that time they’ve become so close. Each day, Corrine learns more and more as she explores her world, and Killian is always trying to help her along by teaching her new words and phrases. He’s a natural with her, especially at this age, and the more of it Emma sees, the more she wants.

“It’s time for sleep, my darling. Mummy and daddy will be here when you wake,” he whispers softly into her hair, and when Emma looks again, she sees Corrine’s thumb hanging out of her mouth and her face squished into his shoulder. He turns around and catches Emma’s eye, blushing fiercely as he bends to place the baby in her crib. Once she’s settled, he rubs a finger along her sweet face to remove one final tear and backs away before making his way towards the door and following Emma out.

Emma doesn’t miss the promise he makes his sleeping child to be here when she wakes up; he’s still reeling from almost losing her, and it breaks her heart.

“She didn’t need the phone, huh?” she jokes as they make their way down the stairs.

He laughs lightly in response and says, “I believe she was too tired for that. It’ll be difficult to get her back on schedule, I’d say.”

When they get back into the diner, Killian disperses into the crowd and Emma sees Henry talking to Regina. She’s happy that he’s rebuilding his relationship with her, she really is, but she’s also having trouble getting past their history. Try as she might, she can’t unsee that small child waiting on her doorstep begging for help defeating his Evil Queen mother.

Regina stands from the booth when Emma makes herself visible and walks over to her, clearing her throat and brushing down her blouse before she speaks. “Emma, I was thinking it might be good for Henry to spend the night at my house tonight. He’s open to it, but said we had to check with you,” she says bitterly.

Emma raises her brows, glancing back at Henry, who gives her a smile. “He is?”

“Yes,” she responds sharply, as if Emma has offended her. “He has his own room, why should he stay here?”

Emma lets out an exasperated huff but nods her head. As much as her delivery absolutely sucked, Regina has a point. Perhaps she should start thinking of a permanent living arrangement herself. “Okay, if he wants to, then that’s fine.”

Regina looks chuffed as she says, “good,” with the soft hint of a smile before heading back to the booth to collect Henry.

With both kids gone or asleep, Emma suddenly finds herself free of her motherly duties for at least the next few hours, and so decides to follow Killian to the patio with two tumblrs of rum, neat.

“So, Gold’s gone,” she says once she’s sitting next to him, and he tips his glass to her in thanks.

“Aye, I ran into Belle earlier. Relieved?”

She nods, taking a sip from her glass. “Yeah. I’m still… I don’t know. I’m pissed.” He nods back at her. “He knew that we… were together on the ship, so he’s known this whole time. He knew it in the Enchanted Forest, and he knew it when he came back here. He could have just let it go and accepted that it was over between us, but he didn’t. And he messed up because of that.”

“Aye. It’s quite frustrating, isn’t it?” She nods in agreement and rolls her eyes as she stares into her glass. “Do you think he knew about Corrine all this time?”

“That she’s ours?” He nods. “No, I think he genuinely blocked the possibility that we have a kid out of his mind. I think when he found out from you and Henry at the pier, that’s what clicked his plan into place for him. He realized that he would’ve lost without this memory potion.”

“Makes sense,” he starts, sitting up in his seat slightly. “I mean, it doesn’t. But it does.”

“Yeah.” They clink their glasses together as they both finish the contents, feeling the warmth rushing through their veins as it combats the cool bite of the late-autumn air. “I have a question,” she states.

“Go on.”

“Can you tell me what Henry said to Neal?”

He purses his lips, glancing up at her and shaking his head. “I don't want to violate his trust, love, but I can tell you that he’s a very smart lad.” She nods. “And I can also tell you,” he starts again, slowly and hesitantly reaching his hand towards her’s, “that Bae is not exactly safe to be around, and I’d feel much more comfortable if you and Henry stayed far away from him.”

“Did he threaten Henry?” She feels her palms starting to sweat.

“Not Henry, love. The lad stepped away from the bars and Neal said some things about you that I’d rather not repeat. That I wish your son hadn’t heard. I stepped a bit too close— in anger, I’ll admit— and he lunged for me, as well.”

She nods her head again, looking down at the table grievously at the news. Before everything, before Neverland and before the curse, she thought she may have been able to have a good co-parenting relationship with Neal, or that they may have even been able to become friends again. But now, he’s gone and ruined everything because he thought he could have more than he even deserved.

“Thanks for going with him.”

“Of course I would, love.”

“And thanks for… for coming after us, in New York. If you hadn’t…”

He shakes his head to silence her and says, “It was the right thing to do.”

They sit in comfortable silence for a few more moments before she says, “can I ask you something else?”

“What is it, darling?” She smiles at the fond nickname.

“How did you do it? How did you get to us?”

He looks down with a small, shy smile and says, “Well, the curse was coming, so I ditched my crew and took the Jolly Roger as fast and as far as I could to outrun it.”

“You outran a curse?” she asks with a doubtful smile.

“I’m a hell of a captain,” he returns in a flirty tone, to which she responds with a soft laugh. “Once I was outside the curse’s purview, I knew that the walls were down. Transport between realms was possible again; all I needed was a magic bean.”

“Those are not easy to come by.”

He looks down again and takes a breath. “They are if you have something of value to… trade.” His words are clearly calculated as they leave his mouth.

She hums again and asks, “and what was that?”

He smiles, eyes still looking at the ground, until he looks up and raises his brows at her, smiling as if he wasn’t about to admit to her that he sold his heart and home to find her and save her family. “Why the Jolly Roger, of course.”

She’s frozen. Her brows pinch together as they often do when he says something heartfelt and profound, although this time feels different. It feels like more. “You traded your ship for me?”

He doesn’t hesitate, answering her with a firm nod. “Aye.”

It happens so fast; she’s kissing him and his hand is lacing through her hair and hers through his. Her heart feels about ten times bigger than it should be at the feeling of his lips on hers after such an emotional confession, and she doesn't know if she’ll survive much more of his thoughtful words and selfless actions. When she finally pulls from him slightly, it’s as if he’s taking stock of what’s happening between them; as if he can’t quite believe that they’re here despite having been here before.

“I—” she starts, although she isn’t quite sure what she wants to say. She smiles as he does, the feel of his thumb running along her jaw and chin and his nose nuzzling lightly against her’s stirring the butterflies in her stomach and the heat much lower. “I want you,” she finally whispers. “All of you. Every part of you and everything that comes with it… I want it all, with you.”

It’s as close to a profession of love as she’s ever come before. She’s perhaps closer to telling him that she loves him now than when she actually said the words to Neal over a decade ago. She thinks she should be afraid— of his answer or of what may change between them, she isn’t sure— but she isn’t.

“I want everything with you, too, Emma. Always.” His use of her name rather than any number of nicknames he has to choose from, and the meaning of his statement, isn’t lost on her.

He kisses her again, like he can’t stay away from her any longer and absolutely needs to have her lips on his. While the last kiss was soft and slow, this one is more passionate and heated as he presses closer to her and laces his hand tighter into her hair. He pulls her gently towards him and she hears his chair scraping against the ground as he scoots forward. Once he’s got her where he wants her, he deepens the kiss, curling his tongue against her bottom lip until she opens up to him. It doesn't take much, the feel of him pressing close to her driving her mad with want.

She’s just about lost her mind when she starts to shift in her seat, planning to move forward and hoist herself up and onto his lap so that she can get closer to him and hopefully sate the heat erupting through her down to her core, until she hears someone behind him clear their throat.

Shit.

“I think it’s about time you and I have a little talk about your intentions with my daughter.” Emma squeezes her hands around the collar of his jacket as her eyes fly open. Thank god she hadn’t actually mounted him…

Killian clears his throat in an attempt to calm himself down before answering Emma’s father, although he still looks completely wrecked and refuses to turn around. “That’s a little old-fashioned even by my standards, and I still pay with doubloons.”

“Yeah, well, I’m leaving,” he says firmly, although she can hear a smile in his voice. “I was coming to give you a hug, but I’m not sure I want one anymore,” he jokes.

She laughs breathlessly as she stands up, moving to her father and giving him a tight hug. “How’s mom feeling?”

“Good, just tired. I’m happy that everyone threw this together, but I feel guilty being away from them, so I'm gonna go back to the hospital.”

“Give her a hug for me?”

“‘Course,” he says, kissing her cheek sweetly, then making a disgusted face and laughing.

Her breathing is still rapid and her heart is still racing as she sits back down next to Killian, so she takes in a big gulp of air and wishes she had more rum.

“Awkward,” she says with a small laugh.

He laughs. And he keeps laughing, and eventually he rests his head against his arm on the table and continues on laughing until no sound is coming out and he’s just a mess of shaking shoulders and teary eyes. At some point, she started laughing too, and anyone who exits Granny’s at this point would probably have the two of them committed.

“We can’t catch a break, love,” he remarks through more chuckles, and she laughs harder still.

Then she has a thought and acts on it so quickly that she can hardly even keep track of it. “Take me upstairs,” she says boldly, desiring not to be interrupted again when all she wants is to feel him on her.

He raises a dramatic brow and cocks his head at her in question, or perhaps seeking confirmation, and asks, “aye?”

She nods, biting her bottom lip in a way that she thinks may be more flirty than she intended before she leans in again and kisses him softly. “Take me upstairs,” she repeats against his mouth.

He stands so quickly that the table shakes and the glasses nearly fall over, and she laughs again. He holds out a hand to her, his smile bright and beaming, and when she takes it, she knows that things between them are shifting and that her life is changing.

She can’t wait.

~~~~

~~~~

Read Chapter 8

A/N: there’s one chapter left!! The next one is..... pure smut. Like, there’s a little plot in there but... it’s smut. So. Stay tuned if you’re into that?

[paradise-creator]

ﾟ*☆*ﾟ ゜ﾟ*☆*ﾟ ゜ﾟ*☆*ﾟ ゜ﾟ*☆*ﾟ

┊         ┊       ┊   ┊    ┊        ┊

┊         ┊       ┊   ┊   ˚✩ ⋆｡˚ ✩

┊         ┊       ┊   ✫

┊         ┊       ✩    

┊ ⊹       ✯

✯

Creating your paradise...

█████

0%

▓████

25%

▓▓███

50%

▓▓▓██

75%

▓▓▓▓█

100%

▓▓▓▓▓

Success!

You've given me a reason, a reason to continue

———————

┊    ┊       ┊. ➶ ˚

┊    ┊       ┊ ˚✧

┊  ˚➶ ｡˚   ☁︎

☁︎

Karma Akabane x reader

Snowfall Week three

Warning, sensitive topics will be present in this story. Read at your own risk

ೋ❀❀ೋ═══ ❀ ═══ೋ❀❀ೋ

Given

The winter season isn’t always cold. It isn’t always heart wrenching. It can be warm and sweet. The winter isn’t all bad and all sad. It can be bright and happy. With all those in mind, the snow and the cold doesn’t seem as bad anymore. As you walk in the streets, you look around your surroundings. The once ice cold winter can turn into a bright and wonderful scenery. How? Well, you spotted a familiar red head. “I’ve been waiting for you,” He said as he offered his arm to you. He had a soft smile plastered on his face, it was so unlike him. What happened to the sadistic Karma Akabane you knew? Maybe it was just because it was your anniversary.

“What’s up with you, you aren’t like this?” You asked as you looked at him. “It’s our anniversary. I can’t act all nice now~” He teased as he pulled you closer. “Alright~ Alright, so what are we here for?” You asked as you looked at him. The line to the building wasn’t long and you still didn’t know what was going on. “We’ll be attending a concert. I heard that the singer is new so I decided that maybe, it was a good date,” Karma then said as he kissed your forehead. You smiled at him and giggled. He really was changing for the better, for you. You heard him talk about this singer, his name was Mafuyu. You don’t really know what you are in for but the flier said they only had one song.

“How long would this event be? They only have one song?” You then asked as you looked at him. “Well, Princess, read the rest of the flier,” Karma then said teasingly. Mafuyu’s group wasn’t the only one performing, there were 2 groups before them and 3 after. “Oh,” You then said as you chuckled. To the red head, you were everything. Your smile, laugh, and your love, makes his heart flutter and his stomach in a whirl. You were the only person that made him like this, soft. As you both entered the stadium, you went in hand in hand. As time passed, you both enjoyed the event. The music and the people are so warm and wonderful. The amount of feelings everyone is emitting. It increased dramatically when Mafuyu performed. A sad love story in winter, sounds familiar.

As the event closed, Karma led you out of the stadium. He was making sure you won’t get lost or squished. “So, how do you like the event? I told you it was amazing,” Karma said in a teasing tone. “It was amazing! I didn’t expect it at all!” You said excitedly as you hugged him. “Thank you for this!” You added as you kissed his cheeks. Karma blushed a bit and kissed your forehead. “Anything for my princess,” He then said as he intertwined your fingers. “Let’s continue,” He then said as he pulled you gently. As the snow fell and the cold wind blew, Karma enjoyed the blissful moment. All his worries and his doubts melted away as he saw the big smile that adorned your face. The golden eyed male would do anything for you. He loved you with all his heart and anyone can see that.

No matter how many times he has been called a freak, monster, and so on. You never judged him. You were always there for him and he was there for you. He loved that you never focused on his flaws and force him to change. Unlike the others, you accepted him for who he is and he is beyond grateful. “Love, can we go there?” You asked as you pointed to a café right across the street. “Of course,” He then said as he started walking over there. Halfway across the street, he realized that there was a car. You were still crossing and didn’t realize that the car was passing by too fast. “ANGEL!” He yelled as he pushed you out of the way, taking the hit instead. Then there was nothing. The memory faded as Karma went back to his senses.

“If only that is what happened,” Karma thought as he looked at the sky. His gun pointed to the blue heavens as he awaited for Korosensei’s figure to appear. “I was so stupid. Why did I let you join me when I knew you were sick? When I knew you couldn’t survive the cold,” The memories of you smiling and laughing was engraved in his mind as he fell. You were the only one that stuck with him till the end. The only one who actually understood him and changed him for the better. As he fell, more memories of you popped in his head. The way you laugh, the way you hated your looks and he would always reassure you, the way you and him would mock Asano whenever Karma was higher. All the good times flooded his mind. Then the last time he saw you alive, the concert. You were so happy when you first entered the stadium. The smile that he always loved appeared on your face.

Then your pale face in the hospital, your breathing so slow and mouth so dry. He has never cried so much in his life but when you left him, everything came crashing down. “Live on for me and you,” Your final words rang in his head as he went closer and closer to the ground. He never looked down and focused in trying to kill Korosensei. He tried pushing you away from his mind, it was months ago and he has to move on. He thought he was going to die. He thought he was going to break another promise. He thought he was going to be with you, his angel. As he continued to fall, the thoughts of his former teacher vanished and he accepted his fate of death. He was so ready to meet you, to meet you in the other side even if you asked to live.

But he then felt a sticky yet soft material on his back as he landed. He was alive but how? As Korosensei scolded Karma and telling never to pull that stunt again. Karma was still in trance, he didn’t realized that Korosensei already flew down. As his body was in shock, an image of you appeared in his mind. “Ha, she was right. I’m stupid,” He thought as he continued to look up at the sky. Korosensei was scolding him like there was no tomorrow and Karma didn’t care one bit. You were in his mind after all. “I’m stupid for thinking that her dying was my fault. She would’ve never blamed me for it,” He said as he then looked at Korosensei, who was still not yet done scolding him. “I was stupid for not being able to realize,” He started as he looked up again. “You’ve given me a reason,” He then said softly. “A reason to continue,” He added as he closed his eyes.

ೋ❀❀ೋ═══ ❀ ═══ೋ❀❀ೋ

Author's note

AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH THIS IS SO LONG OVERDUE-

But nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed this angst that I have created.

[stellacolletore]

08.21.2020

though i would hide it, in my face it still appears (it is true i love) anime: chihayafuru characters: oe kanade, mashima taichi/ayase chihaya summary: with a love like theirs, Kanade’s sure Taichi and Chihaya will be alright. note: covers the events from season 1 (had to rewatch a looot, taichi/kana brotp still the best), seasons 2&3, and my post-queen’s match headcanon (see 7 wonders of mizusawa for details)

i.

President Mashima swipes block over the stalker’s number, and suddenly, Kanade feels things fall into place.

He’s in love with Chihaya-chan.

There isn’t enough room for celebrating her newfound discovery as she laments over the fact that she’s the only one around with eyes that see this. Ergo, she’s the only one who would be knowingly standing along the sidelines, watching wherever the depths of love would take two of her dearest friends. Surely, there’s nothing more frustrating for a lovestruck girl than that.

Chihaya-chan gapes at her phone, totally lost on the purpose behind Prez’s gesture. Kanade sighs.

This love will really take its sweet time, won’t it? 

ii.

He’s just won his most important match to date and still, they find him only thinking of her.

“Chihaya, get up. Let’s go,” Prez is tugging Chihaya-chan’s limp arm, voice tinged with unusual urgency. Dazed at the turn of events, Kanade’s mind is unable to make sense of what’s happening in front of her. The match had gone most unexpectedlyーopening with Prez effectively losing the unnerving level of concentration that has kept him unbeatable throughout four straight games, continuing with the tension (and fault)-filled Class B finals that kept her, Chihaya-chan, and Hanano-san on edge until the last card, and ending with him donning a worried expression in place of a happy one after reaching the long-elusive Class A title.

Her inner voice spells the situation out for her. 

He’s taking her to Wataya-san. Prez thinks Chihaya-chan’s been watching the wrong match, the wrong boy, all along.

That certainly explains the oddly messy game he played with Yamamoto-san. 

But that’s not right.

Kanade’s about to shake him out of his self-sacrificing behavior when Chihaya-chan beats her to it.

“Omedetou, Taichi. Y-You’re Class A now. Congratulations.”

Like mirror, President Mashima’s eyes reflect Chihaya-chan’s glassy ones. Euphoria washes over him as he finally acknowledges his achievement. Kanade wishes she could capture the moment like a photograph, could mark it in long-lasting verses of poetry.

See, Prez? She cares for you just as much. It’s Wataya-san’s big match, too, but she’s only thought of you.

iii.

Prez is playing the game with his heart on the line, and finally, she’s looking at him.

Hanano-san sees this, too. Beside her, Kanade once again admires her kouhai’s pure love, steadfast in the face of heartbreak. It bears the same signature as the President’s, and a twinge of bittersweet feeling swirls in Kanade’s heart. She prays for Hanano-san’s own happiness before bringing back her attention towards the final and most personal match of the Yoshino tournament, sincerely hoping.

Please keep looking, Chihaya-chan. He’s there because of you. President Mashima’s made it there because he loves you.

iv. 

When President Mashima leaves the club, he takes a part of Chihaya-chan with him.

Kanade’s well-aware of what it is, and so she picks up the fallen microphone on the ground, abandoned in the wake of Chihaya-chan rushing out after him. Even though she’s equally left in the dark about Prez’s decision, she understands. That is why, with tears brimming in her eyes, Kanade holds the microphone to her lips, wills her voice not to waver.

You can leave this to us, she thinks, it’ll be alright. 

Needless to say, things are the opposite of alright after that, and soon enough, Chihaya-chan parted ways with the club as well.

Doubt, fear, and helplessness cloud over the remaining members of the Mizusawa Karuta Club now that their sun and moon are missing. Still, Kanade learns to find comfort in the fact that the string of fate tied between President Mashima and Chihaya-chan won’t easily give way. 

A wave of loneliness sweeps her with the chilly night air on the road home. Kanade draws warmth from a poem that sympathizes with her deepest hope of the moment:

Swift waters Parted by jagged rocks Are joined By the river’s end.

v.

Chihaya-chan is a formidable force, poise unbent and passion blazing just as strongly, even in the middle of unmet promises and a missing loved one. 

She pulls them in the classic team huddle. And talks about the fear and the hope she’s been avoiding since he walked out on the club and out of her life. 

“Mashima Taichi, a person who made the karuta club with me, quit the team, but… I believe he will be back someday, maybe years later, or tens of years later. In the meantime, I will become the queen. And...while I wait for him, I will make Mizusawa into a karuta powerhouse like Hokuo Academy…”

The karuta she plays against Wataya-san is one they’ve never seen before, but feels inexplicably familiar. 

It takes Kanade a remainder of the match to realize why. 

Poem 16. 

vi.

President Mashima comes back to fight for the place closest to Chihaya-chan.

In the end, the match went in Wataya-san's favor; leaving everybody in tears at President Mashima’s defeat and Wataya-san’s sincere display of gratitude at the Prez’s valiant effort in playing karuta. 

Kanade just dried her own tears off when she turned towards Chihaya-chan. “P-President Mashima gave it his all, did he not, Chihaya-ch…”

At the sight of the girl before her weeping with strong, bitter tears, Kanade’s thoughts come to a halting stop, untilー

If her tears are indeed for President Mashima,

Then he may just have reached the place closest to Chihaya-chan after all.

vii.

Nobody could believe it.

Chihaya-chan is going for the win, as if she hadn’t been on the brink of losing two matches ago. Taking Wataya-san’s advice of entering her own “arena”, Chihaya-chan played the third and fourth games as Mizusawa’s Ace, pushing the limits of her hard-earned skills and natural talents to get cards for her team. Kanade feels honored to be a part of Chihaya-chan’s strength.

Chihaya-chan swipes the last card at Wakamiya-san’s formation, and just like that, they’re down on the luck of the draw.

Kanade checks the two remaining cards on Chihaya-chan’s side. 

No way. 

There are a hundred cards in karuta, a hundred poems in Hyakunin Isshu, and yet those two cards remained. If this isn’t fate, Kanade doesn’t know what it is.

Kanade looks over at Wataya-san, watching Chihaya-chan’s match after claiming the Meijin title a game ago, and her suspicion is confirmed. The se card belongs to Wataya-san. 

And, of course, the tachi card is Mashima-kun’s.

This is more than sending a card, Kanade realizes. 

Fate is asking Chihaya-chan to choose.

She remembers a strategy Chihaya-chan has always followed as Harada-sensei’s star pupil. 

“Since I’m an offensive karuta player, I would send my special cards to my opponent, and it’s because I want to get some things badly that I would part with them. And I would go into the fight with the resolve to get them no matter what.” 

Chihaya-chan moves to pick up a card.

“Challenger Ayase-san sends ‘tachi wakare’...”

viii. 

“‘Let’s play karuta forever, Taichi’ーSince when?! Ayase-senpai, since when did you like Mashima-senpai? What do you just mean by ‘play’? Is it play, play or play as in let’s date and get married and live happily everーhmhm, mph!” Kanade cuts off Hanano-san’s tirade, noting Chihaya-chan’s rapidly reddening cheeks and startled eyes. “Hanano-san, shouldn’t you congratulate your senpai before anything else?” 

Hanano-san recovers quickly enough, her own cheeks flushed in embarrassment, and says, “Omedetou, Ayase-senpai. You’re incredible.” 

Chihaya-chan merely blinks at them in reply, and Kanade’s instantly worried that her brain has gone haywire after being cornered with Hanano-san’s frank questions. She lays a comforting hand on Chihaya-chan’s arm, thinking about what to say to divert her attention. “Chihaya-chan, Harada-san’s waiting at the break room for you. Shiranami Society’s already throwing a party there, why don’t we goー”

“I just don’t want him to disappear again.” Chihaya-chan’s looking straight at Hanano-san, a mixture of desperation and determination swirling in her eyes. “Apart from chiha, the card that I won’t absolutely let go of is tachi. I want to show him how much I want to get to him by sending and getting the card butー” her eyes start to glisten, her voice shaky, “ーbut he didn’t see me, didn’t he? He’s not here, he’sー”

“Chihaya-chan,” Kanade tries to conjure a warm, reassuring tone. “Don’t worry. If he hadn’t seen youーwhich I highly doubtーthen you’ve just got to show him again, right? You’re an offensive player, Chihaya-chan, I’m sure you won’t give up without a fight.”

Thankfully, those words are enough to quell Chihaya-chan’s despair. She fixes her posture, her resolve following suit, and her eyes twinkle with a newfound passion. She smiles, “Thank you, Kana-chan, Sumire-chan.” 

Kanade beams. President Mashima might have been MIA as of the moment, and Wataya-san is fast approaching with a look that tells he’s about to have a long, overdue talk with Chihaya-chan, but it’s all right. 

With a love like theirs, Kanade’s sure Taichi and Chihaya will be alright.

[woodentranscripts]

Season 1 Episode 1 The Bane of Rudyard

It's the worst day of Rudyard's life when new competitor Eric Chapman arrives on Piffling and becomes an immediate sensation.

Written by David K. Barnes

EPISODE ONE: THE BANE OF RUDYARD

[narration from Madeleine]

Now, Hidden in the English Channel is an island called Piffling. On the island is a village - Piffling Vale - and the village has a square, and the square has this lovely little antique shop but opposite the antique shop is a funeral home which is where much of this chronicle will be set, I’m afraid. You see, I want to tell you all about a man named Rudyard Funn. He owns the funeral parlour, he’s responsible for all the funerals in Piffling Vale and today, he experienced what was undoubtedly the worst day of his life. Which was probably long overdue.

 [funky intro music]

 REV: We gather here today to celebrate the life of Stanley Carmichael, who was taken from us only five days ago   

 He continues

[narration] It all began with a funeral, the antique dealer Stanley Carmichael, whose shop was immediately opposite Rudyard’s premises, had led a life of peace and ordered calm of eighty nine years… and had subsequently crushed to death by a granite sundial. 

 REV: I confess I never actually bought anything from him. His prices have been quite steep actually, though I did have my eye on that sundial. I might still be tempted if it came down in price, hint hint. (laughs)

 [narration] Stanley’s relatives pricked up their ears at the prospect of getting something for that granite sundial. Whilst nearby, his eyes sunken, his skin pale and drawn: stood Rudyard, looking at his watch and wishing strongly that the reverend wasn't an agnostic.

REV: … and undoubtedly looking down at us from his place with God. Unless you don't believe in that sort of thing - which I won’t hold against you, mind you God probably will. Unless he doesn’t exist, in which case he won’t even have anything to complain about, really. 

RUDYARD: (clears throat) Reverend. 

REV: Sorry, did somebody say -

 RUDYARD: Reverend. REV: Oh hello Rudyard- RUDYARD: You’re rambling. REV: Sorry? RUDYARD: You’re rambling again REV: Oh God, am I?

RUDYARD: Yes! REV: I’m so sorry, where was I? RUDYARD: His spirit looking down at us from his place- REV: OH! From his place with God, yes, yes, thank you, right, right, I’ve err Looking down at us from his place with umm… no. No, actually, I don't suppose we could have a quick show of hands? RUDYARD: No! No! Now come on! REV: If you believe in God, could you put your hands up, can we all do that? Put your hands up if you believe, ughh right, right err bout half. Um so! Ah yeah. What I might do is do the service twice- RUDYARD: We don't have time! 

 REV: Once with God in it and the other without. RUDYARD: No! We’re overrunning. REV: Oh! But I thought I might read out a few psalms RUDYARD: Which ones? REV: I don’t mind, I'll be happy to take requests if anyone’s got any favourites? RUDYARD: Nononono. We’re sixteen minutes behind schedule, nearly seventeen. Georgie? (snaps finders) Wake up! GEORGIE: (groans) I don’t want to RUDYARD: We need the coffin in the ground. Now. GEORGIE: Sir, it’s a very heavy coffin RUDYARD: What’s your point? GEORGIE: I’m the only pallbearer RUDYARD: Oh stop moaning, put your back into it! GEORGIE: Ughh Fine! REV: Do we have time for some funny anecdotes? RUDYARD: We’re late as it is and it’s pissing it down - so no. PERSON 1: He’s ruining everything! RUDYARD: There you are reverend, you’re losing them REV: Oh! I thought they were rather getting into it! PERSON 2: Not him, you! RUDYARD: Me? PERSON 3: You horrid little man, stop hurrying things along!

 RUDYARD: Don’t you know what a schedule is? PERSON 3: So rude! RUDYARD: This isn’t my only gig today, you know. I’ve got Mr Ascii to measure up in half an hour! PERSON 1: He’s not dead! RUDYARD: Well he doesn’t look healthy, though, does he? PERSON 3: Stop talking we’re trying to honour Stanley! RUDYARD: Honour Stanley! You didn’t even like him. PERSON 3: How dare you! RUDYARD: I noticed in the shop you slipped that carriage clock down your blouse when you thought no one was looking! (gasps) RUDYARD: And the dressing table! (even more gasps) PERSON 2: I knew it! PERSON 3: Shut up! Bill swiped the portrait of Ova Broughn PERSON 2: Bill! I wanted that portrait! PERSON 1: Well you can’t have it! (gasps) PERSON 1: I’m sorry Jerry, I just lost control, OW REV: Now come, come everyone. Stay calm… Jerry put that shovel down! RUDYARD: Alright, Georgie, get the body in the ground GEORGIE: Sir, They’re not very happy RUDYARD: Of course they don’t look happy, it’s a funeral. Off you go! (she grunts) [narration] The service completed, Rudyard Funn and Georgie Crusoe fled the cemetery and hurried back to the funeral home. Established by local character and serial bigamist Gilbert Funn in the fifteenth century, Funn Funerals have always maintained a solid reputation for being the only funeral home on the island. RUDYARD: (grunts) What it could be a good thing back there, you saw Stanley’s widow GEORGIE: That sad old lady RUDYARD: Yes, when she took a swing at her son in law I think she fell into the grave instead. I don’t know if it was fatal but it looked promising to me GEORGIE: Do you think we’d be able to have a quiet funeral RUDYARD: Asking for the impossible never helped anyone GEORGIE: People smiling, swapping happy memories, I’m not sure every funeral should end with violent conflict RUDYARD: Georgie, once you’ve been here a few more months you’ll realise all funerals always end in bloodshed, there's very little you or I can do about it. Now go and get the measuring kit I want to go to Mr Ascii’s and see if he’s dead yet! GEORGIE: Are you sure it’s worth the bother? RUDYARD: I’ve gone round everyday for the last six weeks, I’m not giving up now, Hop to it! GEORGIE: yes sir~ RUDYARD: Get me a dry jacket, and another hat! Where’s Antigone? Antigone! Now look here, yes. Stanley’s widow! Ha I knew it! No, nothing sorry. We can fit her in a six o clock, I’ll leave her in the ground for the moment, it’ll save time in the long run. No, she shouldn’t be brawling at her age. Of course I could fancy my chances against her, Im thirty-five, she was eighty-two see you at six. Georgie! We’ve got a full day ahead of us! Where’s Antigone? GEORGIE: Try the mortuary! RUDYARD: Are you in the mortuary? Antigone? Antigone? Are you in the mortuary? Antigone? Antigone are you in the- ANTIGONE: What?! RUDYARD: I’m back. ANTIGONE: I’d rather look at the corpses. RUDYARD: Oh for- ANTIGONE: Does rest in peace mean nothing to you?! RUDYARD: Well I don’t hear the guests complaining. Room for another? ANTIGONE: Is it Mr Ascii RUDYARD: Not yet, this ones a bonus! [narration] That’s Antigone, Rudyard’s twin sister, despite actually being born one week afterwards. The poor dear had been diagnosed with depression within twenty minutes of being born - a world record which gave her no consolation at all. ANTIGONE: So how was it today? RUDYARD: Err the vicar’s getting worse and of course it was raining and inevitably it ended with a punchup over a portrait of Eva Broughn. But personally I found it all very moving ANTIGONE: Brilliant, so that's another grieving widow we’re going to have to apologise to RUDYARD: No we won't. ANTIGONE: Why not?! RUDYARD: She fell into the grave and died before I left! ANTIGONE: She what?! RUDYARD: It’s been a very productive morning ANTIGONE: You really have no concept of what good business is, do you? RUDYARD: I’d love to disagree with you and Oh! I’m doing it right now ANTIGONE: I’ve been in the mortuary all morning and do you know what I’ve been up to! RUDYARD: Oh sure I don’t want to know ANTIGONE: I’ve spent the past five hours mixing formaldehyde and methanol with clementine and a tiny, tiny dash of cinnamon. That’s what I’ve been doing for five hours! RUDYARD: Should I ask why? ANTIGONE: To try to make our embalming fluid smell nicer! So the bodies will smell nicer! Because have you really ever smelt a body, Rudyard? RUDYARD: Why do we still talk to each other? ANTIGONE: Now! Thanks to me, they’ll smell brighter, fresher, not like bodies at all. That’s the sort of service I’m striving for, Rudyard. I want them to forget that the body is a body. RUDYARD: Yes that’ll work, our Grandad’s dead but don’t worry because he smells like christmas! ANTIGONE: It’s attention to detail Rudyard! It’s how we run a business, you would know! RUDYARD: We get the body in the coffin in the ground on time GEORGIE: Sir, your other jackets been eaten by moths - I saw the whole thing. RUDYARD: Not now, Georgie, how long did it take for the coffin to get to the ground this morning? GEORGIE: A couple of seconds? RUDYARD: Now that’s a good service! GEORGIE: Because I dropped it RUDYARD: But it got where it needed to be and that’s what they pay us for. ANTIGONE: Rudyard, for the very last time! They don't want chaos! They don’t want stress and they don’t want a relative dead before the first is even been buried! RUDYARD: How do you know what they want?! ANTIGONE: In the name of sanity, Rudyard - RUDYARD: I’ve got a very busy day ahead of , so just get back into the mortuary CHAPMAN: Hello! RUDYARD: Yes? CHAPMAN: Eric, Eric Chapman. I’m new, to the place! Just arrived! GEORGIE: Good morning RUDYARD: Georgie, leave it to the professionals. Good morning. We’ve not met. CHAPMAN: No, because I’m new, to the place RUDYARD: You don't have to brag about it! I have met people before CHAPMAN: You’re Mr Rudyard Funn, of Funn Funerals? RUDYARD: Correct CHAPMAN: Terrific name, suppose you put the fun in funerals RUDYARD: No, of course we don’t, that’s obscene CHAPMAN: Sure, never mind

ANTIGONE: Hello Mr Chapman CHAPMAN: OH! Jesus ANTIGONE: Is this too close? CHAPMAN: A little bit! ANTIGONE: Sorry! CHAPMAN: No, don’t mention it! ANTIGONE: Sorry, I’m Antigone, sorry pleased to meet you. CHAPMAN: Err, likewise call me Eric. Are you in charge? ANTIGONE: I’m the mortician, where the action is, CHAPMAN: I bet there’s not much you don’t know about the body, Antigone? ANTIGONE: That sounded like a double meaning GEORGIE: It’s called flirting ANTIGONE: Oh gosh, is it? CHAPMAN: Well, now ANTIGONE: It’s smashing, do it again, have I made it awkward? DAMN RUDYARD: I haven’t got all day! CHAPMAN: Yes so, Rudyard, Antigone and GEORGIE: Georgie, Hi ANTIGONE: That’s enough! CHAPMAN: I saw you at the funeral, didn’t I GEORGIE: Yeah, helping out, it’s a job RUDYARD: Georgie, don’t give away company secrets GEORGIE: I was only - ANTIGONE: Hang on, you were at the funeral this morning? CHAPMAN: Yes I was RUDYARD: And I’m sure you’re impressed with what you saw there Mr Chapman but we really are frightfully CHAPMAN: Actually I wasn’t entirely sure it came off RUDYARD: I’m sorry? CHAPMAN: For a start it got a little violent didn’t it? RUDYARD: Did you think so? CHAPMAN: At the end yes RUDYARD: I’m not sure what funeral you were watching, Mr Chapman but all I saw was good clean mourning CHAPMAN: Didn’t someone die? RUDYARD: A very convenient place for it to happen, Georgie GEORGIE: I’m not RUDYARD: There you go, don’t let us keep you Mr Chapman CHAPMAN: And I thought there could have been a greater attention to detail. Stop me if I’m getting too critical. RUDYARD: Okay I’ll stop you there ANTIGONE: Shut up, carry on Mr Chapman CHAPMAN: Eric ANTIGONE: Gosh CHAPMAN: I have to say it was a little bit grim, I mean it’s a funeral it’s hardly party time but even so these occasions should be a celebration of life rather than going on about death, do you know what I mean? RUDYARD: Nope CHAPMAN: Ah, I don’t want to be made more miserable and I want to remember those happy magnificent memories, I want a cheerful atmosphere, bright flowers, music, funny recolations ANTIGONE: Sweeter smelling fluids CHAPMAN: Exactly, fluids? ANTIGONE: I think they’re very important. CHAPMAN: Sure thing. That's what I mean! Sorting out those little details, pushing the boat out, or the hearse out, well that's just my two cents for what it’s worth RUDYARD: Well, I don’t know what planet you live on, Mr Chapman, but - ANTIGONE: Thank you! We’ll bear those things in mind, won’t we Rudyard. RUDYARD: remind me- ANTIGONE: Smashing! CHAPMAN: Anyway, I thought I’d swing by ANTIGONE: Oh any time! CHAPMAN: Thank you, ANTIGONE: Any time at all CHAPMAN: Yes, I was just swinging by to see the competition. RUDYARD: Competition? CHAPMAN: Yes. ANTIGONE: You mean like a raffle? CHAPMAN: Not exactly RUDYARD: I hate raffles CHAPMAN: That’s a strange thing to hate. I meant you lot! Er, Funn Funerals the local competition… In funerals RUDYARD: You’re an undertaker. CHAPMAN: Well clients prefer funeral director ANTIGONE: You’re just visiting though?! CHAPMAN: No, I live here now, I’m setting myself up ANTIGONE: Your own funeral home? CHAPMAN: yeah, Chapmans, not quite as catchy as Funn Funerals but there we are ANTIGONE: Where are you going to be? CHAPMAN: You know the antique dealer you just buried, Stanley Carmichael? I’m just taking over his premises. ANTIGONE: Just across the square! CHAPMAN: That’s right! Opposite you actually, we’ll probably see a lot of each other, compare notes, swap stories, down the pub - mine’s a light ale by the way. Err did someone die in here? RUDYARD: Goodbye Chapman. CHAPMAN: Oh sure! Glad to meet you Rudyard, Antigone ANTIGONE: Chapman. CHAPMAN: Georgie GEORGIE: See you later ANTIGONE: That’s enough! CAPMAN: Okay. (exhales) Enjoy yourselves! Ah! The sun’s come out! RUDYARD: If he thinks I’m going to buy him a light ale, he’s very much mistaken. ANTIGONE: Oh shut up Rudyard! This is actually very serious. GEORGIE: He seemed fine ANTIGONE: No he didn’t, Georgie, coming over here waving his credentials in our faces, giving us feedback, my god! GEORGIE: I thought you liked him? ANTIGONE: Liked him?! Liked him?! GEORGIE: Yeah! You were talking about fluids and everything! ANTIGONE: That’s professional chit-chat for god’s sake, do you think I like gorgeous handsome men, do you? Exactly, it’s disgusting, it’s disgusting RUDYARD: I can’t think of a scenario where I would buy someone a light ale ANTIGONE: Rudyard, focus! He is serious competition RUDYARD: Him? Competition? Were you listening to the man? GEORGIE: No she wasn’t, She was gazing into his eyes ANTIGONE: Georgina! Go and make some tea. GEORGIE: We haven’t got a kettle ANTIGONE: Buy one. GEORGIE: Fine ANTIGONE: Rudyard, we’re finished, I think I’ll take a cyanide capsule RUDYARD: We are not finished, we’re an established firm, going back centuries! Nobody round here is going to book a funeral with a complete stranger. ANTIGONE: Rudyard! Look At His Shop! RUDYARD: What is it? ANTIGONE: He’s already changed the sign! ‘Chapman’s’ Just like he said. RUDYARD: I’ll admit he’s working quickly. ANTIGONE: That does it. You’ve got to see the mayor, tell him this village isn’t big enough for two funeral homes! RUDYARD: That’s not a bad idea actually, I’ll see him now. (leaves) One day I’ll find an umbrella. [narration] Rudyard scuttled across the village square and up the step leading to Piffling Hall. He was shown into the office of the Right Honourable Mayor Desmond Desmond. A man who thought the most wonderful words in the english language were “I’m sure it’s going to be fine!” SECRETARY: Mr Rudyard Funn to see you sir. MAYOR: Oh, Thank you Margery RUDYARD: Your worship, I really am most desperately sorry to- where are you? MAYOR: Down here, Rudyard, Under the desk. RUDYARD: Why? MAYOR: Ohh, just sitting here, you know. Doing a bit of thinking, big world out there RUDYARD: Yes, er I came to ask you- MAYOR: Rudyard, do you know what the difference is between a village and a town. RUDYARD: Well er, a town has a greater area, MAYOR: Yes? RUDYARD: Higher population, more amenities MAYOR: Ah, amenities, yes RUDYARD: A mayor! MAYOR: oh yes RUDYARD: I actually came to- MAYOR: We have to do something, Rudyard, with our lives haven’t we Rudyard? Don’t you think? RUDYARD: Yes! MAYOR: I look at my seal of office sometimes and all my envelopes, and I read my name, and have I done enough I ask myself, am I even Right Honourable because I don’t feel it. RUDYARD: Well, to call yourself Right Honourable you have to be a judge or a privy counsellor MAYOR: Really? I’m going to change all my stationary now! You see, this is the thing I’m talking about! What have I earned? What have I achieved? God knows we have to try and justify ourselves, somehow. RUDYARD: mhm, I don’t like the man across the road from me. MAYOR: Exactly, and then what with my sister passing the bucket last week, oh top drawer send off you chaps gave her by the way. RUDYARD: Oh, thank you! MAYOR: Oh, pity it rained RUDYARD: Yes well MAYOR: Can’t help that, or the grounds subsidence, still we all laughed seeing her flopping about like that did we- anyway, Do you know what I’ve decided to do, Rudyard? I am going to turn this village into a town. That’s what I’m going to do. I mean things must expand, mustn’t they? RUDYARD: Probably? MAYOR: Do you think so? Good! She used to say terrible things to me, my sister RUDYARD: I’ve got a problem actually MAYOR: Have you? Well can I help, cause I really like to be useful RUDYARD: I think you can be, you see, your worship, there’s this man. MAYOR: He’s not worth it Rudyard. RUDYARD: Yes. What? No I mean, this man is opening a new funeral home directly across the road from mine. MAYOR: Is that a problem? RUDYARD: We can’t have two funeral homes can’t we? MAYOR: Can’t we, why not RUDYARD: Well it’d be ridiculous! MAYOR: I don’t was to look ridiculous! RUDYARD: Exactly! If we have two funeral homes, why not two fire stations, two hospitals, two mayors! MAYOR: Two mayors!?! Could it really get that far? RUDYARD: I would hate to speculate MAYOR: Help me up, would you? Yes, I think we should stab this in the bud immediately. Thank you Rudyard. RUDYARD: Thank you your worship! MAYOR: Gets me out the office anyway RUDYARD: Well from under the desk. MAYOR: We won't talk about that. Margery, cancel my appointments for today SECRETARY: There aren’t any MAYOR: Thank you! Off we go, Rudyard [narration] Upon arriving at Chapman’s, Rudyard and the - until recently Right Honourable Mayor Desmond Desmond discovered that the place was about ready to be opened! And it wasn’t yet even midday! Rudyard braced himself for a sinister journey into the unknown MAYOR: Wasn’t this place an antique shop a few hours ago? RUDYARD: I don’t understand how he has managed to do all this?! MAYOR: Bit flash isn’t it, all these happy colours, not a patch on your set up, look not a speck of dust anywhere! RUDYARD: I mean, he arrived this morning! MAYOR: It must be said though, these sofas are really comfy! Is that a coffee machine? RUDYARD: Yes? MAYOR: Does your place have one of those? RUDYARD: We bought a kettle only half an hour ago CHAPMAN: Hi, sorry to keep you waiting as you can imagine, it’s all go here! RUDYARD: Is that a lift?! CHAPMAN: Mr Mayor, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Eric Chapman, there are some chocolate truffles in the bowl there, help yourself. Would you like the tour, I’d love to show you around, it’s still not quite finished MAYOR: Perhaps another time, Mr Chapman RUDYARD: You’ve got a lift?! MAYOR: Umm, I don’t know quite how to say this but CHAPMAN: How to say what, Mr Mayor? MAYOR: Well, it’s very naughty of you to have done this, is it? CHAPMAN: Is it? MAYOR: Oh without permission I mean CHAPMAN: But you gave me permission MAYOR: Did I? CHAPMAN: I mean before I came here, I was calling back and forth with your people and everything got sorted and err where are we, here we are, look, here’s your signature MAYOR: Yes, the smiley face in the ‘O’ well, it’s definitely mine! You must understand, I don't always read everything I’m given, I am usually kept very busy CHAPMAN: I’m sure, don’t worry about it MAYOR: What do you think? Rudyard? RUDYARD: That’s a really nice lift?!! CHAPMAN: Oh thanks Rudyard MAYOR: Yes, well, even with all this I mean, I am the mayor aren’t I and I have the perfect right to change my mind. CHAPMAN: Oh do you not want me here? MAYOR: No no no no! Not that but you see it’s just that well err, Rudyard? RUDYARD: Sorry? Yes er, Now Look Here CHAPMAN: Yes? RUDYARD: We’ve already got a funeral home MAYOR: Exactly! We’ve already got one and will the best will in the world we can’t have two funeral homes, can we? CHAPMAN: Why? MAYOR: Because, well, then you see, we’d need apparently have to have two hospitals you see? CHAPMAN: That’s a great idea MAYOR: Is it? Oh well good, I’d get onto that! BUT No, nevertheless the village just can’t sustain two funeral homes can it? CHAPMAN: You could be right there MAYOR: Could I? RUDYARD: Told you so CHAPMAN: But you know what could sustain two funeral homes? MAYOR: No? CHAPMAN: A town! MAYOR: A town? You say? RUDYARD: Hmm No! No- CHAPMAN: Now don’t get me wrong, this is a great village but I think it’s going to be an even greater town! And I want to help you do that in the only way I can: with a funeral home. MAYOR: Can I ask you a question? CHAPMAN: Go for it MAYOR: If we had two funeral homes would we need two mayors as well? CHAPMAN: No. That’s ridiculous MAYOR: Oh, excellent in that case I hereby pronounce this funeral home: open! RUDYARD: What? What are they doing there?! CHAPMAN: We’re taking advance orders, it’s just a service we provide. MAYOR: Well, I won’t take up any more of your time. Mr Chapman CHAPMAN: Oh please, Mr Mayor, It’s Eric MAYOR: Best of luck Eric, if you are ever at a loose end, do pop by the hall, sometimes we have movie nights! CHAPMAN: I’ll remember that and if you ever need our services it’s on the house. MAYOR: Tremendous, looking forward to it, now RUDYARD: Now, now hang on, we- MAYOR: Glad to have you here CHAPMAN: Mr Mayor MAYOR: No no no, call me Desmond! Ttfn CHAPMAN: Talk to you later, Desmond MAYOR: Should I leave the doors open? CHAPMAN: Oh, if you would, Rudyard I’m sorry I can’t stay and chat, can I get you anything. Oh I know what, make yourself a cup of coffee, I’ll better see to that queue eh? Enjoy yourself! Don’t forget the truffles! Good morning ladies and gentlemen, well afternoon now. Well, I’m delighted to say welcome to Chapman’s and remember: We put the fun in funerals RUDYARD: Chapman! [narration] After a coffee, and a couple of truffles, Rudyard stormed out, seething with resentment. He kicked a small dog and got bitten by its owner. Having gotten back to Funn Funerals, Rudyard sat down on a chair by the window and stared out across the road muttering out loud to his only real friend in the world RUDYARD: (muttering) It’s only a funeral home who the hell do they think they are eh? (squeaks) RUDYARD: Exactly, I give him a week, alright maybe two.. Ah he might have gold blend and lounge music but you can’t put a glass on the mechanics. We get the body in the coffin in the ground on time, That’s what it's about, I bet his corpses don't smell of cinnamon. Yeah, we’ll see who runs this village. ANTIGONE: Rudyard you’re talking to that mouse again aren’t you? RUDYARD: Her name is Madeleine ANTIGONE: It’s not normal! RUDYARD: Antigone, you spend twenty-three hours a day in the mortuary don’t try to tell me what’s normal. Off you go Madeleine, we’ll continue this later ANTIGONE: You haven’t moved all afternoon! RUDYARD: I don’t need to move, I’m plotting ANTIGONE: Where’s Georgie? RUDYARD: Day off, no work, plotting. ANTIGONE: Rudyard, for the first time in our lives we actually have competition which means we could really do with having some friends so could you get out there and make some? RUDYARD: I’ll do it tomorrow ANTIGONE: Have you at least gone round to check on Mr Ascii RUDYARD: Who? ANTIGONE: Mr Ascii, the man we’ve been waiting to die for six weeks, because so help me I need to embalm somebody and it could quite easily be you RUDYARD: Look Mr Ascii’s immortal, he’ll never die so what’s the point about it. Now Look Here, Georgie? What? Right, I’ll see you there. Mr Ascii’s dead. ANTIGONE: Is he? RUDYARD: Yes. OH MY GOD MR ASCII’S DEAD! ANTIGONE: How?! RUDYARD: Heart attack, half an hour ago it’s all around the village, Antigone, I’m so happy! ANTIGONE: Took him long enough RUDYARD: Ahh He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead! ANTIGONE: Rudyard! Stop being happy and get over there now! RUDYARD: Sorry, yes, get over there, I’m gone. Rudyard is back in the game! … Rudyard is going to get wet! Have the mortuary ready! ANTIGONE: And Rudyard, don’t cock it up. [narration] Before you judge Rudyard too harshly at his delight at an old man’s demise, I should tell you that Mr Ascii was Rudyard’s old PE teacher at school so his delight is almost entirely justified. Rudyard met Georgie at Mr Ascii’s bijuu residence at five forty-five. GEORGIE: Okay, okay  RUDYARD: Georgie GEORIGIE: Sir? RUDYARD: Say it again for me won’t you, say it again GEORGIE: Alright, Mr Ascii’s dead but listen I’ve got- RUDYARD: Yeessssss, Get in there my son… whatever that means GEORGIE: Yeah I ought to say- RUDYARD: I’ve been looking forward to putting him in the ground, can’t mock me for losing the 200 metre dash now can you, Mr Ascii! GEORGIE: Before you get excited RUDYARD: Right yes, got to straighten up, think grave. How do I look? GEORGIE: Miserable RUDYARD: Great, let’s go GEORGIE: But sir, NURSE: Could we please have some quiet out here, oh it’s you, Mister Funn RUDYARD: Good afternoon nurse, Could please take this opportunity to convey my most prevermed(???) condolences NURSE: Thank you Mister Funn RUDYARD: I’m sure my apprentice Ms Crusoe, has already carried out our preliminary duties so I think in the interest of efficiency we should let the dog see the rabbit, if you’ll take me through NURSE: Well, This is actually rather embarrassing RUDYARD: Oh please don’t say it’s a false alarm! NURSE: In a sense,,, yes RUDYARD: Oh for, Georgie you said he was dead GEORGIE: He is dead RUDYARD: But, ugh, Nurse, one of us in this corridor is deeply confused and I’m beginning to believe it might be you NURSE: No? RUDYARD: I knew it, she’s mad, grab her Georgie. NURSE: I’m not mad! RUDYARD: That’s what a mad person would say, Georgie GEORGIE: Let’s do this CHAPMAN: Rudyard! Great to see you RUDYARD: Chapman! CHAPMAN: Busy afternoon, eh, hello Georgie GEORGIE: Hey, Eric RUDYARD: Stop flirting. Nurse, I demand this man be told to vacate this bijuu residence immediately CHAPMAN: Look, this is my bad, and I’ve really got to apologise for this one NURSE: Mr Ascii requested it! RUDYARD: He what? NURSE: With his final words he said he couldn’t bare to get buried by such a feeble little weed as Rudyard Funn CHAPMAN: Interesting man, he wanted to see my gold medals from the 200 metre dash, gotta say I wasn’t expecting business to kick off so quickly NURSE: You’re doing a most proper job Mr Chapman CHAPMAN: Thank you nurse, I think we’ll collect him first thing tomorrow. Anyway must run, good to see you Rudyard, Georgie. Enjoy yourselves! Ahh NURSE: What a charming man, I hear he’s still a bachelor RUDYARD: So am I.. NURSE: Yes well, hardly surprising is it? GEORGIE: Ahh well, can’t win em all eh sir? Sir, are you alright? RUDYARD: I am so… SIX O CLOCK GEORGIE: Six o clock? RUDYARD: Six o clock! The cemetery, Stanley’s widow, Stanley Carmichael’s widow in the cemetery at six o clock! GEORGIE: Oh yeah! I forgot about that! RUDYARD: What time is it? GEORGIE: About five to six but you’ll never get there. Sir?! Oh for god’s sake, Rudyard! Come back here you stupid. [narration] Rudyard raced down the cliff, past the trees and through the streets with speed that would have finally impressed Mr Ascii, had he not already been dead. His lungs aching for breath, his limbs trembling with the effort, Rudyard tumbled into the cemetery at exactly one minute past six. To discover… RUDYARD: It’s…. It’s all REV: Ahh, there you are Rudyard! RUDYARD: Reverend? What’s going on? REV: Well, I arrived to oversee the preliminaries on Mrs Carmichael’s err, transferal to a better world - if such a place exists - which i'm not certain about one way or the other, and I found that her family and friends had been gathered together already for the funeral. RUDYARD: For the funeral? REV: Since the deceased was already here, and sensibly dressed, he just got it done out of the way, young fella named Eric, got his own funeral practise I understand. I’m hearing marvelous things about it. He’s got a coffee machine! Led them all a couple of sing songs actually, even had my speech prepared for me! Very succinct it was, breezed through it all in no time. RUDYARD: Chapman… REV: Oh he also found a lake! Over there! I think we’re all going boating in a minute. He owns a boat you know RUDYARD: Chapman! REV: Anyway, I better get to be going back to it, we’re having jelly and ice cream, bags of fun. Goodbye, Rudyard! Or should I say: Enjoy yourself! RUDYARD: I see. I see. Well CHAPMAN: Hello Rudyard. RUDYARD: Oh. It’s. you. Did a fair job I hear, congratulations, don’t think it will always be like this they won’t hand it to you on a plate you know, they won’t do that. This is very much the exception. Oh what? What? You can talk can’t you? Say something? CHAPMAN: Rudyard. Have a nice evening. RUDYARD: What do you- What do you mean: have a nice evening? What do you mean by that remark, Chapman? What if I don’t want to have a nice evening? Eh? What if I Don’t? Chapman! What did you mean! Chapman! Chapman?! [narration] Today had been the worst day of Rudyard’s life, until tomorrow came along and topped it. I was there to jot it all down from first hand observation (and a little bit of gossip I picked up later) and of course, being his only real friend in the world, Rudyard tells me everything. My name is Madeleine - I’m going to be the first mouse to be a Sunday Times Best Seller, and I know for a fact that Rudyard want to revenge himself on Eric by well, we’ll burn that bridge when be come to it 

[shadowsong26fic]

Coming Attractions!

I know I usually do this on the first Monday of the month, but given that this month starts on a Tuesday, I don’t feel like waiting that long.

As always, feel free to comment/let me know what y’all are up to, what you did last month, what you plan on doing this month, we can do an Open Question Night, etc.

Also, plugging my Discord server, as I have done in the past--again, this is basically just a (theoretically) more interactive extension of this blog. It’s pretty chill/quiet for the most part, but I’m happy to talk there if you want.

All right, here we go!

So, you may have noticed that my NaNo posts...didn’t happen. That’s because I basically did not meet any of my goals last month--I got a pretty strong start, and then between some IRL/personal life things that happened, plus missing a couple days and not getting back on the horse, so to speak...yeah.

I did get one piece done--a Zuko-centric Avatar: the Last Airbender AU Outline, with the point of divergence being the stampede during the Ba Sing Se arc. Check it out, let me know your thoughts!

Anyway, that was last month, and now it is a new month, and I have Plans and High Hopes for actually Accomplishing things!

Precipice:

I absolutely genuinely for real this time plan to get the last chapter (or two) out in the next week or two. There’s a fairly long section with Bail and Ahsoka and Moonshot (Rex and Leia joining them towards the end); and then a scene with Palpatine and Lavinia; and then a final wrap-up scene from Padme’s POV.

After that, as I’ve mentioned before, things will work a little differently. I’m going to start posting Arc Eight: Escalation alongside Arc Seven Point Five: Preludes. Preludes will be in a separate fic, and will be seven stand-alone short stories taking place during the six-year timeskip between arcs Seven and Eight. They may or may not be presented in chronological order, and they’re a bit more plot-relevant than the stuff that turns up in Bonus Content. A lot of them deal with integrating Rebels content (the first one I have planned takes place two years after Arc Seven and will focus on Kallus); and I’ll probably deal with Maul and Infernalis’ successor. I’m still finalizing all the details for what I have planned here (especially since it can’t mirror Rebels entirely, partly because season 2 alone will be...wildly AU; but also because I have Plans for Thrawn that involve him not being kidnapped by space whales, lol). If there are any specific things you think I should touch on in one of these seven stories, let me know! But bear in mind that it will be limited to seven stories, so I may not do it or I may make a simpler/condensed version for Bonus Content instead.

Anyway, if you’ve been counting the years, you might be able to guess what the titular Escalation in arc eight is :D

That being said, I don’t expect to get any of this out until sometime in January at the very earliest.. I’d like to get a bit of a backlog worked up (so I stop having, multi-month hiatuses between chapters <.< ), and given other things I have planned (see below) it may take a bit of time until I’m ready to post. I’ll put out an update post with a planned schedule/etc. somewhat closer to when things are actually going to get going.

SWBB:

I have picked the story I’m going to do for this, hurray! ...I’m still kind of. Like. Searching for the actual Plot involved, but I know what I’m writing about, so we’ll see where it goes :D It is not OFLAM, which I do intend to keep working on/get out there at some point (which I know I’ve been promising for literal years now but shhhhh).

Anyway, for the story in question, I might already have the minimum wordcount for the first checkin on January 10, (I haven’t counted, but I’m probably close, if I count all the fulltext I have; I doubt all of it will make it into the final story, but we shall see), but I’m hoping to be a bit more solid than I am right now by then.

AtLA:

Apart from the outline I mentioned above, I have a couple projects in the pipeline, now that I’m back in this fandom. I’m hoping to have some significant text done on at least one of them to start posting next year.

My primary focus is probably going to be an Avatar Zuko storyline I’ve been poking at for a few months, but I also have a long epic tragic romance starring Lu Ten that will hopefully materialize at some point.

Additional AU outlines are also a possibility! They’re a lot of fun, whatever the fandom I’m doing them in XD

Original:

Hoping to get some done this month, as always; I didn’t get anything put together last month, but--again, life intervened.

Also, would you guys be interested in seeing some of my original stuff here? I know I’ve linked The Phoenix before, which is a crossover between Star Wars and one of my two primary origfic worlds (and also...pretty much the only time I’ve actively written Vader as Vader, lol...), but I have A Lot more. There should be links in my index post to the archives (which...I need to update...), but I’m always happy to share more!

And...I think that pretty much wraps it up! Focus this month is probably going to be on SWBB and the AtLA stuff, once I finish Precipice, but I’ll probably bounce into the upcoming arcs in Precipice!verse as well, and some original things. Maybe fill some long-overdue prompts/asks...

But, as I mentioned at the top of the post, I also like to hear about what you guys are doing! What have y’all been up to? And/or Open Question Night?

[girlobsessed21]

Is Bellarke misinterpreted or not?

I know this post is long overdue, so sorry for that. I’ve started writing for a publication and it takes a lot of my time. But as promised before, here’s a list of reasons suggesting Bellarke romance and why...

It follows the romantic arc of a lot of romance movies and series. I even created a thread on Twitter comparing some of their lines to the most romantic lines in movies yet the viewers seem to misinterpret. Well, I call bullshit, simply because it is. Now, I can’t give you false hope that they will be paired romantically but I will say this. If they’re not, the writers and producers are less than subpar in their depiction of a platonic couple. Aka they have no idea what they’re doing.

In a show that’s ultimately about survival, it’s difficult to incorporate romance without shifting the emphasis and genre but they seem to do it perfectly with Murphy and Emori, Kane and Abby, Gabriel and Josephine and even Lincoln and Octavia back in the day. What’s sobering about this, is that Bellarke’s scenes are written, filmed and produced more intense, overpowering and chemistry-induced than any of the above-mentioned couples.

This tells me they know exactly what they’re doing and where they’re going with it. Can it be fan service and bait? Sure. But that would make bad television, resulting in audiences looking back on The 100 with dread instead of excitedly recommending it to friends to binge. After Lexa’s death, a lot of fans left the show because of such a sudden horrific end to a fan favorite. I think they might be trying to avoid such a subduing concept again. 

Jason explained in his article that viewers slightly misinterpreted Bellamy’s arc and believe it or not, I somewhat agree with him. Bellamy had no other choice than to save all his people by using Josephine’s mind drive as a bargaining chip BUT of course he wanted to save Clarke too. She’s his person, he’d do anything for her. If he was given a choice between saving his people and Clarke, what would he have done? It just so happens that saving her, meant saving everyone.

From season one to six there are highly robust moments which suggest Bellamy and Clarke love each other a lot more than friends should. I’m not including season one scenes in this list because I don’t think they had quite crossed the verge of friendship there, although the “I need you, Bellamy” and “You look like you could use a drink” scenes were emotional and flirty, laying the premise for the most beautiful romance I’ve ever witnessed.

1. Love is weakness

Listen to the background music of that scene, the intensity and relief on their faces, yeah, that shit’s not platonic. If you wanted to show me they’re besties, they should’ve done a similar hug to Raven or Octavia’s.

When Clarke wakes up in Mount Weather, she asks about both Finn and Bellamy. And the same when she makes it to Camp Jaha. Once Bellamy returns, she runs and throws herself in his arms, which she hasn’t done with any other character except for Madi, her daughter. When Bellamy suggests he infiltrates Mount Weather, Clarke claims she can’t lose him too yet when Lexa tells her love is weakness, she agrees Bellamy should do it by saying she was being weak. Uhm, love is weakness.

2. We can’t lose Clarke

Bellamy crosses an entire grounder army by himself to go after Clarke. Then, limping on a stabbed leg, he’s still hellbent on saving her. All this while his girlfriend is back home, worrying about him. The desperation is in this scene is palpable, bringing us to the realization there’s nothing Bellamy wouldn’t do for Clarke because he clearly loves her.

3. You left me

Clarke refuses Bellamy’s offer to go home with him and stays behind in Polis with Lexa. Of course, he’s hurt and furious. When Clake tells him she needs him, he responds with, “You left me.” If you translate that, it would mean, you abandoned me when I needed you most, you chose Lexa over me and now you expect me to help you?

But apart from the dialogue, look at the way the scene is filmed, Bellamy’s in a proposal stance with soft affectionate hand-holding. The way they look at each other, hurt lingering in Bellamy’s eyes. Clarke crushed his heart and yet he still loves her. That scene tramples the edge of romanticism.

4. Start with Bellamy Blake

ALIE is an AI, more intelligent than any of our average human minds. She had the knowledge of all Clarke’s friends and family combined. When they had to choose someone to break Clarke’s steadfastness, ALIE suggested Bellamy. Granted, I doubt Clarke was in love with Bellamy at this point since she had just lost Lexa, and still, the AI concludes she cares about him more than anyone else.

All the same, a person can love two people at once. Clarke was willing to co-operate with Roan to save Bellamy’s life. The tears that fell while he yelled at her in Hakeldama, suggests she felt something. While their passionate hug and consoling conversation on the beach could be seen as friendly, they’re not that intimate with anyone else.

5. The list

This was probably one of The 100′s most romantic scenes, until 4x13 and 6x10. “If I’m on that list, you’re on that list.” is a simple way of telling someone you can’t live without them. If I live, you live too. I’m not doing this without you. I need you and ultimately, I love you enough to die with you if necessary.

It’s a sobering thought and I think Clarke may have realized the depth of Bellamy’s feelings for her at that moment.

6. If I don’t see you again

Boy, was this scene a bust. Ruined by Roan, who I’ve since dubbed Ruin Roan (I love the Azgeda king). Raise your hand if you know why he didn’t finish the sentence. Here’s a thought, it breeds mystery, but better yet we never got to hear him confess his feelings though we know he would’ve. Giving the writers a scapegoat.

Clarke probably wouldn’t have reciprocated, making the story awkward but Mr. Bellamy Blake was 100% going to tell Clarke Griffin he loved her. Otherwise, he would’ve continued. Now, does he still love her? Absolutely. When you lose someone you love, does your love for said person die with them? Not at all. You find ways to cope and move on but it lurks, showing up when you’re alone or reminded of them. I’m speaking from experience.

7. The oxymoron 

When you look at the cold sweat scene, any regular viewer might miss the intimacy but the soft subtle touches do somehow exceed the boundaries of friendship. Bellamy’s face though when he realizes Clarke might be right, he might lose her, shows a lot of fear. Most importantly, this is the first time we’re introduced to the head and heart concept, showcasing their soulmate dynamic. The metaphor compares them to the two lead features of the human body, neither of which can survive without the other.

But, that’s nothing compared to Bellamy’s devastation when he realizes he left the woman he loves behind to die. That hurt in his eyes and voice was heartbreaking.

8. The radio calls

In essence, there’s nothing wrong with calling your best friend every day for six years but when you use him as a way to keep you sane, you might wanna re-evaluate your relationship. Six people left for space, yet Clarke called Bellamy. This is also the first time we clearly see Clarke’s feelings for him. I’m sure they were there for a while, bubbling below the surface but with years of time and peace, one tends to come to terms with who you are.

And in 5x01, when Madi gushes over Octavia, Clarke longingly stares into space, hoping her heart will return. The pining is further emphasized by her expression when she sees Bellamy and Echo kissing. Yeah, camera work doesn’t lie, it was focused on her and Octavia’s faces for a reason.

Then, that hug in 5x03 was so profound, a hundred different emotions rolled into one. Clarke asks, “And now you’re home?” What is home, earth or herself?

9. Pleading for the life of a traitor who you love

There are two sides to this story. One, Octavia explicitly compared Bellamy’s feelings for Clarke to those of his girlfriend. That line was written into the script on purpose. If someone knows him, it’s his sister, she’s witnessed their entire relationship first hand and uses it to draw a reaction from him. Why? Because she knows he’s torn up about it.

Secondly, in 5x12, Lexa contrasts herself leaving Clarke outside Mount Weather to Clarke leaving Bellamy in Polis (and the gorge). She calls it her biggest regret and tells her former lover not to make the same mistake she did. 

Both times these characters feelings for each other were paralleled to their love for canonical partners. Coincidence? I highly doubt it. 

10. The head and the heart

The emotion in this scene, wow! Throughout season six there are subtle hints of Bellamy’s love for Clarke. He mourns her, Josephine says he cares more about Clarke than anyone else, he tells her the radio calls weren’t crazy but refusing to accept she’s dead and bringing her back to life in Fairytale fashion is nothing short of a beautiful romance.

If the writers had changed their minds about the status of Bellarke’s relationship somewhere along the line, this scene was completely uncalled for. Once again, all I see is I can’t let you go again, I refuse to live without you, I need you in my life because I love you. 

11. I tried to do better

Show this to anyone who doesn’t know the show and they’ll tell you this couple’s in love. Clarke goes to Bellamy, no-one else, for comfort when she’s falling apart. Although short, they share another one of their signature hugs where the passion and emotion are louder than nightclub music. With the rising sun as backdrop, this is as far from platonic as you can get. 

A few last things

The writers of this show aren’t stupid, they carefully build their plots around the foundation like using the neural mesh in ALIE’s chip to save Clarke. They know exactly what they’ve written, filmed and produced. Bellarke was always meant to end up romantically. Unfortunately, in a fast-paced show with one problem after the other, there’s almost no time to reflect.

If they wanted audiences to become invested in Bellamy and Echo’s relationship, they would’ve shown it to us. In 6x12 the cameras focus on Bellamy and Clarke’s faces when he reunites with his girlfriend. His whole arc (misinterpreted or not) revolved around her. That’s the message they convey and 90% of the audience cannot be wrong. When you watch reaction videos or podcasts, most of them agree.

And, they cautiously circumvent the word love in relation to Bellarke. Best friends love each other, Bellarke love each other. The question is in what capacity. My opinion is this, if I dated Bellamy, I certainly would have at least questioned his devotion to Clarke, yet Echo says nothing. Highly unrealistic.

Lastly, go and rewatch all of the above scenes without shipper goggles. Do you still see the depth and intimacy? I do. I specifically chose these because of the romanticism they entail. All the hugs are great, but best friends hug, these scenes have deeper meanings and though we could’ve misinterpreted Bellamy’s arc in season six, all of their scenes can’t lie. Not bringing them together canonically will do a great injustice to a magnificent show.

Yes, The 100 does not fall into the romance genre but the story revolves around Clarke, Bellamy, and Octavia. For six season they’ve shown us how much the two leads love each other and failing to conclude that book is bad storytelling, to say the least. I believe it should at least be addressed if they decide not to trot down the romantic road.

Happy Hiatus everyone. I might post a few more things while we wait for season 7. I’ve written an article about the anomaly as well. But for now, I’ll focus more on other shows, I’m still writing fanfiction though. Let me know if there’s something specific you’d like me to write about or your opinion on the list.

[metawitches]

After the Harry Potter costume party of getting to know Martha/Eva’s world in S3EP1, in episode 2 it’s finally time to visit Adam’s post-apocalypse world, which is a form of the world without Winden that Hannah and Ulrich have dreamed of for decades. Ironically, Hannah and Ulrich both flaked out on the apocalypse and have retired separately in the Winden of previous decades. Katharina followed Ulrich.

Peter and Elizabeth serve as our point of view characters for the aftermath of the shockwave as they search for Charlotte and Franziska. Charlotte has jumped forward 33 years and is now in the barren future with Adult Elizabeth. The version of Young Alt Martha who transported Jonas to her world, then left him behind, is with Stranger, Bartosz, Franziska and Magnus in 1888.

We spend much of this episode in 1987, where things have changed in the last 3 months.

Note: I’m going to continue calling Adam/Jonas’ world the Prime world and Eva/Martha’s world the Alt world, because that’s the easiest way for me to keep track of them in my head. I’ll label the characters the same way. It gets too cumbersome to say Adam’s world Jonas and too confusing to use a code when the character movements get complicated, though eventually I will have to differentiate the Young Alt Marthas with 1 & 2.

Recap

The episode begins with the first sex dream of the season. The Young Alt Martha who’s in 1888 dreams about having sex with Young Jonas in her bedroom, in her world. Soon Jonas disappears and her hands are coated in blood and grime, while holding the St Christopher medal that they pass between them as the symbol of their connection. She tries to stop Jonas’ bleeding the way Jonas tried to stop Prime Martha’s; she tries to wash the blood from her hands the way Prime Claudia did after Egon died; and she stands at the mouth of the cave in front of police tape the way… Well, that’s a universal experience on Dark at this point.

Then Martha startles awake in 1888. She’s in the guest bedroom at the Tannhaus clock factory B&B, or the boarding house that will become Erna’s in 32 years- where the travelers sleep is never made completely clear. Stranger sits and stares at her the way Adam will watch Jonas sleep someday, only Stranger manages to be creepier about it, blowing all of my S2 arguments that he could never grow up to be such a mean old man.

The personality change that goes along with a cycle change anyway and another failure to save his Martha have taken their toll on his fragile sanity. He was always a stalker, but the look in his eye now is no longer calm or benign. It’s malevolent, even though he doesn’t know this woman. It’s enough that she’s the wrong Martha.

He’s holding the letter from “Martha” that Young Noah gave him in Hannah’s kitchen in S2E8, which told him to save Bartosz, Magnus and Franziska with the device. He followed those instructions and left the kitchen, leaving Prime Martha to her fate. He’s probably figured out that this is likely a version of the woman who wrote that letter.

Stranger looks like he has a moment of hope that she’ll recognize him when she wakes up. When she doesn’t, he coldly tells her to get dressed, then leaves the room. He’s left her a pile of period appropriate clothes on a chair.

Despite what I said earlier about the world without Winden, Winden is always Winden, and it always rains there, every month except June, so it’s pouring right now.

Stranger hasn’t warned the others, so Magnus and Bartosz have the fun of thinking Martha survived, then learning it’s not her. Franziska apparently didn’t care about Martha all that much.

Alt Martha: “He’s right. I’m not Martha. Not your Martha. I promised I would make everything right again, so none of this would happen. So that you all don’t die in my world and I don’t die in yours. So that Ulrich… Dad… Mikkel… so you all come back. So all this can really end at last.”

Did she just imply that the other 4 people in that room die in her world? Which would mean Prime Young Jonas does, because her world doesn’t have its own Jonas. Hmmm.

A loud alarm goes off in the Prime world version of Jonas’ bedroom. Another joke/warning that carries between scenes. The alarm is in the form of Mikkel’s clock/radio playing the song “You Spin Me Right Round”, which played in the bunker when Erik Obendorf was held there back in S1. It’s also a little foreshadowing for what we’ll hear on the radio in Claudia’s upcoming scene.

I will never stop admiring this show’s ability to layer and multitask.

It’s September 22nd, 1987. Most of the episode takes place on September 22nd in one year or another. Something big must happen then or be close to happening, but I don’t think we know what yet.

[I’m still writing Snowpiercer recaps while writing Dark, so my head is in 2 very different apocalyptic, symbolic dystopias right now. Give me another week or so, then Snowpiercer will be done for the season and I can focus on this more closely. But also, ugh, 3 seasons of constantly rewritten details, help. As always, I reserve the right to edit my work for a while after publication so I can add what I forgot or figured out a little too late. Also, check out Snowpiercer, it’s a good show!]

Katharina wakes up in Mikkel’s bed. She was in the passage when the apocalypse hit at the end of S2. It’s 3 months later and she’s become Stranger Katharina, sleeping in her son’s bed in his abandoned house.

Did the adult version of Mikkel with the black goo/cesium 137 appear to her in the passage, the way he appeared to Stranger Jonas at the end of S1? And if so, did that affect her sanity even more than all of these other events would have? She saw Mikkel in the guilt/love montage, so we know he’s her hallucination/ghost visitation of choice.

Katharina gets dressed and goes downstairs. Sadly, she doesn’t check the milk like Jonas and Martha always do. She does listen to a phone message for Ines saying that the phone bill is 3 months overdue, which means that Mikkel and Ines must have left the house not long after Old Ulrich tried to rescue/kidnap him in June.

Katherina has stacks of “Missing” flyers on the table with Mikkel’s photo on them. She’s searching for Mikkel here as her own child, despite the fact that legally he’s Ines child now. The flyer says Mikkel has been missing for 3 months. Katharina leaves through the French doors, where she’s broken a hole in one of the windows.

Jana and Tronte are holding the funeral and burial for Mads’ empty coffin today. Hermann Albers (Katharina’s absent father) comforts Jana that at least having the coffin and grave will give them some closure, even with an empty grave. And she and Tronte have each other. Jana looks at Tronte across the room and raises her glass to him sardonically.

Jana: “At least we have each other. Now we can get our closure together, looking at a coffin that’s empty. Tell everyone where you were when Mads vanished. F–king your girlfriend. When my son disappeared, he was screwing Claudia Tiedemann. If only you’d devoted as much energy to finding your own son as you’re wasting on finding your mistress. Then maybe Mads wouldn’t have gone.”

In the previous cycles, Jana lied to the police and gave Tronte an alibi other than Claudia. Ulrich never knew his father was with Claudia until he went through the police records in 2019 and realized his mother had lied to the police, so I doubt this conversation became common knowledge.

The conversation and the fact that the gossip didn’t spread are both shocking in a small town like Winden. Either this is the first time this conversation has happened or Tronte’s long standing affair with Claudia is such common knowledge that no one cares anymore.

Still, this is Jana’s finest moment as a character and a huge change from previous cycles- she started out in S1 as a depressed recluse, then was at least seen at a party, having fun, in Cycle 2. Now she’s able to stand up for herself and fight for what’s rightfully hers. This is the way it’s always been, but also due to the small changes Claudia and Jonas make each cycle, if we are to believe their interpretation of the eternal recurrence and its loopholes.

Tronte’s devotion to Claudia never really changes, because why would Claudia change one of her greatest assets?

I thought what Jana said was quite clear, but Tronte says that he doesn’t understand what she’s saying, which will become one of the catchphrases of the season.

Every season of Dark is about secrets, lies and confusion. S1 focused more on the confusion between what was real and what wasn’t. S2 was about keeping secrets while clearing up some of the confusion. In S3, secrets will be revealed and questions will be answered, but at the same time, the characters lie, lie, lie. To each other, to themselves, to the audience. Question everything that everyone says.

When someone does finally tell the truth, the person on the receiving end frequently says, “What are you saying?” They hear the truth so infrequently that they can’t process it. Or it doesn’t fit their worldview, so it bounces off their ears. Or, as with Tronte in this scene, it’s an inconvenient truth, so they’d prefer it remained unspoken. They’d like anyone within hearing range to believe it’s the truthteller who’s lying or delusional.

Jana’s not backing down this time. She dumps her purse on the floor. There are several newspaper articles with headlines about Claudia disappearing within a week of her father’s death, questioning if the two are connected. Jana implies that Claudia could have had something to do with Mads’ disappearance as well. Tronte walks out of the house without another word.

Finally, we really are going to post shockwave Winden, September 22, 2020. Of course it’s pouring rain. A figure in a mud gray raincoat removes a makeshift door from the front of the police station (most of the glass in town was broken by the shockwave). It’s Adult Claudia. She has the place encased in plastic and boards, locking it up pretty tight, which is a good thing, because she’s leaving her dying daughter in there alone most of the time.

I doubt Regina could get out easily if she needed to, but Regina is in such bad shape that she can’t even sit up, so it’s not really an issue. Claudia has her on a makeshift bed, with a heatlamp pointed at her and a radio playing, like she’s a pet lizard. Or a science project.

The radio is playing a report about what’s known of the cause of the June 27 global natural disasters.

Radio Announcer: “The world’s scientists are still looking for an explanation for the events of June 27, 2020. The epicenter/origin of the global catastrophe is still thought to be the small town of Winden. A French research team believes it is possible that our world stood still for a fraction of a nanosecond on June 27. Tidal forces may have diverged as a result. This would explain the global tidal waves, weather phenomena, and disturbances of electrical systems, which in turn could explain the countless number of airplane crashes and the simultaneous loss of power supply to nuclear power plants worldwide. There is currently no sign of the situation stabilizing…”

Claudia turns off the radio. As a physicist, she helped create this world and she already understands what’s going on. She has work to do to achieve her next goal, but the apocalypse was no accident, at least to her older self, who was quite clear that everything had to happen the way it always has. And we’ve known since S1E10 that this apocalypse has happened before. This is where it gets a little tricky to figure out who told which version what and when. This is, at the very least, the 3rd or 4th cycle with an apocalypse, since both Young and Stanger Jonas have seen it before.

But good on the French researchers for finally figuring something out! I bet they get to see the God particle before Elizabeth executes them this cycle, too!

Claudia pulls out a tattered box of Tamoxifen, Regina’s breast cancer medication, and goes to her daughter. Regina is lying very still and breathing shallowly, as if she’s in pain. She’s bathed in red/orange light from the heat lamp. Claudia asks how she is. Regina says, “Mama?” Claudia leaves the medicine pack next to Regina and turns to walk away. When Regina realizes she’s leaving, Claudia says she’ll be back at sunset.

Well that was cold. Regina looks like she’s barely alive and Claudia is leaving her alone in the cold, dark police station where she also left Aleksander, Regina’s beloved husband,  to die in the shockwave. Do they even know if Bartosz is alive or dead, since Claudia couldn’t be bothered to save her grandson?

Adult Claudia is just the worst. She can’t find anyone to help with Regina, like a clinic or field hospital? What was the point of rescuing her from the quick death of the apocalypse for this long, slow torture? Regina is living through many people’s worst nightmare about how they’ll die. Claudia has made her a homeless person, slowly dying alone, in pain and in desperate poverty. The only comfort she has is the heat lamp, which is a fire hazard. The medication is prolonging her torture at this point.

Claudia is keeping Regina alive for her own comfort, because she can’t bear the idea of losing her daughter, but she still wants nothing to do with the mundane realities of a relationship with another human being. It’s hard to understand why she’s bothering, when she treated Egon and Tronte the same way.

She’s always, since she was a child, cared more about science and math, yet still had a need to keep a person or two on the string. But there must be other people helping her with the God particle at this point.

Young Elizabeth and Peter Doppler are staying in Benni’s trailer on the edge of town. It’s metal, so maybe its roof survived better than regular houses and the rest is easier to board up than their house. When they leave the trailer, Peter turns on a geiger counter to see if the rain is too radioactive to go out in. The levels are safe enough, so they walk to the military encampment near the power plant that was still in place when Jonas traveled there in S1/2.

The guard tells them that the area will be closed off in 5 days. They’re evacuating the zone and sealing off the restricted portions (which includes the power plant).

Peter, becoming agitated: “What are you saying?”

Guard: “We’re walling it in.”

He lets Peter and Elizabeth through, but asks why Peter would do this to his daughter. Young Noah lurks behind a truck and watches his future wife.

Stalking future, former and alternative loved ones is such a habit on this show.

The wall they’re talking about building is the one which surrounded the power plant in the future in S2. Jonas, Silja and Elizabeth had a spot where they could sneak under it to get to the God Particle in the power plant.

Back in 1888, Alt Martha and Stranger Jonas have explained to Magnus, Franziska and Bartosz that she’s from a parallel world which ends in an apocalypse, just like the Prime world. Magnus can’t accept that there could be another world with a different history.

Stranger asks Martha how she found him. She says that Jonas told her where Stranger was when Jonas traveled from the Prime world to the Alt world. Franziska brilliantly points out that Martha said there isn’t a Jonas native to the Alt world. Stranger is at least smart enough to figure out that a version of himself could have given Alt Martha the information, but even he gets stuck on the fact that he doesn’t remember traveling to her world or meeting her before.

He accuses her of lying, then asks if she wrote the letter Young Noah gave him, what she used to travel between worlds and if Adam sent her. He manhandles her while he’s trying to get answers out of her.

You’d think backwards and sideways time travel wasn’t possible in this universe. She’s standing right in front of them, having just come from another world. That means that a future Jonas or a Jonas from a past cycle could have traveled to her world. We saw the Unknown trio take the instructions for the world hopping sphere from Adam’s lair, so Adam had that capability before 1987, even though we didn’t see him use it. Or did we? He might have used a sphere to leave 2020 before the shockwave hit after he killed Prime Martha in S2Ep8. It would explain how he traveled as quickly and quietly as he did.

The group is interrupted by an older man who’s noticed that they’re late in starting their experiments today. He’s blind, but as soon as he enters the room he senses Martha’s presence. Stranger walks out of the workshop without speaking. The older man, Gustav Tannhaus, touches Martha’s face and figures out that she’s the reason Stranger is in an even worse mood than usual. Gustav tells her she doesn’t need to be afraid of him. Even though he has the reputation for being not quite right in the head, what he really has is the gift of foresight.

In 1987, Katharina stands in the high school hallway and hands out “Missing” flyers between classes. None of the kids recognize Mikkel. Young Ulrich stops to talk to Adult Katharina and mentions that a “lunatic” might have gotten Mikkel. Young Katharina shows up and is impatient, so she and Ulrich leave for class, ignoring Adult Katharina’s questions. Young Hannah hangs back and tells Adult Katharina about the old man who tried to kidnap Michael last summer.

Adult Katharina thanks Hannah for telling her how to find Ulrich by shoving her against a wall and warning her to stay away from Mikkel and Ulrich, Hannah’s future husband and her lifelong friend.

Hannah looks at Katharina like she’s deranged. At this point, I think she is. Hannah just went out of her way to help a stranger, again, and has no idea who “Mikkel” even is.

Tronte is dealing with Jana outing his affair with Claudia by questioning Claudia’s assistant, Jasmin, about Claudia’s disappearance. Since the whole town knows about them and his wife has stopped pretending, he doesn’t have to skulk in the shadows anymore.

Jasmin tells him that Claudia, who had always been meticulous about her appearance, really let herself go in her final week at the plant. She wore the same thing twice! And her hair was a mess. She forgot about appointments. Jasmin thought it had something to do with the old woman and dog who came to visit her (Old Claudia and Gretchen), since Claudia was different after that.

Jasmin is right- Old Claudia brought Claudia’s childhood dog, Gretchen, back to her after her pet had disappeared in the caves 33 years years earlier, as proof that time travel is real. That was the final proof that Adult Claudia needed, in combination with what Bernd showed her: the barrels of cesium 137 stored in the caves and the odd data from the power plant accident in the summer of 1986, which pointed to the existence of the God particle.

In the 2020 post shockwave bunker, Adult Claudia begins to assemble her family tree on the wall. The strings that connect the photos form one of the Gordian knots that she’s slowly deciphering.

Peter and Elizabeth have reached their destination, the official Winden corpse ID tent for the dead lost in the blast. There are rows and rows of photos showing the faces of the dead on the wall. This is what the checkpoint guard thought that Peter should spare Elizabeth. The faces of almost everyone she’s ever known are on this wall.

But Elizabeth is strong and avoiding the truth doesn’t change it. She’s always preferred to have information rather than be left out. This is the stuff of nightmares, whether you sees the photos or see the town itself.

We’re shown photos for Officer Justina Jankowski and Aleksander Tiedemann, who were in the police station. Benni was probably at home. Inspector Clausen and Torben Wöller were in the power plant with Charlotte, in the room with the barrels where the rift formed. No idea where Jürgen Obendorf was, possibly also working somewhere on the power plant grounds. Their heads are all easily recognizable and in relatively good shape, for having been through an apocalypse.

Peter and Eli look through the rows, then check with each other. Neither has found Franziska or Charlotte. A soldier tells Peter that all of the bodies that have been found are represented on the wall. When he relays the news to Eli, she suggests that maybe they time traveled. He hugs her.

We know they won’t find Charlotte and Franziska among the dead because Eli’s right, but they have no idea where their family members were when the shockwave hit.

Katharina rushes to the police station and demands information about the man in the psych ward who tried to kidnap Mikkel. Police Chief Martin Döhring says he’s told her before, he’s not going to give her any information relating to Michael Kahnwald, no matter how much she wants it. She has no proof of who she is or that Michael is her son.

But then Döhring does give in and tell Katharina that Child Protective Services has known where Michael and Ines were all along. They decided to go into hiding for a while for Michael’s safety and to give him a break. The “lunatic” is back in the psych ward, where he’s been for the last 34 years. That number rings a bell with Katharina, so she asks Döhring the kidnapper’s name, but he’s done with her and tells her not to come back again.

As Tronte is driving by the only bus stop in town, he notices Regina sitting there with Gretchen the Dog in her arms. He stops and asks if the dog belongs to Regina. Regina says that the dog belonged to Claudia.

Now that he’s established that Regina might have some information about Claudia for him, he offers her a ride.

Once she’s in the car, he mentions that the dog looks just like the original Gretchen (because Gretchen is a time traveling dog). Regina figures that’s why Claudia kept her. She asks Tronte if he thinks Claudia is guilty of the crimes she’s rumored to have committed, like murdering Regina’s grandfather and her close friend Mads Nielsen, Tronte’s son. Tronte doesn’t know.

I guess they know Claudia well. Since she did commit 2nd or 3rd degree murder on Egon, they are right to wonder what she’s capable of rather than blindly supporting her.

Tronte asks Regina if Claudia said anything about an old lady in the week before she vanished. Regina tells him no. Then he asks if she said anything about him. Both of them get emotional. Regina tells him Claudia didn’t mention him and asks to get out of the car. She’ll walk the rest of the way home. Belatedly, Tronte remembers to offer to help her if she needs anything, then drives away.

This is the man that everyone assumes is Regina’s father and he hasn’t even asked her how she’s been surviving for the last 3 months without a parent to to support her. Even if he’s not her father, he’s her mother’s oldest friend and lover. You’d think he’d care about her a little, for Claudia’s sake. It’s clear that he only cares about Claudia.

Regina is just so alone in the world. She didn’t need to be used by Tronte to further his obsession with her mother.

In 2020, Claudia begins work on the God particle. She makes the first of the tapes documenting her process. Jonas will listen to them when he arrives in the future in S2.

Peter and Eli visit the Kahnwald house, as everyone eventually must. It’s tattered, but still standing (which we knew, since Jonas sleeps there years later). Peter leaves Eli in the kitchen while he looks upstairs. Hannah’s photos are still there- blown on the floor and ragged, but otherwise still recognizable. Eli looks at one while she waits.

Young Noah startles Eli, but moves slowly so as not to scare her further. His hair is black instead of blonde, the way Magnus’ is in the Alt world. In both speech and partial sign, he tells her he’s looking for food and asks if she is, too. She pulls out a notepad and writes down “mom and sister”, then asks where he’s staying. He writes “cave” on the notepad, so she won’t forget. Now the page says “mom and sister cave”.

Peter comes back downstairs and accuses Noah of following them. He says that he told Noah to stay away from them.

Noah: “You want to protect her, I know. So do I. And I will. After you get killed.”

Noah speaks his answer, but doesn’t sign it. Then he leaves. He did speak the words in full view of Eli, so depending on her ability to read lips, she may have understood what he said.

That evening, it’s still pouring rain. Bartosz visits Alt Martha in her room and apologizes about Jonas. Just, you know, his general surly Jonasness. (It’s all Jonas’ fault.)

When they left 2020 at the end of S2Ep8, Stranger wasn’t aiming for 1888, but they traveled at the exact moment of the shockwave and this is where they ended up (this is where Time sent them). The device is out of cesium 137 and they can’t get anymore in this time period, so theyre stuck here until Jonas can create a new God particle.

Bartosz doesn’t seem to consider that someone else could come from the future and rescue them. Or Martha could help them. But they’d have to have a destination in mind if they left, so maybe that’s the issue.

Martha asks about the workshop, Gustav and what they’re doing. Bartosz doesn’t answer her questions. Instead he tells her he needs to show her something.

Down in the workshop, Gustav asks Stranger if Martha is a traveler, like they are.

Gustav: “When I found you, now that was a sign. A God-sent miracle. Whatever this woman means to you, don’t forget what we’re going to create. Paradise. Every calamity can be reversed. The world’s suffering can be destroyed before it even exists. A perfect world. Sic Mundus Creatus Est.”

Jonas listens to what he says. He still hates the sound of Sic Mundus, but he’s drawn to rest of Gustav’s prophecy, now that it’s not coming from Adam. He wouldn’t be Jonas if his mind weren’t spinning in self-hating circles.

He’s reached his Faust moment of temptation and he hates himself for being drawn to the same ideas and promises that he thinks corrupted Adam. Gustav is his White Devil, promising him a world without Winden, where suffering has ended, if only Jonas will put in the hard work and self sacrifice necessary to bring it about.

Gustav referred to the travelers as a miracle from God in all sincerity, but Jonas knows what that future brings. The temptation is to give in and believe it will turn out differently this time. Yet, what choice does Jonas have, other than to keep walking the same path? Bartosz and Alt Martha won’t let him settle down in the 19th century and forget about who he really is. Neither will his own conscience. And another White Devil, Old Claudia, always shows up eventually to stir the pot. Or she sends an emissary.

Katharina goes to the mental institution to look for Ulrich. She discovers that the nurse at the desk is her mother, Helene Albers. Helene is wearing the St Christopher medal that we’ve usually seen with Jonas and Martha. When Katharina asks for Ulrich and explains that he’s her husband, Helene judges Katharina for being with a patient who’s also a much older man and refuses to let her see him. Katharina uses her knowledge of the medal to talk her way in. She says that her mother also had a medal just like that. St Christopher renounced the devil and carried Jesus, the creator of the world. She begs Helene to let her see Ulrich.

Katharina describes the medal to show she’s a pious Christian, a good woman by her mother’s standards. But calling Jesus the creator of the world in that moment is an inside joke based on Ulrich’s favorite song, Pleasure to Kill by Kreator. “My only aim is to take many lives. The more the better I feel.” If I remember right, Helene never liked Ulrich. Katharina passed the favor down to Martha by pulling her away from Stranger Jonas.

Helene says that Ulrich was just released from solitary. He’s sitting at a table, playing chess by himself. Katharina sits with him. As soon as she gets his attention, she promises to break him out.

Jasmin is the last one at the power plant. She turns out the lights as she prepares to leave. The Unknown Trio turn them back on, then surround her threateningly. After confirming her identity, Adult Unknown tells her, “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”

He shushes Jasmin, who is about 8 months pregnant, then strangles her with his garrotte.

At least he made sure to kill the correct pregnant secretary.

Jana fiddles with an ouroboros bracelet as she sits in her living room in deep thought. Tronte comes home and sits next to her. She tells him that at some point he’s going to have to choose between his family with her or Claudia. He says that he saw Regina today. She looks like a grown up. Jana remarks that Claudia has never said who Regina’s father is and she’s always wondered if it’s Tronte. Tronte doesn’t respond directly to that opening. He agrees that he has to decide between the two families and takes Jana’s hand.

It’s not hard for Tronte to choose Jana right now when Claudia has disappeared without a trace or a word. He cares even less about Regina than Claudia does, that was made clear, though we’ve never seen much evidence that he cares about Ulrich either. He imprinted on Claudia when he was young and everyone else will always come second, no matter what. We know he runs right back to her when she shows up again.

In 2020, Regina is alone and trying to sleep in the damp police station while it storms outside. Old Tronte comes in and squeezes her hand, saying, “I’m so sorry, but it has to happen. She said it’s the only way to save you.” He smothers Regina with her pillow.

Well, at least Regina’s suffering is finally over? I don’t think she ever did anything worse than say a few snappish words to the people who had done terrible things to her. And people were so awful to her. I hate the way both she and Aleksander died alone, after they were so devoted to their little family in life.

Prime Old Tronte wasn’t saved from the shockwave by any means that we saw, so how is he alive now? And did Claudia or Eva send him to kill Regina? Regina was definitely right to be nervous around him when she was young.

Back in the trailer, Peter heats up cans of soup while Eli thinks about Noah. She asks Peter what Noah said to him, but Peter refuses to tell her. She pulls out the triquetra diary, which he’s somehow held onto since season 1, and demands that he tell her more about what’s going on. They shove each other back and forth in the trailer, but not hard enough for either to get hurt.

Peter must know from the book where Franziska and Charlotte are, but he won’t tell Elizabeth, out of a misguided attempt to preserve her childhood.

Leaving her in the dark is worse than telling her a little of what he knows and turning it into a story she can handle. This is why fairy tales exist.

On September 22, 2053, Charlotte sits in the cave and looks at Elizabeth’s photo of Noah, Eli and herself as a baby. Eli returns from outside and sits next to Charlotte. Charlotte gets up to leave, maybe to take over standing watch outside the cave. Eli tells her it will be okay and they press their foreheads together.

In 1987, Young Katharina does her homework and listens to music at the kitchen table. Helene smacks her on the back of the head, hard, and in a vicious voice, tells her to clear the table.

We’ve seen Magnus smack people the same way, especially Mikkel, many times, though not as hard. This is another version of an eternal recurrence. The behaviors and personalities that recur in families down through the generations, in addition to physical similarities, become like seeing the same people and the same dynamics repeated over and over, with no exit possible other than blowing up the cycle by walking out and not reproducing.

Or going through extensive self examination and being self aware at all times, in order to avoid falling back into old patterns, as Stranger recommended. But the Faustian White Devil of similar personality types will always be there, bringing with them the temptation to revert to old patterns of behavior. Nietzsche was specifically thinking of never ending relationships with his difficult mother and sister when he worked with the ideas of the eternal recurrence and amor fati, love of fate. Dark shows these recurring behavior and thought patterns through the generations in each family cluster in Winden, even before we know that characters are related.

It’s montage time. This episode, the song is Broken Sleep, by Agnes Obel.

Adult Stranger Katharina takes her leave of Old Ulrich in the psych ward. They both have the same air of desperation about them, despite how far apart they are in age now. Ulrich’s advanced age didn’t make Katharina hesitate even for a second, after she tried so hard to keep Stranger and Martha apart.

In 2020, Prime Adult Claudia finds Regina dead in bed and is devastated. She wasn’t the one who ordered Tronte to kill her daughter.

In 1987, Young Aleksander comforts Young Regina, who misses her mother.

Adult Jana sleeps with her head on Tronte’s lap. Mads is still missing. So is Claudia. They are lost in their separate grief.

In 2020, Young Elizabeth looks at the page in her notepad that says “mom and sister cave”. Whether it was on purpose or not, Young Noah told Eli where her mom is. She’s just 33 years in the future.

Young Noah works to clear rubble out of the passage. If he can clear it out enough so that it works, Charlotte and Young Elizabeth could make contact. In his life, it’s probably not that long since he finished building the passage the first time. No wonder he seems slightly resentful.

Stranger Jonas enters Martha’s room, probably hoping to creepily watch her sleep again. She’s the wrong Martha and she’s not there, but he’s still drawn by the unbreakable tether between them.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Martha is on a field trip with Bartosz to the caves. He takes her to the Sic Mundus Temple of Doom, which has has fallen into disuse. The room that will become Adam’s study is set up as a classroom, with a triquetra knot in the place of his favorite painting. While Stranger is looking for her, she’s looking at what he’ll become.

Bartosz: “It’s like a secret society. Old Tannhaus is the only one of them left. His father was convinced he could supercede the rules of space and time. He dedicated his entire life to doing just that. And so did his son.”

Martha: “They tried to build a time machine back then?”

Bartosz: “Jonas is trying to rebuild things the way he saw them. He’s been here already. Not now. In the future. He asked you something earlier. If Adam had sent you. He said that Adam killed Martha. Who is this Adam?”

Martha: “He didn’t tell you that? He is Adam. Jonas.”

We swoop to the Alt world, where Old Eva is telling Young Jonas her truths.

Old Eva: “We don’t know our end, but our end knows us. Salvation or damnation. We can indulge in the illusion of free will if we want, but we cannot escape our ultimate destiny. The choices we make in each world may be different, but nevertheless, they converge on the same moment. Things may not happen in the same way, or at the same time. But they always happen. You believed a world without you would be a better one, but they’re all going to die. Mikkel. Mikkel will die. Everyone will die. The apocalypse occurs in my world, just as it does in yours. In mine, it will happen in 3 days time.”

But no pressure.

As they’ve been speaking, she brings him over to a family tree that’s made from stone inlays in her floor. Let me take this opportunity to tell you that even when something is literally written in stone, it isn’t always true.

Commentary

Old Eva confirms that the 2 worlds are roughly parallel, though not exact mirror images. Her world operates under the same fatalism that the Prime world is subject to, so it probably doesn’t matter whether there’s 3 years or 3 hours until the apocalypse, it can’t be stopped. Let’s get Jonas home before it hits though, ‘kay?

I know we’re working on letting go of attachments this season, but I’m pretty sure Jonas is an essential part of the symbolic balance of light and dark in this universe, so we need him, or the rainbow ponies will take over and it will be all sparkles, all the time.

Sun fairy Metamaiden asks what would be wrong with that? (She has actual rainbow hair.) I am a creature of the night okay? (How do you think I knew Jonas didn’t want to be left alone in the light?) I’m just advocating for balance here.

I’m convinced the Kahnwald house is the black hole machine that gives birth to other black holes. There’s a device hidden there that Jonas put under his bed and then forgot, 200 cycles ago, when they were all new at this. Everyone is drawn there and will eventually sleep in that bed. In fact, it’s probably the bed that’s the ORIGIN everyone is looking for. The time travel plot was hatched there, in the distant early twentieth century past, and won’t be destroyed as long as the house and the bed are standing. 😉

The school and the factory have similar silhouettes. Could the factory have been reworked into the school?

Foresight like Gustav’s is believed to be seen through the metaphysical 3rd eye, located in between the eyebrows in the lower forehead. I talked about Sic Mundus as a mystery school back in S2Ep1 & S2Ep8. Though Bartosz doesn’t characterize it that way, Gustav’s foresight firmly locates it in that arena, rather than as simply an academic and scientific endeavor.

Katharina and Ulrich have both gone about their investigations in an uncompromising way that didn’t gain them any trust from the authorities, despite the fact that they are both local authorities themselves. But it’s not like there’s a rule book to follow for losing your child to someone else in another time period or solving child murders and kidnappings by time travelers across 3 times periods.

The soldier at the checkpoint, played by Maximilian Dirr, seems familiar to me. I think he might still have been one of the guards in the 2052 episodes, but IMDB isn’t crediting him. If I notice him when I get to that point next time I rewatch, I’ll note it here. Or someone else can let me know in the comments. Maybe he was a cop or worked in the power plant.

Family Trees- Skip If You Don’t Want to Know What’s on Them Yet!

My screencap of Old Eva’s full family tree might come out too blurry to read, so I’ll add the family tree on the Netflix website for this episode, though they are a little different. If you visit the website yourself, make sure to stop on the home page first and select which episode you’re willing to be spoiled up to.

Katharina’s father is listed as Hermann Albers (Thomas Arnold), the farmer whose sheep died in S1Ep3, Past and Present. In hindsight, the death of the flock of 33 sheep and the Bible verse Albers quoted to Egon were warnings to Egon that he’d be dead soon. Albers told Egon he was a member of Noah’s church. (Mark 13:33, “Be on your guard. Be alert. For you do not know when that time will be.”)

In the same episode, Mikkel spends his first day in 1986, Claudia starts work as the director of the power plant and HG Tannhaus finishes work on the time device. It must be that once those things had happened, Egon’s future was solidified. Helene Alber’s religious medal also pegs her as a member of Noah’s church.

Old Gustav Tannhaus is HG Tannhaus‘ grandfather, with Leopold Tannhaus in between the two as Gustav’s son/HG’s father. Gustav was born in 1813 and HG was born in 1913, 100 years apart. Gustav’s father is Heinrich Tannhaus. Sic Mundus’ history stretches back as least as far as Gustav’s birth in 1813 and forward at least as far as 2053, the farthest we’ve seen anyone travel forward, a period of 250 years.

The big shocker on these trees is the pairing of Bartosz and Silja (Girl from the Future) and then them being the parents of Noah and Agnes. Agnes is Tronte’s mother and Tronte is Jonas’ great grandfather, which makes Bartosz his great great great grandfather. Silja is the child of Egon and Hannah. Agnes and the Unknown give birth to Tronte in both worlds.

So now Bartosz knows that EVEN MORE STUFF is all Jonas’ fault. That should make for some fun times ahead. Maybe Bartosz isn’t so much blaming Jonas for everything as exasperated with him, the way you get with a favorite child who just can’t stay out of trouble, no matter how hard you try to keep him safe. Bartosz wants to keep his favorite progeny alive and well and Jonas keeps screwing everything up. Bartosz also prods Jonas along his dark and uncomfortable path.

Was There Originally A Jonas in the Alt World?

It is odd that Stranger doesn’t remember going to Alt Martha’s world when he was Young Jonas. I get the distinct impression that there used to be a Jonas in Martha’s world, but he wanted to be erased. So they kept Mikkel from going back to 1986, just like Jonas wanted in the Prime world, and as Eva indicated to Prime Young Jonas. To make up for Jonas’ absence in the Alt world, they have to bring him over from the Prime world for a brief time to interact with Martha to trigger certain events.

That’s an arguable interpretation, it’s true. It’s never said straight out, but Eva has said to Jonas twice now that he wanted a world without himself, with the hope that it would be a better place, but it’s not. In this episode, she specifically said that even Mikkel dies, and as a child instead of as an adult, so there was no point to making a world without Jonas.

But she didn’t say that there had been cycles where Jonas existed as a native in the Alt world. However, the way she practically blames him suggests that the Alt world exists in its current form because some version of Jonas, either from his world or hers, talked her into trying out the “world without Jonas” concept he’s been so keen on for 2 seasons. So either he used to exist there as a native or the Prime version has been visiting there for a while and talking Eva into experimenting.

There is a 3rd option, that Jonas willed Martha’s world into existence as a place where she could live and he wouldn’t be there to kill her. It’s an attractive option. But she still goes and gets Jonas and brings him to her world in every cycle, so either Martha didn’t agree to Jonas’ plan, that’s not the correct option or Jonas just can’t be written out of Martha’s code because he’s too essential to the way her story goes. Jonas’ own story seems to require Martha at various points.

I’ll explore this more fully as the season goes on- don’t want to give away spoilers now.

But I do think Martha was always the chosen one in the Alt world, whether or not Jonas was ever native to it. That’s one reason why it didn’t make much of a difference for Jonas to disappear there.

Did Season 1 Show A 3rd World?

The way that Martha’s world reflects her personality and Jonas’ world reflects his, argues for the main actor within the world being the one who imagines/dreams/Wills the world into being, with the world following the characteristics of that person’s mind. And that makes me wonder if we’ve actually seen a different world each season. I haven’t thought it through enough to figure out whose world it would have been in season 1, but season 2 was Jonas’/Adam’s world.

Since we know we’ve seen Jonas and Martha’s worlds, I wonder if there’s something about being young that makes it easier to create the new world or connection between worlds? I think if S1 isn’t also Jonas’ world, Teen Charlotte is the best option for whose world it is. Charlotte is both the only person we know of who’s time traveled as an infant and who is connected to Tannhaus (the narrator of S1). He set the tone for the scientific understanding and the worldview of the season.

We see quite a bit of Charlotte as a teenage and an adult investigator that season and of Tannhaus in two time periods, 3 if you count his TV show. Charlotte’s daughter Elizabeth also plays a part, with Noah seeking her out and Yasin disappearing. The two of them revolve around each other exactly the same way Mikkel and Jonas do.

Or else it could be Mikkel’s world, but I feel like Mikkel has too little control. Same with Helge. It could be Claudia’s world, since she’s all about control.

Sic Mundus Creatus Est: Faust meets the Devil and a Prophet Meets a Saint

From a scientific point of view, Jonas ends up taking over Sic Mundus because he figures out the importance of their work to improving on the scientific work he’s already done with Claudia. For that reason, the scene where Bartosz introduces Alt Martha to the Sic Mundus classroom and tells us their true history for the first time is important. It shows that Sic Mundus wasn’t just a crazy cult that Adam made up to keep his followers in line or a symptom of his madness.

Instead, the organization has has a rich history of scholarship and alchemy created by multiple generations of researchers who devoted their lives to the work. Jonas/Adam learned from this history to create his own version of Sic Mundus, which added elements to the overall time travel scheme that were missing from the approach based purely on scientific theory. HG Tannhaus eventually stored some of the sources Sic Mundus studied in his clock shop along with the Sic Mundus group photo, suggesting that elements were incorporated into the version of time travel that worked. Tannhaus’ ideas were largely based on Einstein, but even Einstein couldn’t solve everything.

Foresight like Gustav’s is believed to be seen through the metaphysical 3rd eye, located in between the eyebrows in the lower forehead. I talked about Sic Mundus as a mystery school back in S2Ep1 & S2Ep8. Though Bartosz doesn’t characterize it that way, Gustav’s foresight firmly locates it in that arena, rather than as simply an academic and scientific endeavor.

Gustav: “When I found you, now that was a sign. A God-sent miracle. Whatever this woman means to you, don’t forget what we’re going to create. Paradise. Every calamity can be reversed. The world’s suffering can be destroyed before it even exists. A perfect world. Sic Mundus Creatus Est.”

This is the prophecy Sic Mundus lives by in the future versions of the organization that we’ve seen, including Adult Elizabeth and Teen Silja in the 2050s: Forsake family ties in favor of the Paradise Sic Mundus will create, with Jonas as the savior. In Paradise, all of the suffering will have been worth it, because the suffering will be reversed, as if it never existed, and more.

Stranger Jonas fought for decades to avoid becoming Adam, to avoid becoming the leader who believed in and led others to believe in this prophecy, yet now he’s falling into the trap that he knows will lead him there, based on promises he swore he’d never listen to.

What changed? Why is this temptation ensnaring him now, when it never has before?

His frame of mind has changed. Emotionally and mentally, he’s been pushed beyond anywhere even he’s been before. His last chance to save original Martha, the one he spent 33 years pinning his hopes on, has failed. He’s stuck in the 19th century, helpless. Or maybe hiding. He really hasn’t been honest about his full history with the teens.

This episode is notable for how exhausted so many of the characters look. Everyone is tired of the fight right now, and Stranger is not only tired, he’s more hopeless than he’s been since he had to send Mikkel back to 1986 and Michael to his death.

He doesn’t have the strength to push down what his heart wants anymore. He wants to believe what Gustav said: that Paradise is possible and that free will isn’t. That it’s preordained he’ll succeed, so he will. That he’s always given in to the lure of Sic Mundus, so he might as well do so again.

Stranger needs some kind of relief and religious conversion can be an incredibly soothing drug.

Jonas has met his White Devil, and the devil told him he’s the savior who can bring about Paradise. Up until this point, Jonas has always believed that change was possible through his own sheer determination or Claudia’s science and plans or Adam’s authority and knowledge of the future. Here in 1888, as far as he can tell, that all lies in ruins at his feet. He’s failed; he’s been betrayed; the very universe is working against him.

Maybe it’s time to make a deal with the devil and study the occult/alchemy seriously. Maybe science isn’t enough and the missing ingredient can be found there.

Jonas has fought a mighty struggle for more than 30 years, which probably should qualify him for sainthood. Most saints have these sorts of relapses into doubt and despair, then find their strength again, even Jesus. Especially saints who mostly go it alone and live in their own heads, like Stranger.

In this sense, he’s not really a classic Faustian character. Claudia and Ulrich, the 2 White Devils from S2Ep7, the episode of the same title, are much more like the classic Faust, the character who can’t resist following their Will and Desires and so is easy prey for the Devil.

Ulrich is the classic Faustian sensualist with a heart of gold, who we root for but who just can’t stop himself from following his big heart into the next barrel of trouble he’s attracted to, whether it’s a new woman or thinking he can save the children. He’s a boy who will never grow up and we love him for the innocence at the center of his mistakes, even though eventually he becomes too toxic to live with, since he never stops to consider the consequences of his actions. The devil promises him he can be a hero or be a king, but he’s always eventually the architect of his own demise because he can’t control his tendency toward excess.

Claudia’s Deadly Sin of choice is ambition, in the form of scientific advancement at any cost. Literally any cost, whether it’s her child or her soul. Or anyone else’s soul. Since Goethe’s Faust was a sheltered academic who left his books behind to gain experience of the world and was then burned by falling in love and getting an unmarried woman, Gretchen, pregnant, Claudia is probably meant to be a combination of the Devil, Gretchen and Faust.

One of the important implications of Goethe’s Faust is the concept of earning salvation vs escaping damnation. Though characters ostensibly are meant to use their lives accruing points that will send them in one direction or the other, in the end, God acts as a referee with veto power. He can use His Grace to do whatever He wants with the characters. If He decides He likes their style, or their deathbed conversion, no matter how they’ve behaved previously, He can pick them up and bring them into Heaven. Or He can send them in the other direction. Christianity has a lot of loopholes and God is fickle.

Personally, I’m going to stick with karma/eternal justice.

Ulrich is the King David model of Faust, God’s chosen one who’ll always be forgiven eventually. Jonas is more in the tradition of Job, where God makes a bet to see how far He can push someone before they crack. Claudia is a version of Eve, who won’t stop until she’s eaten all of the fruit from the Tree of Knowledge and ruined Paradise for everyone. God sets her up for both great success and great pain, for His own reasons.

Martha is a saint, the opposite of a Faust. We were told this from the moment we met her in S1Ep1, when she was on a hunger strike to save starving children. Same with Noah. Everything he’s done has been for his family and he’s suffered terribly because of it. Martha is a compassionate saint and Noah is a martyred saint. Those are two ways to transcend to a higher plane of existence, which is why saints can perform miracles. Mikkel also martyred himself for his family and the greater good.

A lifelong sinner who repents and redirects that energy toward God also becomes a saint. This is the reason God loves to make bets with the Devil. It builds up karmic energy, which eventually creates a surge in one direction or the other. This will be true of any unbalanced life, whether it leans too far toward good or evil, saint or sinner. In Dark, Time is God, so the build up of karmic energy and the surge of it seeking eternal justice at death will affect Time.

Martha and Jonas are tied together to balance each other as light and dark, care for the individual (he saves those closest to him) vs care for the greater good (she saves the planet) and hope (she finds comfort in myth, stories that prove she’s never alone) vs nihilism (he’s always a stranger, always alone). Claudia is a third element, the neutral, unstoppable centerpoint of the will, which assumes it’s balance, but is merely unfeeling.

S1 can be read as Part 1 of Goethe’s Faust and S2&3 can be read as Part 2, but I’m not going to do a close examination. Part 2 is also a blatant rip off of Dante’s Divine Comedy and I’d rather just discuss that source, even though it’s not German. I have no trouble with the many other versions of Faust, and there are many, from the original 1580s religious commentaries, which are fascinating, to Pinocchio, which most everyone knows in some form, but was originally written as a novel in 1883. Goethe’s version of Faust is based on so much misogyny that my brain forms a protective wall and won’t let me take it in too deeply.

If you want to look more closely at the ties between Goethe’s Faust and Dark, here are a few links:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goethe%27s_Faust

https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Faust-Parts-1-and-2/plot-summary/

themes: https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Faust-Parts-1-and-2/themes/

symbols:  https://www.coursehero.com/lit/Faust-Parts-1-and-2/symbols/

https://lettersfromthedustbowl.com/faustusE.html

“Hell is empty and all the devils are here.” -Shakespeare and Adult Unknown

This is a quote from Shakespeare’s The Tempest which is relayed secondhand to a deposed king. While the surface meaning of the quote is obvious, the nuances of what it means coming from Unknown’s mouth as he kills a very pregnant secretary depend on which character you take to be the true author of the words.

The original speaker was a prince who was leaping from a ship that was burning because it had been set on fire to gain revenge on the king, his father, who was on board. Prince Ferdinand had nothing to do with his father’s crimes. Unknown is sympathizing with the fact that Jasmin herself is largely outside of the Winden social circle that’s involved with time travel conspiracies. She’s collateral damage. (As far as we know.)

But in the play, the audience hears the line spoken by Ariel, a magical being, who relays it to the former king, Prospero, the brother of the current king, Alonso. Many years ago, Alonso betrayed Prospero and drove him from his kingdom. Ariel reluctantly works for Prospero, who is also a magician, in return for his freedom from an evil sorceress, Sycorax. Prospero ordered Ariel to set fire to the ship in order to wreck it and bring its occupants to Prospero’s new island so that the former king can carry out an elaborate revenge plot.

Coming from Ariel, the line applies to just about everyone.

In the play, Ariel is the symbol of justice personified, much as I have compared Unknown to Schopenhauer’s Eternal Justice or karma. Unknown’s use of Ariel’s line suggests that he is aware that he is playing the role of both Eternal Justice and Prince Ferdinand, rather than blindly following orders or randomly perpetrating acts of violence.

Prince Ferdinand becomes the love interest for Prospero’s daughter, Miranda, who speaks the famous phrase, “brave new world”. From the close up on Eva’s family tree we know that Unknown is Tronte’s father in both worlds, making him part of the Nielsen line and the only one who spans the two worlds. Prince Ferdinand and Miranda’s pairing helps bring the two warring kings back together, which means that Ferdinand also acts as a bridge between kingdoms.

Ariel has worked for two powerful masters and also has his own power. Both masters have been dubious, but Ariel has chosen to stay with Prospero. I believe Unknown has ties to both Claudia and Martha. When this scene occurs, he’s just watched the Prime world go through an apocalypse which helped either created martha’s world, created a link to it or solidified the link to it. An apocalypse is about to occur in the Alt world.

Ariel has watched Sycorax perform evil acts, and now is watching Prospero risk lives for his own purposes. This is another layer to Unknown’s use of the quote. Is he expressing despair that he has to watch these apocalypses occur, but can’t stop them? Is he, like Jonas, trapped in this never ending loop of of death and loss that has to be repeated every cycle and he can’t get out of it?

There are several potential reasons why someone might want Jasmin dead. For one thing, there’s the bootstrap paradoxes. Those have been created over time by erasing the causative events and memories, so that only results remain. Both Jasmin and Bernd were instrumental in providing Claudia with the information she needed to figure out the complete theory behind the God particle, which she and Jonas then used to turn the God particle into a time machine.

In the scene where Jasmin dies, she walks in on the Unknown examining the binder which held Claudia’s early research into the God particle. This is the binder which was originally handed to Claudia by Bernd when he gave her the data related to the accident at the power plant in 1986.

Claudia first discovered financial discrepancies in the power plant’s books thanks to obscure records which Jasmin obtained for her. Jasmin looked over the records as well and noted the issues. Bernd told Claudia that the plant was cooking the books to hide the accident, then Claudia demanded to see the records of the accident.

Unknown takes the binder with him and kills the two people who know about the data trail. Is he trying to erase the memory of the origin of the God particle in future cycles? Is he stopping someone else from investigating in the future?

Or maybe there was some reason why Jasmin’s baby couldn’t be born? She’s always at the power plant- maybe she knew too much in other ways, as well?

The deaths of Jasmin, her baby, and Bernd, along with the destruction of the abandoned Sic Mundus lair, all in 1987, must be part of some larger plan.

I was struck by how exhausted and ragged the Unknown look in this scene. This is hard on the Child and Old versions, especially, as it should be.

The Day the Earth Stood Still- The Science

According to those tenacious French researchers, the Earth stopped spinning for a nanosecond during the shockwave, which is 1 billionth of a second, then started spinning again.

The video above is the best explanation I could find for what would happen if the Earth stopped spinning, but it describes what would happen if the world just stops cold and never restarts. It’s more catastrophic than what would happen, though the basic process is the same and I think we’d all still be very dead eventually in reality.

The video goes on to discuss some fascinating concepts of time, such how atomic clocks measure time and the fact that all sorts of things affect the speed at which the Earth rotates, so it’s not an accurate way to measure time. Did you know the Earth is turning more slowly as time goes on? We’ve lost more than 20 seconds since the 70s. Time is relative.

The show listed just about all of the apocalypses- tidal waves, earthquakes, hurricanes and other intense storms, electromagnetic pulse, all of the planes crashing at once, all of the nuclear power plants melting down at once. They didn’t list war, plague and famine, but those sometimes take a few months to develop in the aftermath of the other disasters. If they showed us the world outside of Winden in 2025, it would be filled with disease, hunger and people fighting over the few resources that are left.

My best guess is that the tiny lack of movement when the Earth stopped for a nanosecond, combined with intense inertia causing everything possible to move a teeny tiny bit, would create small, hairline cracks in everything that was attached to the Earth’s surface. As the Earth restarted, then continued to move, those cracks would grow, and things would crumble and fall even worse than they normally would in the resulting tidal waves, earthquakes and storms.

This video goes on to discuss some fascinating concepts of time, such as atomic clocks and the fact that all sorts of things affect the speed at which the Earth rotates, so it’s not an accurate way to measure time. Did you know the Earth is turning more slowly all the time? We’ve lost more than 20 seconds since the 70s. Time is relative.

Also we are such a nerd family that we had loud disagreements about the theoretical physics of this. Don’t ask.

This is the result of my husband the mathematician’s calculations on the issue. Despite the way he wrote it, I am the practical catastrophist in the family who believes the apocalypse is always nigh and should be prepared for. He is the theorist who never believes there will be damage in the real world. Metamaiden is the balanced middle.

Since the speed of Earth’s rotation varies based on latitude, I chose the latitude of the city of Weimar in central Germany, which is at about 51 degrees north.  Earth’s rotational speed at that latitude is 655 miles per hour, or 1,054 kilometers per hour, or 293 meters per second (calculated at https://www.vcalc.com/wiki/MichaelBartmess/Rotational+Speed+at+Latitude).

That means the Earth’s surface would move 293 nanometers (billionths of a meter) in the nanosecond that the Earth stopped.  That’s about a thousand times the diameter of a water molecule (0.27 nanometers), and about 29 times the diameter of PG5, the largest synthetic molecule ever made (10 nanometers).  Depending on how closely packed together two substances are, that 293 nanometers of travel could provide plenty of room for the molecules of one substance (say, water) to smack into the molecules of the other substance (say, rock) in that billionth of a second, potentially triggering havoc.

As more comparison, the width of a human hair is 75,000 nanometers. 293 nanometers, the distance inertia would shift everything on Earth when it stopped, whether it was attached or not, is so small it’s hard to imagine, but it’s enough to throw off cycles, set off chain reactions and fracture inflexible masses when done with the weight and velocity of the Earth behind it.

The Day the Earth Stood Still- The Film

  They are definitely referencing the film.

In this short documentary, Decoding Klaatu Barada Nikto, the filmmakers and others discuss how The Day the Earth Stood Still purposely relates to the Cold War, fear of nuclear proliferation and and the pro United Nations sentiments of the filmmakers. Dark has spent 3 seasons showing us how a group of people who were interested in traveling to other times and to other timelines/worlds will stop at nothing, not even global mass destruction and death involving all of the apocalypses at once, to achieve their scientific goals. And nuclear science is at the heart of what they do.

The Day the Earth Stood Still believes scientists, with the help of the UN, can save the world. Dark seems to be saying we can’t trust the scientists anymore. Unless the message is that the scientists will take us to the golden glitter Harry Potter world, which I’m totally okay with. But that world is threatened, too, so it’s not the ultimate answer. The science and technology that came out of the Enlightenment and have continued through the Industrial Revolution to the present day, which are seen as both progress which will unquestioningly aid humanity and as beneficial knowledge which must be pursued, have led to many of the ills our culture and planet now face.

Unless we somehow put the brakes on- stop the world- the apocalypses we currently live in will only get worse. As I write this, it’s currently 102ºF (39ºC) outside my window, there is smoke in the air from the forest fires that are burning all over the Southwestern US, including one about 20 miles from my home, and my state diagnosed a record number of COVID-19 cases yesterday. That’s 3 apocalypses. Famine from joblessness isn’t far behind. How many riots and shootings does it take to make a civil war?

We need to start getting the message and acting on it without worrying about the details.

Which brings me to the importance of the code phrases. Klaatu Barada Nikto is a code phrase which the alien, Klaatu, his human friend, Helen, say to his robot guardian after he’s killed, to stop the guardian from destroying Earth in retaliation. It tells the robot that the damage done to the alien is repairable by their standards, so the situation can still be salvaged. But no direct translation for the phrase was ever written into the script or otherwise. It’s been left to the viewer to interpret the exact meaning, though the gist of it is clear. Fans have obsessed over its exact meaning for decades and even the cast and crew all have slightly different interpretations.

The important thing about the phrase Klaatu Barada Nikto is that it triggered the correct state of mind and action in Klaatu’s robot, Gort. The meaning helps trigger Gort’s action, and it’s extremely important that Gort understand the message correctly, so it’s worth analyzing, but on the level of meaning, not exact wording. Having an exact direct translation might help us, but isn’t essential for Gort or Helen, who brings him the message in the film.

In the same way, the characters in Dark are triggering each other with certain words and phrases. Sometimes the meaning matters, but I don’t think it always does. Sometimes just the sound of the words acts as a reminder to their inner selves of where they are in the cycle and what the next step is. Many of them are following difficult paths and want out, while at the same time their memories are being erased to form the bootstrap paradoxes. They need nudges along the way to keep them following the same footsteps they’ve created in previous cycles.

Are the bootstrap paradoxes a reference to the way history tends to be forgotten in the real world, so that we are condemned to repeat it endlessly, never correcting our mistakes, repeating the same platitudes and religious doctrines to justify our actions?

Images courtesy of Netflix.

  Dark S3E2: The Survivors-It's time to visit Adam's post-apocalypse world, the world without Winden that Hannah & Ulrich spoke of for decades. Like Stranger, those 2 skipped the apocalypse & traveled to previous decades. #DarkNetflix After the Harry Potter costume party of getting to know Martha/Eva's world in S3EP1, in episode 2 it's finally time to visit Adam's post-apocalypse world, which is a form of the world without Winden that Hannah and Ulrich have dreamed of for decades.

[wellntruly]

An overdue post sitting in my drafts I gotta get out of my system

-- -- --

“God’s Grace Spares the Struggling ‘Kings’ For Another Season, New Showrunner To Step In,” reads Variety in Imaginary 2009. “New ‘Kings’ Showrunner Promises Fresh Vision,” reports Vulture, subhead: “‘Doin’ right by God’s Boys’ she Tweets.”

IN WHICH

I slide out of the pieces of Season One I wanna keep like blocks in a Jenga game, blithely topple the remainder, and REBUILD THE TOWER ANEW.

IN WHICH

Sly Tower of Babel references...are welcome & appropriate!!!

IN WHICH

I Break Season 2 of NBC’s Kings

Oh do know now---this is a long post

Alright. So first up, if this show were to come back in real life, Michael Green’s wish to skip ahead 10 years between seasons has become both a better choice as well as the only choice, as it is in fact 10 human years later for all the actors. But we’re imagining a fantasy 2009 where Kings was a) renewed even with those numbers, b) I am there, as a time-traveling showrunner from the future, who may or may not have sent Michael Green off on a long vacation without cell service under the impression that the show was cancelled, and just---[*slide whistle*]---taken his place. “Yeah Michael says it’s fine if I invent Gilboan social media,” I say after checking a “text” from him on my “phone” (it’s my dead Blackberry from college I’ve brought as a prop).

So! It’s ten years ago, and we’re coming back One Year Later, in Kings time. Often fans think they want things to pick right back up where they left off, but I assure you you don’t actually want that here. What you do want is to feel the air on the streets of Shiloh almost twelve months after the Prince and Princess each vanished from public sight. The Palace assures that they’re fine, but where are they? Where are the twins? And you do want to see what shape the stories have taken since Gilboa’s shining hero David came back from the dead, only to disappear again over the border, leaving a strangely bloodied King back on the throne. He headed toward Gath, the whispers say---toward Gath? We pick up one year later so we can see what all this has wrought, what movements have begun to rise, what is transforming. Aannnd so that in the last act of the premiere Michelle can return from her year-long exile, disrupting this new Gilboa, the catalyst that sets off the narrative thrust of the season. 

Now I am so sorry to say it, but we’re losing Ian McShane. Not right away! He’ll get two episodes, technically three, and they’ll be good ones. But then he has to go, because we’re doing a classic three act structure and this is not his story much further. Season 1 is David in the court of King Saul Silas, Season 2 is King David establishing his own court, and Season 3 is God’s Boy Gets Dark. As much as I generally dislike good-guy-goes-bad character arcs, this is just what we’re working with in canon here. And we’ll do it right, it’ll be Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, and “wow God kinda destroyed this man to achieve His own aims didn’t He?”, and, you know, if Gilboa is God’s Kingdom on Earth than what must be God’s Kingdom in Heaven, etc. Also, by Act/Season 3 it will be crystal clear that this was always the story of Jonathan as much as that of David, his own transformation over the three seasons taking up just as much emotional oxygen, and then he can die in Season 3 possibly more Good than the man who brought him there is anymore, and take the show he stole with him.

Also if we lose Ian McShane we get more $$$ to spend on other things, because he is easily our biggest salary the rest of this cast is cheeeaap as hell in 2009 value, and this whole exercise may be pure spitball fantasy but I’m a producer at heart and still gotta think about those imaginary dolla’s.

All the rest of the characters stay though. Thomasina stays because they gave me like TWO total personal details about her and that’s SORELY LACKING, Season 2 sees much more. (What compelled you to give that lovestruck guard a kiss! What was behind your bone-chilling advice to Jack as you locked him in!! Thomasina?!) Hanson stays, absolutely, because he’s the clean-featured, tightly-wound, tidy little pointman, and like hell am I losing this show’s Arthur now that I’m here to finally do something with him. Also people will start actually calling him Handsome in the show not just in my ears. The guards stay too, because that’s easy continuity, in light of how I’ll be changing...so much else. And Rose Benjamin stays, albeit in a reduced capacity, because after deposing her husband it’s just gonna be structurally necessary. We’ll make sure all her scenes are extra juicy though, don’t worry.

Anyway, is there anyone else on this show besides these ones and the three young bloods.... Oh Reverend Samuels! Totally Ghost Samuels stays, haunting peeps and disrupting yer peace. I find I’m actually glad he was killed now, because he’s not actually going anywhere, and now I’ll get MORE CLERICAL FIGURES FUCK YEAH. There will be a NEW head of the church, oh I am agog with possibilities, AND, we’re adding mooooore. Do you know what this show needs? Fucking prophets, listen to me: imagine a modern prophet flapping around Shiloh’s parks like Gilboa’s Prior Walters. Imagine a prophet smoking. Imagine a prophet with a vlog. Imagine a prophet literally has your number. He texts you. Imagine Jack leaving a prophet on read. Delicious, it’s all happening.

Another thing that is happening is that we’re editing a sequence to the whole ass entirety of the Jeff Buckley cover of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’. It’s happening, it can’t not happen. What is the point of this show if that does not happen. I was going to say that we’ll earn it but we don’t even need to it’s already ours, it’s David’s song. Listen if The Young Pope can do ‘Hallelujah’, we can fucking do ‘Hallelujah’.

Now that I mention it...I mean not that we’re just going to become The Young Pope, but here are the things we’re doing like The Young Pope:

1. Music. This show is gonna have a MUSIC DIRECTOR and MUSIC, bold/borderline embarrassing contemporary as well as old as balls & neat as hell. We’ll use one of our McShane $s for that. We will potentially use two $$s for that. I mean you know who else used a ton of existing music right? Our night soap spiritual leader The O.C. [Fiddler on the Roof boom] TRADITIIOOOOONN 2. God & Mysticism. Again, shockingly little of these things in Season 1. Sea-change starts now. It’s gonna be massive. 3. Do not try to be too cool for any of this, shun reservation, embrace the inherent aggrandized absurdity of our premise and just Do The Damn Thing. Every choice should be the big choice. This will also allow us to start deploying... 4. ARTSY TABLEAU SHOTS. Will they heavily reference the history of artistic depictions of these events from the Judeo-Christian-Islamic tradition? Is the Pope Catholic?? 5. Specific, but at some point my prophet wears Diane Keaton’s “I’m A Virgin But This Is An Old Shirt” T-shirt

Speaking of character design, David comes back with a beard, right? Yeah David definitely comes back with a beard. David for sure comes back with a beard, why would I even question that. We will be accused of using superficial appearance changes to do the bulk of the legwork necessary for character development, by me I will do that accusing, but we were left with Season 1 David---we need all the legs up we can get. God’s Dimwit is coming back looking older, looking more anti-establishment, self-reliant, hot, and, most importantly: LIKE KING ARTHUR AND ALSO JESUS. If Christopher Egan can’t carry off a beard, I’ll replace him. He is expendable---this beard is not.

Oh my god, if I could replace Christopher Egan…..oh I never should have thought about this. I wouldn’t. But if I had to...what I want is like a younger, American Ewan McGregor….and I can’t think of who that is, but it doesn’t matter anyway slam the door on that vision we’re sticking with what we’ve got.

For instance, something we’ve got, got to DEAL with, is that Gay Prince Jack is, and I must just stress that this is CANONICALLY how things were left, imprisoned in a room of the palace with his lavender marriage fiancé, and told that maybe they’ll be let out if they produce an heir for Silas to “raise right this time”, in a fully Fuck Or Die [Imprisoned] scenario that really aired on NBC, America’s Secretly Fucking Wildest Network. And while a year will be just the right amount of time to allow Outlaw David to maybe learn some things and get a little bit scarier in a sorta unknowable, static-on-the-air God-y way, which will be great fun, it’s also aaalmost too much time, really dancing on the edge here, which feels right, for imprisoned Jack to get hella pale and listless and cracked-smiled and strange but not fully fully mad. Just, a little half-mad. The Half-Mad Prince in the North Wing. We’ll let that poor girl get rescued out of there somehow or another after a few months, maybe in flashback we’ll see see him help her fake some sort of medical crisis (“This is not your prison---go”), and just leave him alone for the rest of the year suspended in air, to quote St. Vincent’s ‘Pills.’ Ooo maybe they keep him on pills… Oh I don’t know, too dark? Hell it’s Jack on Kings, probably not dark enough.

And what of his sister? Ah Michelle, you may be my greatest challenge, but I have a somewhat unorthodox idea that maybe, just maybe, might make you great. Michelle always had plenty she was doing in the show, the problem was that they literally made her shoulder Virgin, Whore, and Mother in just one season, which is a fucking lot for one character to try to sustain. No wonder she felt so inconstant and flip-flopping, they kept changing her positioning as soon as she could get her feet under her! Also she’s an idiot, like her dear David. And listen, I’m not actually going to change that for either of them. David’s going to be my good-not-bright King Arthur straight out of T.H. White, and Michelle I’m just gonna tweak juuuust a bit, combine her dumbness with her drivenness so that she’s just more boneheaded than anything. Sorta like Peggy Carter? That thing where she’s just stubbornly walking into the burning house because That Woman Cannot Be Told. She’s still gonna be stupid, but she’s also going to be braver than everyone else, partly because of it. She’s also gonna be a mom now, because thanks for this pregnancy plot Season 1, you shouldn’t have! You...shouldn’t have. But you did! So we’re committing to Rose’s pregnancy-hiding exile of Michelle, setting her on some bright & cool wind-and-sun-scoured island, Mediterranean meets Maine, which sounds like I’m insane, so: these paintings. She has people with her, community and purposeful work and whatnot---we don’t need to bother fleshing that out really in the show, just enough to indicate that her situation is much much more mentally healthy than Jack’s.

So to catch up: David’s in the forests of Gath building an army and a personality, Jack is languishing in captivity building himself intricate rituals with no idea how close God is resting near him these days (He loves the ones who barter themselves), Michelle is resting with her sleeping infant daughter on her chest, a warm fire within it, waiting, and the Benjamin monarchs have turned super withholding and mysterious, deflecting all questions about their children, as the city grows ever colder and the people more restless, pieces of iron and flint skidding down stone streets.

And our season begins.

Thirteen episodes, like the art-house standard of five years yore.

Episode 2.1

Establish new paradigm, new artistic language, new television show, it’s A Whole New Kings. Here’s what we do: long cold open, not a single character from last season---we’re out on the streets of Shiloh. We’re with the people, all kinds of people, people at carts selling food, people clumped on city squares, talking a little furtively, bundled against the cold. “Holy shit,” a woman says, the first audibly spoken line (New Kings’ got jokes). She’s looking at her phone as she holds something hot and foil-wrapped in the other. She looks up at another woman with her, shows her the screen, voice awed stunned excited scared: “They’ve added it.” It’s Gilboa Twitter, no I have not come up with an alternate name for Gilboa Twitter, and it has appended a white moth emoji to the hashtag ‘#WherearetheTwins?’ As the scene spools out we realize that quiet yet growing activist groups have begun using a white moth to symbolize the missing Prince and Princess, the pale, darkness-kept reflection of their father’s orange butterfly, and that now the largest state-independent social media platform & news source has picked it up as well. The question, and the attendant doubt in King Silas, is getting too big to ignore.

We won’t connect with the King and Queen until after the credits, and they’re strained and tired and brittle. They each try to talk of their children but in ways the other one does not want to. “Your daughter will be returning soon,” Rose says, air like a lioness indoors, and Silas just throws a gruff hand, “Bah!”, looks away under his saturnine brows. Rose looks out the window, across a courtyard, her eyes finding the room where her son is locked in.

The rest of the episode continues to build the King & Queen’s tension with each other and their country, and the growing movements out on the street. David’s name is spoken a few times---maybe he has an epithet now? That might be fun. But we do not see him. We do see Jack in act three, and he’s quite worrying. In Season 1 Jack spent three quarters of his time being a smug (scared) asshole lashing out at everyone around him, and one quarter of his time shaking apart in just tremendous pain as his parents ripped him open again and again like Prometheus and the eagle. This Jack has maintained his defensive sarcasm and cleverness for where to jab people back, but he’s too tired and sunlight deprived to keep the forlorn glimmering in his eyes tamped down anymore, and it’s a really disconcerting combination. He has a letter from Michelle that a sympathetic servant had slipped him, and through that we see some of Michelle’s very different but still lonely prison, hear the bright wind and her words of promise. That she’s working on something. She also mentions David.

At the end, Michelle returns quietly to the Palace. She does not have her baby with her. She and her parents have a weird dinner. During it, a flag is unfurled on a pole somewhere high up---the Princess’ flag: she is in the royal residence. The servant who pulled it up looks nervy but committed, eyes glowing as he puts his phone back in his pocket. The people on the streets fucking notice. At dinner, Silas’ phone buzzes. Michelle smiles at her parents over her glass of red wine, as some thunder rumbles. “It’s good to be home,” she says. Michelle??! (Hell yeah.)

Out on the border, David steps up on top of a small knoll. He has The Beard, and forces behind him. He looks over to Shiloh in the distance, searching, and spies Michelle’s flag. He grins. “God save the Princess,” he says lowly, and steps forward.

END EP 1

Episode 2.2

And now we go BACK in time, and we DO pick up with David right where we left him in the Season 1 finale, and then spend the whole episode catching up on his year of Plot-Plot-Revolution, bringing us up to speed with him at the end of Ep 1, because that kind of Ep 1/Ep 2 structure is FUN. When Episode 2 begins with ‘One Year Earlier’ in contrast to the first episode’s ‘One Year Later’, the audience is gonna be like, *scream*

Now, I do not know the particulars of how David gathers an army and makes a plan and takes Gilboa, but that is why I will have a writers room. What I do know is that he gets a hell of a lot more God-touched, as mentioned earlier, and he grows that beard. He also figures out a way to communicate with Michelle on her island and they plan most of this shit together, because let’s be real they share one brain cell between them and need all the support available. Do you all like epistolary novels? Great, because these two are gonna cover a lot of ground in letters. Such hits as “hey I’m having your baby!” and “omg babe WHAT :D” and “you getting real God-y has illuminated for me that ultimately I do want to maintain my vow of celibacy and be close with God in my own weirdo way but I do still love you I know this is strange but like, platonic life partners with our daughter maybs?” and “I love and respect you in whatever way you want, I am Dad.”

We don’t catch all the way up to the exact moment that ended Ep 1, because we’re gonna want to see the heisty shenanigans unfold in all their glory in the next episode, so instead we end with marching and someone being like “What if her flag isn’t up when we reach the border?” and David just grinning “It will be.”

The soldier pausing with a cart but calling after him: “Sir, how can you be so sure?” David’s voice coming back strong through the trees: “You have to have faith!”

Episode 2.3

The big throne-taking episode, David returning like the King Under the Mountain. I do mean it, this one’s gonna have a heist vibe. Partly because THEY’RE MY FAVE, partly because battles are expeeeensive. You gotta pay all these actors for so many days of filming, do all this stunt coordination, edit for ages, and then so often battles are just boring to actually watch. Clang clang clash, yawn, naw. We’ll spend more time writing and do the coup CRAFTY STYLE. Michelle on the inside, peeps on the street, David’s gang will have their part too. Ends with David taking the Palace in Shiloh, killing King Silas because a bloodless rendition of this old story is a wrong one and also like hell are we letting Ian McShane go without a bombass death scene. But what we save for the final moment, the real whallop, is David, splattered with blood, triumphant but ignoring everything to find Jack, and free him from his gilded cage.

Listen, you guys already see what I’m setting up here. Kings, if you didn’t want me to do this, you shouldn’t have started adapting the story of David and Jonathan. And established that David’s initial love interest had taken a vow with God AND that this Jonathan is gay!!

Anyway, ‘Border Song’ for the end sequence of the episode? Why not. I can guarantee you it will cost us less to license an Elton John song than film a big battle number, especially in 2010 when no one’s making Rocketman. We do it all in a visual ballet with that “Holy Moses” refrain arcing over it all, it’ll be great. On-the-nose but satisfying about it. The “I have been removed” stanza is Jack and Michelle, the “I have been deceived” Silas, the rising “I’m coming BACK to the BORDER--” section David walking on Shiloh, arty gestures to effective military maneuvers during the instrumental bit and regicide, last stanza David is climbing stairs, “He’s my brother” when he opens the door to Jack’s prison room, embrace, “Let us live in peace” over the black cut to credits. So like it’ll be a Lot, but that song’s so good people will enjoy it in spite of themselves. “Wow this dumb show’s really going for it,” critics will remark in mildly affectionate surprise.

Episode 2.4

Really tempting everyone to be like “So is Kings a musical now?”, but this is our ‘Hallelujah’ moment: whole cold open is dialogue-free, just that song as we pick up the pieces of the city, and our characters mourn the King and their own fate in their differently situated ways, fitting the mournful tone of the song. 

The rest of this episode is about whatever plot business will be necessary with a new monarch, but emotionally, it’s mostly about establishing a new sorta Arthur/Lancelot/Guinevere structure between David and the Benjamin siblings. He’s the King, and they’re the two most important people in his life, and he openly loves them both, and they (twins now instead of lovers) are conferring like, so he’s *our* David, is that what arrangement is coming together here? We share him? Share and yet no one is sleeping with anyone, to make this even further heady and undefined and in-ter-est-ing. Jack is also still pretty mentally and emotionally topsy turvy as he recovers so we have a ton of leeway with him.

Anyway David and Michelle get married in this one, a combo ceremony with their being publicly crowned King and Queen. They make sure Jack is involved in the proceedings in a pretty unorthodox way. The populace is like “huh” and “this could be weird, but I think I’m into it?”

Oh also, this will just be happening throughout this season periodically, but in S1 they established that there’s a public address system built into Shiloh that Samuels could speak through at the pulpit in his house of worship. Love that, definitely keeping that, definitely having calls to prayer, with a like, shofar horn heralding them.

Episode 2.5

My goal here is to make as many of these episodes as I can the FUN kind of episodes. Structurally these last two are actually pretty down the line, so we’re getting back into the concept pieces with this, The Thomasina Episode(!)

You know that thing shows do sometimes where they’ll suddenly follow a more secondary character around the whole time, literally following them whenever they move from room to room, and you see everything from their perspective? That’s what we’re doing, babey! FINALLY we’ll learn some more about THOMASINA. There are so many options, can’t wait to pull this together with my writers room. Due to Thomasina’s role in the household/government (monarchies, man), we’ll get views on both the politics and David/Michelle/Jack, and what the deal was with Silas and Rose over the past year. But mostly we get to center Thomasina. Does the episode open with the camera tracking along close behind her heels as she walks into a room? Obviously. In the last scene does she slip those heels off and rub the arch of her foot while sitting on some stairs talking with Hanson or someone like that? You know it.

Episode 2.6

More fun episodes: pack everyone up and move them somewhere NEW. [chanting] Vacation ep! Scene change! Yeah yeah! Concept: the royal household takes a long weekend to breathe at one of the Benjamin’s summer villas. Does not need to actually be summer, I think chronologically it may even be winter---possibly even better tbh. Finding, securing, and filming at whatever manor or whatnot we find will cost a pretty penny, but we’ll save money down the line with our classically defined bottle episode (hold tight!). But here, the different surroundings and dress code frees everyone up to get looser, get odder, get both more familial and more sexy. If you’re starting to think, “oh so kinda Charles Ryder with the Flyte siblings at Brideshead vibe---hey wait how come David and the Benjamin twins wasn’t more Brideshead from the start?!”, welcome to my world.

And because we’ll need something to cut some tensions, one night Hanson gets drunk with those two guards. It’s honestly a great section, humorous and humanizing.

Episode 2.7

Alright we’re halfway through IF U CAN BELIEVE IT, time to bring back: ROSE BENJAMIN. She was not killed in the taking of Shiloh, she was removed until things had time to cool off. She’d actually gone to Michelle’s island, and now returns with: THE BABY. The baby’s here y’all! I have not decided yet how I want Michelle and David to play this off to their people. They are the King & Queen and Gilboa has a lot of goodwill towards these young cuties, so they probably have a fair amount of options really. I’m almost thinking it might be charming to have them say they’ve adopted this baby because they just wanted to start a family right away, and everyone’s like ohhh okay sure ;) sure you did ;) we got it ;) ;)

Meanwhile, post-Brideshead Jack is about crawling out of his skin over David. He has fully admitted to himself that he wants him, Biblically, jokesjokesjokes, and is LOSING his mIND about it, because it’s Kings’ Jack. Content warning for internalized homophobia, Rose with her son (woof, remember them in S1), and ~Religion~. Because Jack has the additional problem of how God got very interested in him during his imprisonment, and the Prophet character I’ve added is not making any of ANY of this easier. Things start breaking and cracking around Jack like his own visual leitmotif. Rose takes him to church. Exquisite use of Jack on his knees, repeatedly, we are dying. It is, in short, this season’s most Catholic episode, for our most Repressed Catholic Gay, but with the added twist that God Himself almost seems to be trying to draw him out, to Jack’s intense erotic confusion. ‘Big God’? Why not. Why the fuck not. If we have not earned Jonathan Benjamin Florence + the Machine’s ‘Big God’ by this point, what are we doing. “Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ it hurts.” No I do not care that ‘Big God’ was not released yet---this is all made up.

Episode 2.8

Alright alright it’s BOTTLE EPISODE TIME. Fuck guys I love bottle episodes. Location: that court business conference/throne room with the glass wall onto the park, of course. An unusual bottle episode in which the characters are not physically held there through any outside means or internal motivations, it just happens that after David walks in for his first meeting that morning, events upon events conspire so that he just does not leave. Whatever actual kingdom-relevant plot is forming the backbone of especially this latter half of the season will really be fomenting here, but listen, I do not know what it is. Le shrug!

Anyway, Michelle’s a fucking mover and a shaker in this ep, appears a handful of times in various meetings and sessions, sometimes in a seat sometimes in the audience sometimes holding her daughter, and it’s only the last time that we learn what she’s forced through over the course of the day. Dare I say it, Michelle might be smartening up!

Also we realize in this one how badly David’s going under for Jack too, HALLEFUCKINGLUJAH. Of course it dawns on him in a fucking court session, wouldn’t expect anything else for God’s Dumb Boy, whom He loves bothering. By the time we get to the last act it’s late at night, and everyone has filtered out, leaving just David and Jack. Aaaannd they somehow end up sublimating their leaping feelings for one another into deciding to enter into dangerous political cahoots together. Fuck. Something they do not do. Because why do this if we don’t drag it out am I right!!! Hahahahaha, ur welcome about it.

Here I’ve got a final image for this episode for you: Jack leaves after David makes some excuse that he’s just going to stay and finish up one last thing, because naturally this episode has to end on David, he got us into this bottle. He’s sitting in one of the chairs at the table facing the windows as Jack departs, maybe watching him softly in the reflection. The camera finally moves to outside the room for the first time, looking back in through the glass, and though you can’t hear it you can feel David’s groan of exhaustion & longing as he just slides forward to press his face into the table, arms outstretched to either side, wrecked boardroom Jesus.

Episode 2.9

So do you like mutual pining? Are you ever going to like Episode 9! David and Jack are getting full into their dangerous cahoots, and their FEELINGS. David is fucking smitten at this point, and in agony, because Jack is going high key fey and seems absolutely ready to die on the altar of his love for David, in service to his King, whom he won’t touch, he won’t he won’t he won’t, he prays to God that he won’t. Will they get it together before something terrible happens??? Before we all die???!!! Fans are losing their goddamn minds.

Really this whole season exists to give Sebastian Stan the chance to have a scene where he’s flashing his white-like-the-edge-of-broken-china smile at David in some social-political setting and David smiles back all secret and fond and golden, and the group breaks up and Jack ducks into an empty locked room to let out a dry sob and masturbate tragically with his forehead leaning against a wall, and then dashes the tears out of his eyes and fixes them fiercely and goes off to tear someone apart on David’s behalf, if not really his request. I actually don’t know if that happens here or in Ep 7, and then something even better happens here, but IT HAPPENS. All manner of this happens. Again, you’re welcome.

Episode 2.10

Jack leaves the city as part of the cahoots, off doing something risky and nuts because they’re fucking idiots. David glowers and broods, stormclouds gather over Shiloh in pathetic fallacy/God’s sympathy, take your pick. Michelle’s like good Lord just take him to bed already, Tumblr’s like, my Queen?? Trying to distract himself but unable to do kingdom work, David wanders around the palace barefoot carrying his kid on his hip, teaching her stuff, inspo heavily Robert Pattinson in High Life.

In the last scene Jack comes back to Roxy Music’s ‘Psalm’ and It Finally Happens, with full orchestral magnificence courtesy of Bryan Ferry belting about deliverance. We’re not doing the whole 8 minutes because we’re not out of our minds, but we’ll cut it up into something shorter that still keeps that good build, and will make sure we keep the “He’s gonna take you by the hand / He’s gonna make you feel so good” bit, because hohoho. Public’s like “wow Kings really did it.” On Twitter I retweet my pre-season promise with “How’s that”

Episode 2.11

Recall that it is NBC, but also recall what Bryan Fuller got away with on Hannibal. So, we do some very, veerrry clever storyboarding, and intercut various palace business with various boning business. I am all in it for this edit, this is gonna be so fuuunnn.

Also, whatever political plot is continuing off of the cahoots. I think it will in some way involve Michelle and her mom working together on something, too. Also Michelle gets coffee with the Prophet and we realize that they hang out and talk about people, vibes like a less sinister version of Syd and Clark in that one episode of the season of Legion that shall not be otherwise named. One thing Michelle and the Prophet are coordinating on is making sure Rose doesn’t find out that her son has been taken to the King’s bed, as-it-were, etc, because sadly she just does not understand that God’s Plan is for them to get gay married.

Episode 2.12

Speaking of: David & Jonathan make a covenant with one another. Bible fans lose their SHIT. We’re doing Oscar Wilde proud, we’re doing James Baldwin proud, we’re doing GOD proud.

A large portion of this episode is given over to the new “Reverend” (we might just...elide giving them an official title this season) conducting a religious service. This is our most Jewish episode.

Also whatever the political plot is continues along.

Episode 2.13

Finale. I really have shot myself in the foot vis-à-vis actually coming up with a good payoff for you in the last episode, given that I never did figure out the rest of the plot did I. Eh I’m not a real showrunner, what do you expect.

I do know the finale opens with the Prophet, out on the streets, for a nice resonant echo with how the first episode began. Probably it ends with a neighboring country at the border, right, in another echo? You’ve made your kingdom, now you gotta defend it? And King David seems weirdly chill, or no, confident. He’s smiling, he almost seems like he’s glowing a little bit, his eyes a little God-mad, a little unhinged. “It’s gonna be alright,” he’s assuring Jack, in a room in the Palace as you hear horns outside. Jack is concerned, becoming more concerned, David’s low-level thrum of holy manic energy making him shake a little, especially when David grabs him, his grin now like a crack of lightning. “We have God,” David says in a rush, and kisses his forehead almost roughly, soundly, and wheels out of frame.

We end on Jack’s face, the Fear of God, the Fear of Man, an enigmatic play of emotions as the score crashes around us, a hint of what territory we’ll be traveling into for Season 3.

Okay there we go, that’s my second season of Kings.

-- -- --

More Kings nonsense, unfolding in chronological calamity: The O.T.

[thefantheorist]

Monster Arm Part 3: Tying Up Loose Ends

Hello all my fellow Fan Theorists! Today I am finally gonna be putting out the long overdue Monster Arm Part 3 theory that I promised @sge8 I would do. So thank you very much for your request and sorry it took so long to get out. 

Anywho, let’s talk about Eclipsa for a second, and if you haven’t seen up to the most current episode in season 4 I’m gonna slap a big SPOILER WARNING on here just in case so proceed at your own risk.

Okay, Eclipsa’s presence in season four of the show has pretty much served to turn everything we thought we knew about the mewman hierarchy on its head. She doesn’t exactly seem like she is evil, however, she also doesn’t seem all that innocent. I mean, her monster husband has been confirmed to have feasted on a bunch of innocent mewmans. But honestly, I can’t quite seem to feel bad for them seeing as literally half the mewman population are complete and total dicks to all monsters, even peaceful monsters like Buffrog. Moving on. It seems as though the show is trying really hard to convince us that Eclipsa is good and honestly, I believe that she is. Or at least she is trying to be. But whatever the case, her being the central antagonist of the series is wildly ambitious of them, seeing as they only have like half a season left to wrap up the plot lines of Meteora’s magic powers, Marco’s monster arm thing, Moon’s arc with the old mewman loyalists, Mina Loveberry (who just kinda sprang out of nowhere and seems like she is going to be one of the series’ antagonists), the whole issue with the wand and the death spell, and all the filler crap they’ve poured into this season even though I still love all of it. Just, the fact that we still seriously don’t know who the primary antagonist is means that Eclipsa is probably not going to be evil, since it would mean that there would be yet another unresolved plot line that we have to deal with. So with that being said, let’s try to figure out what is going on with this season and what is going to happen next.

So, I already talked, in detail, about the Monster Arm plot line in the first two parts of this theory, here’s the links if you wanna check that out:

Monster Arm Part 1 Theory

Monster Arm Part 2 Theory

So leaving that plot line behind, we are going to talk about an easy plot thread that I think we can tie up: Star/Marco/Tom/Kelly love square(?). I am sad to say it, but in tv shows, especially those aimed and younger demographics, the writers have typically already established which couple is going to be endgame and while that can fluctuate over time, the writers of the story usually stick to the first couple. Why do you think they booted Jackie off the show as quickly as humanly possible once Star found herself a new love interest? Either way, I am pretty sure that Star and Marco are set to be endgame, but really, it doesn’t matter to this theory so maybe I’m wrong! And if you are a Tomstar shipper or a Kelco... Melly... Marcelly--yeah I like that best-- shipper or a Starco shipper, I love all of you and all of your ships are great so please don’t hate me. Either way, this is one of the least important theorizable elements of the show for me and for this theory so let’s move on.

Mina Loveberry... she’s pretty much the wildcard of the situation because I literally have no clue what she is going to do half the time, aside from overreact and punch something. However, I do have some speculations as to where her plot line is going to go. So, it seems that Mina is crafting a large suit of armor for... someone, probably one of the people who fought in the war against Globgor and is completely loyal to the throne of Mewni and former Queen Moon. I also think that they are someone who has a great power like Mina does, except they are much stronger, and they are obviously someone that Mina loves and respects, so maybe a family member or former colleague or something, however, that doesn’t really matter. What is important here is that we remember that Mina holds to her belief that Queen Eclipsa is a traitor and that Moon is the rightful heir to the throne.

Alright next: Eclipsa. Like I said before, I definitely don’t think that Eclipsa is going to be an antagonist, but I also don’t think that she is going to be aligned with Star when it gets down to it. Eclipsa, while not wanting to have conflict between the monsters and humans, definitely has a preference towards the monsters, since they respect her more and actually treat her with kindness, but also because she has a kindred spirit with them and whatever happened in the past with Globgor, which seemed to have been pretty bad, Eclipsa sided with him rather than the mewman people, so I suspect that when push comes to shove, Eclipsa is going to protect the monsters rather than the mewmans, which is important for reasons that I will get into in a minute.

Speaking of Globgor, we already know that in the past he killed many mewmans, I suspect because he was protecting Eclipsa, but what does that mean for the show going forward? Well it seems to me that when Globgor is let out of his crystal prison, which he will be I can promise you that if anything, then he will probably be fighting alongside Eclipsa and the monsters in what I imagine is going to be a giant civil war. Yeah, you heard right Star vs. the Forces of Evil: Civil War is upon us, with one side being the mewmans, led by Mina Loveberry and the person in the giant armor, and the other side being the monsters, led by Eclipsa and Globgor.

Now I’m sure after leveling all of these lengthy claims at you, you’re a bit skeptical, so let me back this up a bit. So we know that monster and mewman tensions are high amongst the adult generation in the show, I mean, they had a whole episode centered around it in Cornball.

I mean, pretty much the whole episode is like this. So we know that monster and mewman tensions are high. We also know that most of the mewmans don’t like Eclipsa, I mean take your pick of pretty much any season 4 episode with her in it and you’ll figure that out pretty quickly. Even in the newest episode, Queen-Napped, where they seem to be taking a liking to her, that is only because she got kidnapped. And even then, Ponyhead had to lie to the mewmans to make them think that Eclipsa’s life was on the line and had to live stream the gang trying to save her in order for them to get anyone to care. So there’s that, but there’s also the fact that most of the old mewman subjects have just resorted to Anarchy. Oh and also there is this line from Moon at the end of Ghost of Butterfly Castle.

Segue to...

Moon. What is her role in all of this. Well, aside from the fact that she has created a camp of Mewmans who all would rather go back to their lives living without monsters, than try to assimilate and change, she doesn’t exactly seem to be doing much in this season. Unlike in the past seasons, where Moon was always a very active player in the final episodes, I don’t think that she is going to have that central of a role in season 4, partly because I think that the cast of characters is getting too cramped, but also because of the aforementioned picture. This picture seems to tell us what Moon and her mentality are about this war and her place in it. When the time comes, she’ll want to avoid the fight and conflict, much like she did in the final battle with Toffee, and her only real goal in the matter will be to protect her family, because that is who Moon truly cares about. Sure she cares about her people, but she doesn’t care enough about them to interfere in a war, especially if it means losing someone she loves again. Speaking of, what about Star? Where is she going to be in all of this? Well, it seems pretty obvious to me that Star--and Marco, Tom, Janna, and Kelly probably--will be stuck in the middle. The new generation of people who are going to stop the fighting and save the world. The most accepting generation. The tech obsessed, rebellious, post-millennials, you might say. *cough cough* gen Z *cough cough*

Yeah... if you didn’t get the symbolism this show was trying to hammer into your skull, then this is what it is. Now this isn’t just speculation, the show pretty much blatantly says it in the Cornball episode.

So now we’ve got all of those plot threads wrapped up, but what is happening with Meteora. Well, it seems pretty obvious to me that the “extremely powerful magic spells that haven’t been used for centuries” is Meteora, and if it isn’t then Christ does this show have a problem with too many antagonists. However, I can’t tell you for sure where Meteora’s story is headed. The best that I can do is suspect that either Meteora’s story is going to be happening concurrently with the civil war that I mentioned, or it’s going to end with Glossarick sending Meteora back in time to grow up as Heinous, which would be why she stayed alive for all those years since her parents were frozen in the crystals, which is why Glossarick is training her to do magic in the first place. I like the last one better because it is just inherently more interesting, but it probably isn’t going to happen. But moving on now to the thing I titled this whole theory on: Monster Arm.

Yeah I know I said that I was gonna drop it, but I have to tie this all back together. Remember how I said that Star and Marco would probably be in the middle of this civil war and all, well I do think that will be the case, however, I think that there is more in store for Marco. Marco has this innate pull towards the darkness and dark magic. Remember his wand?

Yeah, I’m definitely not the first person to point this out, but those little bat wings seem oddly out of place, until you look at the title card:

The star inside of the ‘r’ in Star’s name obviously correlates to her wand, the little skull that dots the ‘i’ in evil correlates to Ludo (remember the first Quest Buy episode where Ludo tries to use Star’s dying wand and a little skull comes out of it), but the little wing on the ‘e’ in evil doesn’t correlate to any of the wand’s former users, or even Ludo in his dream sequence about the wand, but it does match up with the little bat wings on Marco’s wand. Essentially, the title card is telling us how this show is going to end. In the end, presumably in this civil war between mewmans and monsters, Marco is going to get corrupted by Eclipsa’s magic, perhaps because she uses that dark spell, that seems to be important again, on him or some other entity and it drives him towards evil, and after he turns, the finale of the show will be about Marco and Star battling it out

Star vs the Forces of Evil

Star vs Marco

Thank you guys so so much for reading all the way through this, I know it was a long post. Finishing up this post was actually really tough for me because I absolutely love this show and I am so sad that it is going to be ending, but I genuinely hope that the finale for this season lets the show go out on a bang and not get bogged down by the multitude of characters. I know that this theory couldn’t address all of the plot lines and characters in the show, like Janna and Marco’s family on earth, but I hope it at least gave you something to chew on. Like I said before, I don’t think that Eclipsa is going to be evil, especially now that it seems like Mina is going to be a pretty heavy antagonist. Honestly, I did my best to give all of you a theory that tried to tie up all the loose ends of this series, but I really can’t, especially with the Meteora thing. Also, would you guys like the ending where Meteora gets sent back in time (since the whole time travel episode with Glossarick made it an actual possibility)? So that’s all that I got for you guys today. Thank you all again for sticking with me and I hope you all have a wonderful week.

Monster Arm Part 1 Theory

Monster Arm Part 2 Theory

[heretowinbitch]

Prompt: Post Season 2. Beth comes home to find her pearls on the door. O_O

thank you for sending this !!   i’ve had a bit of writer’s block since the finale ( and i think i’m not alone in that,  from what i’ve seen ),  and i told myself i’d power through and make this happen so i hope you like it !   ( and i hope maybe i’ll be able to get back into the swing of things as far as writing goes )

“we’re free.”

she says it brightly  —  maybe  too  brightly  —   with a practiced smile perfectly plastered over her lips.   she needs to sell this,  beth knows,  because in order for ruby and annie to be on board,  they have to see her confidence,  they have to see that this can  work.

( what she can’t let them see is the way she feels a little hollow inside,  like when she loosed the first bullet from the chamber of rio’s gun,  with it went a piece of her heart,  a piece of her sanity.   by the time he fell to the floor,  something else fell too,  something crashed to the ground and shattered beyond repair and the only way for her to move forward is to bury it )

it takes a little convincing,  a lot of practice,  but there’s something satisfying about doing it on their own,  not being beholden to someone else   ——about not having their fates hanging over their heads with every step.   

turner is gone  —  maybe not for good,  but gone  for now  —   and by the time he resurfaces  ( because beth  knows  he will,  knows that eventually the gratitude for saving his life will be overshadowed by the humiliation she put him through ),  she plans to have things running so seamlessly,  that he’ll see nothing but the mother he told her to be.

a few months later,   and they’ve all sort of settled into a routine.  

the dealership took a hit after the raid,  but dean managed to get it back up and running  —  with beth’s help  —  and things are almost back to normal.  officially,  she still manages boland motors with him,  they trade off days at the dealership in the same way they trade off days with the kids.  it works,   and it works better than she’d expected,  better than beth had thought them capable after everything that had happened.  turns out,  they’re much better at co-parenting as separate entities than as a married couple.  and she’s content with that.

unofficially,  her job is something else entirely   ——something that isn’t printed on any books,  in any ledger.   she’s not using the dealership to move the money,  because she promised dean it would remain separate,  clean,  free from anything that might put it in jeopardy again.  but beth has some ideas in the works,  some planned investments that could make things easier  —  both in making her seem legit,  and in providing an opportunity for the business. 

she’s returning from one of these investment opportunities  —  a meeting with a real estate agent who manages properties in the greater villages.  it’s a long shot,  because beth’s credit is nonexistent,  but the guy she met with didn’t seem all that concerned after she’d pointedly flashed him a bit of cash when she went digging in her purse for a pen.  it brings a smile to her face now,  as she climbs out of the van,  because things seem to be falling into place nicely,  and finally,  she thinks,  finally maybe it’ll stop feeling like she’s  drowning.

so engrossed is she in these thoughts,  that beth almost misses it.  she’d unlocked the door,  closed it behind her,  tapped in the code for the security system  ( call her paranoid,  but she’d been overdue for an upgrade ),  and set her purse down on the bench,  turning toward the kitchen.  but she doesn’t make it even one step from the entryway  —  frozen with one foot hovered in the air,  poised to take that step  —  before something registers in the back of her mind.   

and she can  hear  it,  the way it sort of swishes back and forth,  the momentum of the door closing causing it to sway from where it hangs on the doorknob.  she can’t bring herself to look,  yet,  gaze shooting back to the panel by the door where she’d just pressed in her code.  it had been armed when she entered,  which means someone had to bypass it to get in.  so much for  security.

her heart finds its way into her throat,  threatening to choke her,  and beth is already struggling to breathe when she finally turns,  the pounding in her ears seeming an almost fitting percussion to the swishing sound as it begins to slow.  seeing them hanging there  —  it’s reminiscent of another time,  a callback to the start,  and that feels ominous in its own right  —   does that make this the  end?   

her hand is shaking as she reaches for them,  the iridescent shimmer almost blinding in the light that peeks in through the window,  and beth swallows hard when her fingers make contact with the pearls.  she wants to not believe it,  wants to imagine this is some cruel joke,  maybe played by one of his boys,  someone who isn’t pleased with the way things went down. 

but no.  it’s too  personal,   means too much,  speaks too many warnings,  too many  threats.

and she knows that’s what this is.  it isn’t a calling card,  not in the way it had been when she’d done the same,  but a threat.  it’s a warning that she was never free to begin with,  that she’s still barely keeping her head above water,  and now comes the  storm.  

why then  —  as she pulls them free from the door,  thumb pressing over each pearl reverently as though they’re some holy thing,  and she’s silently speaking her  prayers  —  does beth suddenly feel relieved?

[kitkatt0430]

Okay, so what if Fringe and The Flash took place in the same universe?

Fringe ended January 2013; the accelerator incident that created the Flash occurred in-universe December 2013.  So Fringe Division could have easily been sent to investigate what was clearly a Fringe Event in Central City.  Walter’s gone (I know there was a time skip at the end of Fringe even with the Observers defeated, but lets just say Walter’s gone already, mmkay?) but I’d like to imagine that maybe the team has started branching out and growing.  So maybe a small team headed up by Astrid - who is long overdue this kind of promotion - shows up in Central City to investigate the incident and determine what sort of fallout they may be dealing with here.  

Astrid gets to Central City and starts investigating STAR Labs; who is going to show up on her radar here?  The main STAR Labs trio of season 1 of course: Harrison Wells (Eobard Thawne) himself and also Cisco Ramon and Caitlin Snow.  But also the other employees of STAR Labs.  The ones who are jumping ship, who are being quietly pointed towards earlier retirement, who are getting laid off by Wells because ‘STAR Labs’ is downsizing in response to this ‘tragedy’.  And one name keeps popping up.  Hartley Rathaway.  So Astrid tracks him down for an interview and finds him suffering from his newly enhanced hearing.  Hartley is no longer just a potential source of information implicating Wells in criminal negligence in the accelerator incident; he’s evidence that the city itself has become an ongoing Fringe event because of how he was altered by the dark energy released that night.

Broyles isn’t convinced that one person is evidence of an ongoing Fringe event.  Or at least he knows he can’t justify an ongoing presence in Central City based on Hartley’s enhanced hearing alone.  So Astrid has to find more ‘meta humans’.  (Would that even be a term yet?)  She’d hire Hartley as a temporary consultant, giving him the means to create the hearing aids he desperately needs to tone down his now painful hearing to something more manageable but also inadvertently promising him revenge - she is investigating STAR Labs and building a case against Wells, after all - and she knows how to deal with bitter, angry scientists.  Without really meaning to, Hartley winds up loyal to Astrid because she gave him the means to put his life back together after Harrison tore it apart.

But while all that character development for Astrid and Hartley’s going on, they still have to find more metas to justify a permanent presence in Central City for Fringe division.  (Astrid doesn’t want to leave the job undone and Hartley is starting to realize he doesn’t want this job to be temporary.)  And they do start discovering metas.  Starting with the comatose Barry Allen, whose unusual seizures and rapid healing have also attracted the attention of Harrison Wells.

I’d have Fringe Division in Central City wind up as a joint task force between the FBI and the CCPD headed up by Astrid, with Hartley as their lead scientific advisor and Joe and Eddie attached to it on the CCPD’s side.  They’d have a lab with little nods to Astrid’s time working with Olivia, Walter, and Peter - a piano for playing when their brains get stuck looking for inspiration, a little cow figurine to represent Gene... 

So now there’s this massive, on going Fringe event and the Observers marooned in this timeline are drawn to it, maybe thinking they can somehow use this to their advantage in reinstating the path to their future.  There’s William Bell, who in this timeline became the very sort of megalomaniac that Walter was so afraid of becoming himself, drawn to the promise of powers beyond anything even he’s imagined... perhaps even a new method of cheating death.  So the Fringe Team in Central City could easily create a whole new ‘season 1′ with stories dealing with new metahumans and tying up loose ends that Fringe’s truncated final season didn’t have time for.

But imagine beyond the first season of The Flash.  Maybe Earth-2 is The Other Side and the accelerator incident here had ripple effects there, causing Harry’s accelerator incident that same night.  (Though that’s my general headcanon regardless of whether I toss Fringe in there too.)  The breaches between the two Earths allow for new story lines with the other Fringe Division and Walternate.  A return of the shapeshifters, perhaps, seeing metahumans as a potential method of finally stabilizing themselves.  Fauxlivia and Lincoln and Scarlie vs Deathstorm and Killer Frost and Reverb... and not to forget Zoom, of course.

[blue---rose]

White Widow - Chapter 2

Fanfiction.net | AO3

Title: White Widow Chapter: Two Author: Blue Rose Rating: M (Hard R) Pairing: Sasuke/Sakura Summary: "Running away was easy; not knowing what to do next was the hard part." - Sakura needed to stop fantasizing about running away to some other life, and start figuring out the one she had. [Sasu/Saku, Modern AU]

Warnings: Adult Content Disclaimer: I own nothing, and I damn sure don't make a single red cent for this either. So please, don't sue the Blue

Author Notes: If you like please don't forget to review/comment/like. A very special thank you to my amazing beta: MySoberThoughts

･ﾟ* : *ﾟ･

He looked down between them and decided… it was one of the most foolish things he ever did in his entire life. The air rushed past his lips and his whole body strained for some measure of control, but watching himself as he took her was stripping any discipline he possessed. He wanted to savor this conquest, as barbaric as it sounded. It truly was the only word his muddled brain could come up with, to describe how it felt… to be able to get this close to someone like her, to have been deemed worthy enough to allow him into her bed, inside of her…

The groan he released did not cover the sound of them joining, his hips pulling away and... Gods... he could see how she covered him. The neighboring apartments and full moon cast the room in shadows, but through the dim light, he sees everything.

Her essence on his length as he began to move quicker…

The beautiful arch of her back…

The thick, wild mane that almost glowed peach against the sheets…

It became easier as they went along, moving together so fluently they could have been mistaken for long-time lovers; companions that had spent countless nights together, getting to know every dip and curve… every hidden crevice.

His patience in the beginning with her … taking his sweet time… allowing her to adjust and succumb to the pleasure that raced down to her toes, was paying off. She moaned beneath him, her body moving with a hypnotic, feline grace as she followed his lead. She yielded to him, offering herself…

…if he promised to keep taking care of her, like his sinful eyes had sworn to her that they would… she would give him anything he wanted at all… all night, for as long as he demanded it. The unspoken way his body communicated with her, all the ways he could make her feel… and all the things he could do, if only she would let him.

He was trying to fulfill that promise now. Shifting his hold, he moved at a faster pace, eager to show her all the ways he could make her sing for him. She was mistaken if she thought the little mews coming from her full lips would placate him for long.

Hands grasping, slipping across soft skin as she all but purred, green eyes finally meeting his own over her shoulder… looking at him in a way that had him aching… straining… just for her, and his lips pulled back, mouth opening to tell her just how fucking good she was being to him right now and he-

･ﾟ* : *ﾟ･

He awoke as his throat closed, cutting off the groan that was rising from his heaving chest. Sweat cooled on his forehead and pecs, the tank top sticking to his skin as he kicked the blankets off with a huff. His pulsing erection throbbed against his lower belly and he shut his eyes once more. He didn't have to check the time to know it was still very early. It was still dark out, but in a few minutes the predawn, morning sky would give way to streaks of blues and greys. His heart was still beating fast, as his mind scrambled to retain the images from the dream.

' Not just a dream though… was it? ', he thought.

Sasuke frowned, not liking the interruption from sleep the dream had caused… especially regarding that. Fuck, he was way too old for this shit… hardly an adolescent. He supposed it made sense though. It's not like these thoughts were just randomly populating. She was back, it seemed. And seeing her, standing there… no matter how fleeting, was bound to stir up memories of their last encounter together before she disappeared.

Damn, she looked good... really good. Standing there, tall boots hugging the edge of her thighs … looking so beautiful… with those legs that went on for days, and every inch of exposed skin sent heat racing through his veins. He sighed, running his hand across his face before running blunt nails across his scalp in frustration.

' Doesn't mean I have to like it. '

Accepting that he would not be going back to sleep anytime soon; he sat up, swinging his legs so his feet touched the floor… running a hand through his midnight locks again, body still humming. His only options were to either go for a run… or take a cold shower. His eyes flickered down, taking stock of his calming length, beneath his sleepwear and decided… some air would do him good.

By the time he rounded the corner at the end of his block, the playlist he selected on his phone was two songs in… and he had faith that, the repetitive pounding of his feet on the pavement would drive out any lingering thoughts of a girl that made it clear she did not want to be thought of, or chased.

At least for now…

There would be some time, coming soon he was sure… that would allow them to settle up, and actually, talk. And this time, she wouldn't go running off to some random airport gate to board a plane, before then… he'd make sure of it.

He was not someone to be ignored, as she'd soon come to know… even if she learned that lesson the hard way.

Sakura Haruno now had his full attention.

:✧･ ﾟ･*･ﾟ･✧ B R✧･ﾟ･*･ﾟ ･✧:

"Oh, I wish you'd visited the Manila Ocean Park while you were there. I'm telling you, it is absolutely amazing. Your father took me there a few years back." Mebuki said as all three ladies made their way outside. They had just all but gorged themselves on French Toast and mimosas, chatting half the morning away in the little café.

The older Haruno fussed over her daughter constantly, not missing a moment to inquire about her health… as well as her dating life. Only her mother could squeeze in talks about home cooked meals and husbands randomly, despite the topic of conversation. She tried to brush her off like normal, insisting that her job left little to no time for finding dates lately… or whipping together three-course meals every night.

"It's not like I'm going on a girl's trip. I don't go there to visit museums and beaches. I'm working."

"I know, I know. That doesn't mean you can't take care of yourself. Your health is important, you know that. I swear, if I didn't know for a fact you can cook more than microwavable meals, you'd put me in an early grave. I worry about you Sakura." She cupped her daughter's soft cheek, frowning in concern.

She really was proud of the work her daughter was doing with a small humanitarian group, the small organization was a branch of Doctors Without Borders. That did not take away the uneasiness she felt whenever her only child went abroad; sometimes to war-torn nations to lend aid, spreading health awareness and overall helping and doing good. Her concerns were only put to rest when, and ONLY when she heard her daughter's voice over the phone during a scheduled check-in, or… more importantly; when she was back in her home town… close enough to touch and hug and smoother with affection.

Sakura smiled, reaching up to cradle the warm hand still pressed against her face.

"Momma…" She gave her hand a squeeze before lowering both of them. "I'm fine… really. I eat, and not just junk food and grease. I promise."

"She has been eating salads and lots of lean protein since she's been home this time, Scouts Honor." Ino pipped up from behind them, slipping her sunglasses over her eyes. Sakura turned back to her mother.

"See?"

"Neither of you were girl scouts. We couldn't even get you two to join the Brownies because of the uniform color, remember? It wasn't 'in season' at the time." She deadpanned. Ino just cracked a smile at the memory.

Mebuki turned and swept Sakura up in a hug, squeezing just a bit too tight… but it warmed her heart, because it reminded her of the giant hugs her Dad still gave out, and she returned the tenderness eagerly. "I miss you so much. You really need to come home more often." She pulled back, catching her eyes before she could look away.

"And not just to your apartment, in the city… but home. You need to make more of an effort Sakura. Thanksgiving was the last time you set foot there, wasn't it? Such a long time ago. I know it's been difficult, and I completely understand-"

"Momma-"

"I mean it." There was a sharpness that entered her voice and had her back straightening. Her mother was not one to repeat herself, and when she did… you'd had better shut up and listen. That all, too familiar tone was hard wired in her brain, and even adulthood could not erase it. It was the language between a parent and child, and Sakura buttoned up immediately. "I know your father will be away for a while on business, but I'm still there. Your home, is still there, and you'd best make your way there to come see us… and sometime soon."

Green eyes were intently focused on her, and Sakura just knew; if they'd been somewhere more secluded, then standing on the sidewalk in DuPont Circle… they would indeed be having whatever discussion Mebuki felt was long overdue. Thank goodness for old school parents, who thought heavy conversations were best done privately.

Cracking a smile, and in an attempt to reset the mood; Mebuki changed the subject to Sakura's dating life.

"Hmmm, maybe you could bring that Managing Director home next time, for dinner. What was his name?" They walked her to her car, but Sakura stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, a muscle in her jaw twitched.

"…Dr. Dan? My boss?" She could not be serious.

"What a nice young man he is." Mebuki sang as she fished out her car keys.

"…He's my boss." Sakura deadpanned.

"You two could be discrete. Is such a thing, against company policy or guidelines?"

"Ew." Ino muttered, deciding to sit this one out. Sakura needed to fight her own battles.

"He's my mentor's fiancé, Momma", Sakura shook her head. Mebuki unlocked her car doors when they arrived to her parking spot, chuckling while pulling both girls close.

"It was just a thought. Anyways…I'll see you girls soon. I have a few stops to make in Georgetown before heading back. Sakura, you make sure to call me tonight, hmm? Love you girls!" One last departing kiss on the cheek and she was off, the little two-door coupe pulled away into traffic, leaving the duo standing there, a slight breeze brushing past them.

Ino turned to Sakura while pushing a few golden strains behind her ear. "Want to grab a drink?" Sakura's eyes widened, checking the time on her phone… confirming her suspicions.

"It's not even noon yet." She conveniently left out the fact that they just downed a few glasses of orange juice and champagne not too long ago.

"Ugh, whatever. Coffee then." She relinquished, leading her across the street to cut through the park, to grab a cup. She wasn't ready to part ways and wanted to spend as much time as she could with her best friend. "So… anything new? Other than 'Sexy Dan the Man', are there… any other guys I should know about?"

"You are horrible at being subtle; you do know that… right?"

"Then don't make me continue on with this charade and finally give me the 'deets I've been dying to get, for well over four months. And please, don't spare the horrid details. Because you owe me Hurano!" Did she even take a moment to breathe during all of that?

They took a seat in the outdoor patio area, enjoying the slightly warmer, spring weather the weekend ushered in. It was pretty nice out, with the sun making an appearance here and there despite the overcast. That didn't stop her expression from closing up, not quite sure how she wanted to approach the subject. It was at that moment she realized, she never really allowed herself to think about it. As crazy as it sounded, she was successful with her intentions of distraction over the last few months, and had not dwelled on the unknowns she'd left behind.

"There's not much to say. It was just a hook-up. Nothing special."

"Nothing special?" Ino echoed, after giving their coffee orders to the petite waitress.

"It was either So-God-Awful that you needed to run away, almost halfway across the world to escape the disappointment, OR-"

Her eyes lit up, gleaming with realization.

"It was good. Really good. And maybe… that scared you? I know you… and I have a funny feeling this was something loooooooong in the making you sneaky, sneaky girl. So what happened? You tried to ignore-", her hand waved in the air in Sakura's general direction, "-whatever has been building for a while… then… what? It all came to a head one crazy night of hormones?"

"And morning." She had no idea she spoke out loud until Ino gasped, recognition dawning across her pretty features.

"You whore!"

Aaaaaaaaand thank goodness that; despite it being a wonderful Saturday morning, the coffee shop was not packed, and no one was sitting close enough to clearly hear the outburst. Sakura still sunk down further in her seat and wished she was wearing one of the fitted caps hanging in her closet; she could at least, have pulled it low over her head and pretend to disappear for a while.

Two steaming cups were placed in front of them both, and the waitress tried unsuccessfully to hide her smile. She heard enough, to not meet Sakura's eyes, and said to let her know if they needed anything else. "Yes… please, be louder. I don't think they quite heard you in the back." She scolded when they were left alone. Ino waved her hand dismissively, blowing the hot liquid in her cup. Manicured nails tapped the porcelain rhythmically.

"Why had I not seen it? I got zero vibes from either of you, even leading up to it. I saw you over Thanksgiving break and you didn't say a word. I can't believe you tried to keep this from me." Ah, there it was… the bit of hurt finally peeking through. Sakura's gaze softened.

"This wasn't an ongoing thing, it only happened on New Years. I mean, I always thought he was kind of hot, but I never thought to act on anything. I mean, sure we've all been around each other but that was it, really. He was just one of Kiba's 'work friends'. You know that." There was no secret love affair that carried on for months, right under everyone's noses. It was much simpler than that.

"It wasn't…planned." She continued, her hand reaching up to graze the industrial piercing in her ear, a nervous habit. "I was just confused, after. I was still trying to figure some stuff out, and didn't want to make a bigger deal out of what happened, than it already was. Last year, everytime I saw him… I don't know. I just began to pay a little more attention to him then I should have. I don't think he knew, though. At least, I don't think he did. I just kept teasing myself with the thought, but never acted until…"

A sharp gleam entered her ocean colored eyes. "He didn't blow you off, did he? After… I mean."

"No! No… nothing like that. I promise." The killing intent bled away from the blonde's aura, but Sakura tried to put her completely at ease. "I'm serious. I mean, he had to leave after… and it was kind of awkward…-"

"Awkward enough for you; to hop on a plane, twenty-four hours later? To the Philippines?"

"That's not fair. That trip was planned and booked, even before I came home the first time, on Thanksgiving. We made it to France before turning around because of the delay. I figured I'd come home for a bit, while waiting. It's the only reason why I was in the city at all, remember? It just so happen we got word the very next day, after… you know…" She cupped her hands around the hot mug, the warmth seeping into her chilled digits. "When the embassy cleared us, we had to go."

Trailing a fingernail around the rim of her expresso, Ino bit her lip. She sighed, before leaning in.

"He asked about you."

"W-…What?"

Another sigh… before-

"I guess this was a few days after? He came with Kiba to a party. I don't know him that well, but I knew something was up. He never asked about you before then… so why start now? You dodging my texts and calls all but confirmed it for me. I knew something was up." Ino smiled. "I let it slip to Kiba, but he was utterly clueless."

Sakura rested her chin on her fist, elbow propped on the table in a way that would have Mebuki scolding her for lack of manners.

"Tall, rude bastard wouldn't squeal, either. 'Mind your business, Yamanaka', he said. Hah! As if! He should have minded his business... kept his ankle-spanker in his pants, and away from my poor, little, naïve friend." She huffed. The look on Sakura's face was priceless. She wasn't sure what she was about to say, but Ino cut her off. "So you iced him out after, huh? Is that it? That's what happened?"

Sakura shifted in her seat, lashes fluttering as she blinked, picking at the crisp white table cloth.

"He did try to call… sent texts too. I just…" She nibbled on her bottom lip. "It's just that… this was the first time I'd been with anyone since…you know… 'him'. And not just making out, but like… all the way."

Her eyes glinted briefly.

"I don't know… I just let it all get to my head, you know? Making a big deal out of nothing… over thinking everything… getting worked up and-"

She was going to give herself a headache if she kept this up. The more she said out loud, the crazier she thought she sounded. Especially now, when she was forced to face the hidden, deeper issues… things she'd dropped and left in her past.

"Look… we're friends. I love you… so much, you know that. You can tell me anything, and even though it might come off that way… I'm not judging, ok?" A brief pause had her meeting her gaze. "I just don't want you to get in the habit of running, every time something happens. Sometimes, you have to stay and deal with it. And I also don't want you to keep things in."

Sakura winced, immediately on the defensive.

"…That's not fair."

"No… maybe it's not. But it doesn't make it any less true."

"One has nothing to do with the other." She knew where this was going, and she didn't like it. Not one bit.

"You rarely go home…" Ah, and there it was.

"And that makes me a bad person?" Sakura countered, heart rate starting to elevate.

"No-"

"You know why…"

"I know-".

"You fucking know why." She whispered. The unshed tears began to burn, and she blinked rapidly. She tried to take a breath, the air getting caught in her throat and she tried to calm down.

She was quite surprised to find herself so upset… so quickly.

Gods, does that make her such a bad person? Does that make her such a bad person because she didn't want to go home that often… only to be reminded of-

"Can I get you ladies anything else?" The waitress returned, refreshing their water glasses.

"The check please, thanks." Ino replied, reaching under the table to grasp Sakura's knee. The pinkette grabbed her napkin, discreetly wiping the corner of her eyes. When they were left alone once again, Ino gave her a small smile. "I didn't mean to upset you. You know I want to see you happy. That's all… I promise. It just worries me sometimes that you keep a lot bottled in. I don't ever want you to think that you can't come to me."

Gathering her composure, she nodded. She knew Ino was coming from a good place, knew what type of person she was, and where her intentions lie. She returned her smile, letting her know that all was forgiven, even if they agreed to disagree for now.

"So…" The corners of her mouth turned up, the lopsided grin giving her away before she could continue.

"How was it? I hope he knew what he was doing with that thing, and wasn't just mindlessly shoving away."

Sakura almost choked on the still heated coffee, glaring at her around a cough, her throat unconstricting. "Should I even ask how you would know something like that?"

Ino just rolled her eyes.

"Grey sweatpants; last October. You know I don't miss a thing." She winked, as if that explained anything. "Now, back on topic. Was it good? It must have been good for him, to have come to me, asking about you. That's my girl. Been off the pony for a while, but saddled up like a pro!"

Maybe… just maybe, getting up and leaving the table was the best option. It would surely spare any more embarrassment than she already felt.

The waitress returned with Sakura's credit card and receipt, while Ino excused herself to take a trip to the ladies room. Sakura's phone vibrated, and she swiped right to unlock and answer the device without looking, signing her name on the slip of paper in front of her.

"Hello?"

"…Hello?" Sakura tried again, only hearing a faint melody in the background, before the call ended. Looking at the screen, she didn't have long to dwell on the call before Ino made her return to stand next to the table, one hip poked out to the side as she tapped away on her own phone.

"Hey, what are you doing tonight?"

Sakura stood as well, the call from the unlisted number quickly fading from memory. Her eyes lowered in thought. "Not sure… I don't think I had anything planned. Why?"

"Ten-Ten is in town this weekend. We are so going out tonight." She was already leading the way down the street, to where they parked. Even in sneakers, Sakura was hard pressed to keep up… increasing her pace, calling out for her to wait up.

"I'm going to call Chino; see if she can fit us in for blowouts, right now."

:✧･ ﾟ･*･ﾟ･✧ B R✧･ﾟ･*･ﾟ ･✧:

His body felt strangely cold; despite the fact heat was drifting across him, from the fireplace. There was this persistent, ringing in his ear and he couldn't tell if the noise really was loud… or it was just something he was focused acutely on, instead of the pain.

' Fuck. '

It really hurt to breathe. It felt more like a chore, than a life necessity. A thump could be heard somewhere in the home, but he didn't trust himself to accurately locate where it was coming from. He could gauge that he was tired as hell, and wondered just how long his eyes were previously closed before he opened them (barely)… just a few moments ago. His phone flickered to life, making him squint at the cracked screen. Bloody fingers reached out across the wooden floor, moving slowly… barely able to manage a grip on the device to pull it closer.

Message:

"Dear Valued Customer, it has come to our attention-"

His eyes blurred again, and he blinked hard, twice.

Message:

"-ause of this, we have reversed the following transaction-"

Dark eyes skimmed the text. His thumb pressing a box on the screen.

Message:

"Confirm Transaction Reversal?"

A new payee was chosen; one from recent history near the top of the list, and the selection was quickly made. He accepted the changes, his breath beginning to rattle in his lungs. His fingers scrolled across the screen, trying to press the correct characters. The emoji options came into view; an array of colorful option to choose from. They weren't needed however, and his fumbling fingers tried to get the device to switch back to the qwerty keyboard layout.

He was unsuccessful, and finally choose one as his eyes began to feel heavy.

Message:

"-re about to transfer all available funds. Are you sure?"

The green button was pressed.

Message:

"Transaction Complete"

His fingers begin to cramp, trying to hold his hand steady before he gave in. He let the device go, landing face down on the cracked screen just as he heard muffled footsteps approaching. His chest tightened as he let out a wet cough; his eyes closing for what he thought would only be a moment. He just needed to rest, just for a minute, and he would feel better… he was sure. The room stopped spinning just before darkness claimed him again.

END CHAPTER

Next: Chapter Three

[connorssock]

Hi, I'm that Comment person from ao3, and want to say hi, and ty again for your amazing writing, I always enjoy reading it :D I also have an idea for a prompt, but don't feel obligated to fill it if it's not something you'd have fun writing (*´罒`*) It's kinda long, so will send a 2nd message :0 2/2

Gavin is v depressed, and due to the amount of work he’s had recently, he’s been unable to, or forgot to pick up refills for his medicine, so one day he doesn’t come to work. Connor, Hank, and Nines notice, but don’t start to worry for a few days. Eventually Fowler asks them to go check up on Gavin, and they find him unable to even get out of bed or find the energy to pick up his phone to call anyone for help. They then stay w/ him until he’s ok, and maybe become closer? >

I am so sorry this took so long to fill, Comment! Partially it was because I needed a break between this and the chapter of Android Update 5.12 which was very very similar. And partially because it…sort of ran away a little. I hope it is what you were after though!

The Net To Catch Your Fall

It was the season for colds and flu. Gavin had been bracedfor it, a bug had been making its way round the precinct and the sore throat he’dbeen waking up with for the last few nights spelled a few not so great daysahead.

“Morning G-Man!” Tina chirped at him as he walked past herdesk.

“Morning,” he said. Or tried to, but it was more of a hoarsecroak.

“Well shit dude, sounds like you went to town on a hundreddicks last night.” It was reassuring to know that Tina was a sympathetic asever.

“I wish,” Gavin shot back with a grin.

“Want me to grab you some throat soothers?”

She was alright after all; her heart was in the right place.All the same, Gavin waved her off.

“I need to go to the pharmacy anyway; I’ll pick some upthen.”

Of course, he didn’t get a chance to go to the pharmacy.They were called to a crime scene half an hour before he finished work. By thetime they were done the pharmacy had long since shut. There was always the nextday.

Unfortunately, the next day was no different to the previousone. By the time Gavin could get to the pharmacy it was shut. He shrugged, hehad a few days leeway, he was organised and knew how to keep his shit together.It was going to be fine.

If it wasn’t going to interview potential witnesses, it wasa meeting that over ran or getting caught up in paperwork that needed to beurgently filed. Getting a warrant was no laughing matter and even a day’s delaycould mean the difference between a successful case and evidence beingdestroyed. A packet of throat sweets landed on Gavin’s desk.

“Since you still haven’t managed to cough up your lung, nomatter how hard you’re trying,” Tina said and walked away.

“Thanks,” Gavin tried to yell after her but his voice cameout more as a whine.

He popped a lemon flavoured sweet in his mouth and tried toignore the sluggishness that had been creeping through his body.

Things were getting worse though. He struggled to focus onhis work which he could blame on his cold but the blanket of indifferent dreadthat shrouded him wasn’t so easy to dispel. Finally, he had the time to go tothe pharmacy. It had been almost 2 weeks he’d been trying to go. Of course itwas the day he left his prescription at home.

The clock ticked over six and Gavin pushed away from hisdesk. There was no point in staying to finish the report he’d been staring atfor the last three hours. It wasn’t like anyone was ever going to read itanyway. He walked out of the precinct and didn’t look back.

His desk was empty the next day. A few people cast curiousglances at it but people assumed Gavin had finally succumbed to the bug goinground and had decided to take a day off to recover. When his seat stayed emptythe following day and the day after, Nines began to worry. He approachedCaptain Fowler with well-intentioned questions and didn’t expect the bluntanswers he got.

Fowler had no idea where Gavin was, he didn’t pick up hisphone, reply to e-mails. For the time being, he could be signed off as absentdue to sickness but if he didn’t get in touch soon, Fowler couldn’t cover forhim.

“Why don’t you pop round his? Check in with him. It’sunusual to take so long off without at least a message,” he’d suggested.

It got Nines thinking, he didn’t know what he’d say to Gavinupon encroaching on his home. He also didn’t want to do it alone. That’s how hefound himself with not just Connor, but also Hank behind him as they approachedGavin’s home.

There was no response to knocking. Not on the first attempt,or the second. After the third time, when Nines raised his hand to knock oncemore, Hank grabbed his hand.

“I don’t think he wants to answer the door,” he said.

Sullenly, Nines lowered his hand.

“What if he’s in there and he needs assistance though?”

They could hear Gavin’s phone ringing in the hallway of theapartment block. If the man wasn’t in, he’d left his phone behind. Just to makea point, Nines called it again and stared Hank down.

“Fine, if he gets pissed that we broke into his flat, you’retaking the blame,” Hank rolled his eyes and gestured to the door.

Nines lifted his hand and prepared to break through it

“Woah!” Hank grabbed his arm again. “Easy there.”

He reached for the door handled and twisted it. It openedwith a click and Hank shot Nines a look that spoke volumes.

“Always check the easiest route first,” he grumbled.

It was impossible to miss the way his fingers stillunclipped the top of his gun holster, ready to expect the worst. The apartmentthey walked into was stale for want of a better word. It hadn’t seen movementin days and Hank wrinkled his nose at the smell. Nines called Gavin’s phoneagain and they listened to it ring and vibrate from a room with the door ajar.Slowly, they moved towards it.

The room was darker than expected, the curtains haphazardlypulled shut and the phone lit up the room where it rang on the bedside table.The smell of days old sweat lingered and Nines was tempted to shut hisolfactory sensors down but something stopped him. On the side of the bedfurthest from the bedside table was an unmoving form.

Connor pulled the curtains away and they stared at Gavin whowas curled up in bed, bare shoulder poking out from under the cover. His eyesslid over the three intruders before turning back to the bedside table in anunfocussed stare. Out of shock, Nines rang the phone again and watched Gavin’seyes track to the noise before returning to his blank stare.

“Gavin?” Connor asked.

There wasn’t even a flinch of acknowledgement from the bed.Hank looked over the room, there was a half full bottle of water on the floorby Gavin’s side, his phone on the bedside table, plugged in and charging. Thosehe was happy to see. What was more troubling were the boxes of pills next tothe phone, indiscriminately piled up but thankfully none of them open alongwith pen and paper. It was obvious that someone had tried to write something,but sheets were scrunched up with scribbled out words. Whoever Gavin was tryingto write to, he had obviously failed.

“I don’t understand,” Nines started and Hank cut him offwith a sharp look.

“Connor, tidy up a bit in here please,” Hank nodded at theboxes of pills and the pile of clothes abandoned at the side of the bed. “You,come with me,” he pointed at Nines.

They walked into the kitchen where Hank began to rummage throughthe cupboards, looking for something easy on the stomach.

“My scans show that Gavin is fine,” Nines started again andHank slammed a cupboard door shut.

“Does that man look like the walking definition of fine?” hesnarled.

“No. I don’t understand. Even his lingering laryngitis isall but gone.”

“Just because your scans show that someone is fine doesn’tmean they are. There’s more to a human than just their body. Like there’s moreto you than your chassis and hardcoding.”

While Nines stood and contemplated the words, Hank continuedhis search. After a moment his eyes fell on the fridge which had a few piecesof paper held to it with magnets. Mostly they were scribbled reminders, shoppinglist, appointments and meeting dates. Amongst it all, he spotted a vaguely familiarlooking piece of paper. A prescription.

“Ah.”

That was all he said before he pulled it free and scannedover it. He frowned when he saw that date and looked at his watch as he workedout how overdue it was.

“Take this to the pharmacy, pick it up. Tell them it’surgent police business if they give you any trouble.”

Obediently, Nines took the proffered prescription and left. Itgave Hank a few minutes to find a pack of plain digestive biscuits in the backof a cupboard before Connor appeared in the kitchen doorway with an armful ofboxes.

“I’ve done what I can,” was all he said before he found theempty drawer and began to sort through the pills.

“I know, Con, I know,” Hank laid a reassuring hand on hisshoulder. “Baby steps, remember?”

Connor shot him a sad smile and wondered whether all humanswere so broken or whether it was a side effect of knowing him. He watched Hankdisappear into the bedroom and sighed. He hoped he was just unlucky in knowingso many humans cursed with depression.

Inside the bedroom, Hank put the plate of biscuits down onthe bedside table and took a good look at Gavin. His hair was falling in greasystrands, his usual stubble longer, almost worthy of being called a beard. Helooked hollow, eyes empty of all light and each breath a slight shudder like itwas the most difficult task in the world to keep breathing. It probably feltlike it.

“I can’t promise that eating something will make you feelbetter, but it might be a start,” Hank tried.

When he got no response, he shrugged. He hadn’t expected hisvoice and idea to work miracles after all. Without sighing, or even expressingany disappointment, Hank walked around the bed.

“I’m going to help you sit up, if you feel light headed atall then squeeze my shoulder and we’ll get you lying back down. But once you’reup, I’m going to but a biscuit in your hand and you’d going to eat it.”

There was no response but Gavin let his arms be positionedaround Hank’s neck and put up no resistance to being sat up. His face wassallow in the light and Hank gave him a moment, holding his shoulders to makesure he wasn’t about to keel over.

“Okay,” he muttered and let Gavin go.

It was almost like watching a haunted doll. Hank pushed abiscuit into Gavin’s lax fingers and after a moment they grasped hold of it.Mechanically, the biscuit was lifted to Gavin’s mouth and he took a bite, eyesstaring at the far wall. When he’d finished it off, there were crumbs on hisshirt but it was the least of Hank’s worries. Instead of brushing him down, heran a gentle hand through greasy hair.

“Well done,” he murmured and Gavin’s eyes fluttered shutbriefly. “Nines will be here with your prescription soon. Things will get backon track.”

He helped Gavin lie down again and wished they were at thestage they could at least change the covers on the bed.

True to his words, Nines was back with the prescription andhe helped Hank sit Gavin up again. They pressed two pills into his palm and watchedhis throat bob as he swallowed them dry. The water he swallowed after it was anautomatic gesture, not one borne out of need.

“Try to get some sleep,” Hank rumbled softly. “Nines willstay with you while Connor and I will sort a few things out.”

They left the door half open and Connor’s LED flashed yellowfor a moment as he listened to Nines start to talk. It was all inconsequentialthings, stories from the precinct, the cases they worked on, where they made adifference.  Not once did Gavin even huffout a note of acknowledgement and Connor reached out to Nines in silence.

His lack of responseis not a reflection of you. Do not lose heart.

It seemed to dissipate a little of the disappointment thatNines found himself sinking into and he continued talking to Gavin, even if hischoice of stories veered towards the more outrageous.

A quick phone call to Fowler and suddenly the three of themdidn’t have a day off together for two weeks. Each day Hank, Connor or Nineswas off and they could spend the time with Gavin until he got back on his feet.

“I read somewhere that animals could bring positive healthbenefits to humans,” Nines mulled over dinner one evening. It was Connor whowas sat with Gavin that night.

“I’ll take Sumo with me tomorrow then,” Hank nodded and eyedhis dog. “I’m sure Gavin used to have a cat.”

The next day was Hank’s first alone with Gavin. He got thereearly enough for Connor to be able to get to work comfortably and he ignoredthe puzzled look of seeing Sumo on a tight leash by Hank’s side.

For the most part, the day was quiet. Sumo had made himselfat home in Gavin’s flat, snuggled up next to him and occasionally turned tolick the man’s hand that was buried in his fur. It was the first time Hank hadseen Gavin move voluntarily, even if only to thread fingers in thick fur andgrip like his life depended on it. Maybe it did.

The next day it was Nines with Gavin. He mostly sat on thebed, on top of the covers and talked. When he saw Gavin’s eyes droop, sleepthreatening to pull him under, his voice softened until he was certain Gavinwas drawing deep even breaths, eyelid fluttering as he dreamt. The fact he wokewith a panting gasp shouldn’t have surprised Nines, nightmares were on par forthe course really. But he hadn’t anticipated a hand shooting out to grab at hisin a vice like grip. Nines pulled the hand into his lap, the fingers of hisfree hand stroked over the knuckles until they relaxed a little.

“I’m sorry,” Gavin whispered, voice hoarse with disuse.

“You’re doing just fine,” Nines replied and pretended not tosee the tears that trickled across Gavin’s face, tracing the path of the scaron his nose.

With Connor there, it was a little less personal. He didn’tsit with Gavin all the time, gave him space as he worked at his kitchen table.There was the sound of a door closing which made Connor jerk upright, followedby the sound of a shower turning on. With a small smile, he hopped off thestool and walked into the bedroom. It only took him a few minutes to change thesheets, fluff up the pillows and quickly air the room. By the time Gavinstumbled out of the bathroom in nothing but a pair of boxers, Connor was backon the stool as though he’d never moved in the first place.

“Didn’t you used to have a cat?” Connor asked that evening.

Gavin had sat up by himself and accepted the small bowl ofthick soup with a brief moment of eye contact. Obviously it was the wrongquestion to ask because Gavin froze up at the words and his head dipped, hairfalling into his face like a shield.

“She’s the neighbour’s now,” he rasped after a minute ofsilence.

“I see,” Connor didn’t, but he wasn’t sure what he could sayto remedy the situation.

“When I last had an episode,” Gavin broke off for a momentfor a breath. “When I last got like this, I couldn’t look after her. It wasn’tfair. Couldn’t neglect her like that. So I found her a better home.”

He sniffed and Connor furiously tried to backpedal withplatitudes of Gavin doing the best for her, of her being happy in her new home.Nothing seemed to help, if anything it just made things worse and he had totake the bowl from Gavin’s lax grip before it spilled everywhere.

“Because anywhere was better for her than with me,” Gavingasped and pulled his knees up to his chest.

His tears stopped as quickly as they started but he didn’ttake the bowl back from Connor that evening. Even from the living room Connorcould head his stomach rumbling with hunger. Humans punished themselves in thestrangest of ways for the oddest of things.

Handover to Hank in the morning was a mixed affair. Sumo hadbeen allowed to charge ahead into the apartment and had already taken up hisfavourite spot on the bed next to Gavin. It left Connor with a chance to giveHank a rundown of all the good things (shower, clean bedsheets and sometalking) as well as the not so good (crying over his cat, perhaps it was bestto avoid the topic for a bit). All through it, Hank nodded and when he was doneand getting ready to leave, Connor was surprised to be pulled in for a hug.

“You did good,” Hank murmured against his hair, “sometimes agood cry is what’s needed.”

Puzzled, Connor left for work, mind racing through thereasons why inadvertently making Gavin cry was a good thing. He drew a blank.

Back at the apartment, Hank knocked on the bedroom door.

“Rise and shine,” he called, “the pill club is moving to thekitchen table today.”

There was no response from the bedroom but he didn’t expectmuch either. After a minute of puttering around and setting out breakfast, hereturned to the bedroom.

“Ready to face the world yet? I won’t even make you dress upif you’re not up to that yet. Just come out and keep an old man company whilewe take our happy pills.”

That at least got Gavin staring at him, the hand buried inSumo’s fur stopping. It was enough of a reaction for Hank to retreat, confidentthat Gavin was going to follow. Sure enough, a few minutes later thefloorboards creaked and Gavin appeared in the kitchen doorway. He had even puta t-shirt on.

“Sit, sit,” Hank urged him towards one of the stools as heperched on the other one.

Each place was set up identical, a bowl of porridge, a glassof fresh orange juice and a box of pills next to each glass. Gavin eyed it allsceptically, carefully tacking Hank’s movements as he took his own pills andpopped one out. He took it with a gulp of orange juice and smiled at Gavin.

“You too?” Gavin asked. He’d recognised the brand of pillsHank was taking, it was one he’d tried himself but the side effects were toomuch to cope with.

“Me and probably half the precinct,” Hank nodded.

“Huh,” Gavin huffed out and reached for his own pills. Twosat in his palm as he regarded them before lifting them to his mouth andswallowing them dry.

“There’s no shame about it, you know that, right?” Hankasked softly. He didn’t look at Gavin, kept his eyes carefully on the spoonfulof sugar he was sprinkling over his porridge.

“Yeah, I know,” Gavin finally admitted.

It was progress, Hank didn’t want to push for too much toosoon but at the same time there was something they needed to talk about.

“That night we first came over,” he began delicately.

Gavin stiffened in his seat, ready to bolt.

“You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” Hank heldup his hands to placate, “but the door was open, you made it easy for whoevercame to find you. No need to call the police, break your door in, cause ascene. Trust me, I know, I’ve been through the same process. The pills on theside, you were going to take them, once you wrote your notes. But you neverfinished a note. What held you back?”

The silence between them stretched to an uncomfortable levelas Gavin pushed his porridge around in the bowl. Finally, he pushed it awayuntouched and crossed his arms over his chest defensively.

“I didn’t have anyone to write a note to,” he bit out atlong last.

Hank nodded, no judgement showed in his face.

“I realised I was such an unwanted fuck-up that I didn’teven have anyone to say goodbye to. Nobody would miss me if I lay down and diedso that’s what I did. Wasn’t even worth taking the pills because they wouldhave been wasted on me.”

The outburst left Gavin’s chest heaving and Hank looked overat him calmly.

“Do you still think that?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” Gavin ran a hand through his hair thescratched at his beard with a disgusted frown.

“I don’t mean to pry and I know it’s none of my business,but,” Hank took a steadying breath and held Gavin’s gaze, “I thought you andNines might have a bit of a thing going.”

Gavin looked away at that and he scoffed.

“The poor bastard doesn’t know any better. He’ll find someonemore deserving soon enough.”

“Funny,” Hank mused, “that’s exactly what I used to thinkabout Connor. Don’t you think it’s a little unfair to be making that decisionfor Nines? Rather than asking him?”

“Can’t we talk about pills that make us less miserableinstead?” There was a whine to Gavin’s voice that made Hank smile.

“For what it’s worth, I’d have been gutted,” Hank finishedhis porridge and left the table to do the washing up.

The rest of the day passed quietly, Gavin burrowed back intohis bed but at least he was sitting up, back against the headboard and flickingthrough his phone. That evening he suggested that Hank go home but he was wavedoff.

“One more night on your couch won’t kill me,” he’d said.

In the morning Nines was at Gavin’s door, knocking politely.Hank opened it with a loose smile.

“He’s in the shower, had enough of beard itching,” he saidand stepped round Nines’ and patted him on the shoulder.

By the time Gavin emerged from the shower, freshly shaved tohis more usual look and hair towelled dry, Nines had breakfast set up.

“Hey,” a sudden bout of shyness took over Gavin and hestruggled to look at Nines.

“Hello Gavin,” Nines replied and held out a bowl of fruits. “Igot you some breakfast.”

“Thanks,” Gavin took the bowl and scooped up the box ofpills from the side. He popped two out and swallowed, chasing them down with astrawberry.

They stood in the kitchen awkwardly, Gavin munching on hisfruit for lack of anything better to do while Nines leaned against a counterand watched him. Eventually, the bowl was empty and Gavin ran out of excusesnot to talk.

“So,” he began and rubbed the back of his neck, “thanks. Foreverything. And sorry.”

“Are you apologising for your mental health?”

Gavin knew Nines well enough to find a hint of incredulityin in his voice. It made him dip his head and mumble his response.

“You are the way you are,” the words seemed so easy, comingfrom Nines, “you cannot help your chemical imbalance any more than I can helpmy core coding. We can both try to work around it with pills and layers ofsubroutines but neither of us asked to be the way we are.”

“I know that,” Gavin kicked at the ground in discomfort, histoes rhythmically stubbing against the floor.

“So you have nothing to apologise for unless you think Ishould be apologising for being built to be a killing machine.”

“I should have told you sooner, you should have known whatyou were signing up for right from the start.”

“You do realise I’m a state of the art detective androidwith real time lab analysis capabilities, right?” Nines let out a small smileas Gavin’s head snapped up in disbelief.

“You knew all along?”

“I happen to enjoy analysing everything about the one Ilove.”

The bowl went clattering from Gavin’s hand and he steppedaway with wide eyes.

“You can’t say that,” he gasped, a hand clawing at his chestas though trying to keep his heart in place. “You’ve not lived enough to knowthat.”

The unimpressed look Nines shot him was usually enough toinstil fear in anyone but Gavin had become immune to it over time.

“If you’re quite done.”

That at least shut Gavin up. Patiently, Nines offered up anarm in invitation for a hug and he tried his best not to roll his eyes whenGavin looked hesitant.

“I won’t bite. Unless you ask me to.”

“Prick,” Gavin huffed out a laugh and stepped over the bowlthat had cleaved in two as it fell.

“Are you quite done having an existential crisis?” Ninesasked even as he wrapped Gavin in his arms and rested his chin on top of hishead.

He could feel the brush of a smile against his collarboneand Gavin burrowed in a little closer.

“I’m not sure yet. Might have to stand here a little longerto make sure.”

Nines let him cling on, ignored the little shiver thatpassed through Gavin every now and then as he fought whatever inner demon itwas that had reared its ugly head again.

“Tomorrow,” Gavin mumbled into his chest,” “we’re going towork. And I’m buying you, Hank and Connor the biggest gift baskets I can find.”

“Or you could ask us to help next time you find yourself inneed. Preferably before things hit rock bottom,” Nines tried to compromise.

“Can’t promise that,” Gavin shook his head and looked up atNines with wide eyes. “But I can promise to try my best.”

“That’s all I ask,” Nines replied and leaned down to press akiss to his lips.

The next morning when Connor knocked on the door, both Ninesand Gavin were ready to head to work. They bundled into the taxi alongside Hankwho smiled warmly at them all before pulling Connor’s hand into his and linkingtheir fingers. Shyly, Gavin reached out for Nines and grinned when they did thesame.