#to be clear this excludes most of the flash family

[marie-dufresne]

Marie Valentine let herself into the office. Despite having been a ghost for eighteen years, her reintroduction to society—and her place with the elites—had been seamless, so when she needed something, she helped herself to it.

There was no complaint from Reeve.

“Elena,” she greeted in return, though didn’t go much further. She wasn’t terribly comfortable arounf the girl. She had…many things to say to her.

“Loz has lost something. I’ll be quick.”

Her boys were all out of the office (probably for the best. They worked best in the field, not behind a desk), but she was familiar with where they dropped the belongings that she so often came in to fetch.

She was thankful it was Loz who had forgotten something. Reno’s station was just as much a mess as Kadaj’s room had always been, but Rude, who Loz had been partnered with for his atonement, was a pristine, orderly, minimalistic sort of man and though her son was not, she clearly found the key that had fallen from it’s chain, perfectly set inside the middle drawer of the desk, next to a staple remover.

Closing the drawer with a little click, she straightened herself, adjusting the wide black belt that hugged her natural waist before letting her gold purse slide down to her elbow, flicking it open and depositing the key.

Loz and Rude would be working late, so her instructions were to drop it off to Tifa. Did she have to? No. Did her husband disapprove of how she continued to coddle them? Yes, yes he did. But Marie had always been the sort of woman to overstep every boundary where he children were concerned.

Though she didn’t intend to stay, Elena’s hair caught her eye and for a moment, she pictured it drenched in red. It was an intrusive thought, one that truthfully, she was avoiding.

When she had heard of the torture her sons had administered upon Tseng and Elena, her heart had broken. Having known Tseng since he’d been a child, approaching him after the fact had been easy. She hadn’t been well received, but she reached out, she offered all of herself for whatever he needed. They were healing.

But Elena?

She didn’t know this girl. She hated hearing what had been done, but Elena had become a TURK while Marie had been away in Mideel, in hiding, raising her family away from the prying eyes of Shinra (Tseng excluded). She had no connection, but she did harbor guilt. At some point, she had to confront this girl, to let her know she didn’t condone what they’d done. That was not how she raised them.

Clearing her throat, she tucked some of her greying curls behind her ear, resisting the urge to pull it all into a braid. Her underarm flashed aqua, her sleeves stopping at her elbow, the mako that glowed beneath her skin as bright as it had been forty years prior.

“Elena,” she repeated, approaching her desk, extending a hand, her gold bangles jingling lightly, “we really haven’t been properly introduced. I��m…the triplets’ mother.”

Marie knew that she knew this. She’d been called ‘mama’ in the office often enough. Not to mention the rumors that flew around. Still, as much of a people person she was, as much as she could talk her way out of or into most anything, this was an incredibly uncomfortable situation.

closed thread with @marie-dufresne

pale fingers paused in their typing frenzy as elena exhaled loudly , eyes scanning the screen in front of her. they darted back and forth , double , then triple checking her report. data entry was mind-numbingly boring on the best of days , but that didn't mean that she didn't want it to be incorrect. she had standards , after all. a few clicks later and the document was sent with a whoosh to the appropriate inbox.

reaching her arms above her head , elena linked her fingers and stretched. her back popped in a few places , alluding to the length of time she'd spent hunched over writing. a content sigh left her as she lowered her hands and then propped her chin up with her palm , gaze directed towards one of the many windows in the office.

a bright orange was refecting off the the many buildings surrounding the tower she was in , bathing the room in a myriad of dusky tones. she could almost feel the warmth of the setting sun on her skin. the door creaked open , causing her to look the other way. at the sight of the figure , elena let a small , polite smile arrange its way on her features.

‘ marie , ’ she greeted , rising from her desk. ‘ hi , what brings you here today ?? i'm the only one in at the moment. ’ she kept her tone casual and tried to not be as clipped in front of strangers as she normally was. marie , after all , wasn't a stranger. elena had seen the other woman around often , sending her a polite smile whenever they made eye contact. truth be told , she didn't know how to act around her ; elena was used to working with men , and the only other woman she'd been close-ish with was her sister.

[uravity-the-infinity-girl]

Shoto and Fuyumi headcanons

Touya and Natsu have always been close. Fuyumi doesn’t have that same relationship with them as they do with eachother but she still played with them every day and after Touya’s ‘death’ Fuyumi and Natsuo only really have each other. Now as adults they have that bond that Fuyumi always envied but she always worries that Shoto might feel what she felt-perhaps he longs to have a close bond with his family as well?

So Fuyumi instantly puts in everything she can into becoming closer with her youngest brother so he doesn’t feel excluded or intimidated by her and Natsuo’s close bond.

Fuyumi loves taking photographs, ‘to capture good memories’ she says. She’s always had to cherish the few good moments she had with her family because they didn’t come often. Shoto is so unintentionally photogenic and together their photos are awe inspiring. They go on long walks together in the park for the sole purpose of taking photos- after a while they stop needing to talk one look at a pretty display of flowers or bench in the sunlight and the both know what the other is thinking. One day Fuyumi suggests Shoto should take some pictures of her instead of vice versa like usual, they go about their normal walk, they both have a great time and he seems happy with the results. However when Fuyumi scrolls back through her camera roll she finds most of them are out of focus and her head is cut out of the frame but she treasures them anyway and sets her favourite as her lock screen. 

She also starts helping Shoto with his homework and revising for exams. He’s a machine at rote learning- she makes the prettiest flashcards with hero society laws and the dates they were passed and he can have them memorised the next day. Before UA written exams she goes through every flash card with him before bed to make sure he’s ready. While Shoto can learn off any information he does struggle with some essay questions or giving his opinion, it’s just not the way he was trained. Fuyumi (and Natsuo as-well when he’s not busy with his own work) will help him practice with these questions and he’s delighted to see so much improvement. 

Another of Fuyumi’s hobbies they do together is cooking and baking. At first he just watches, leaning against the counter as his eyes closely follow her actions. She finds it a little intense and awkward but appreciates the effort regardless. One day he comes home from the dorms for the weekend and empties a shopping bag on the kitchen table. He shyly tells Fuyumi that he wants to make Shio Daifuku because Inko made it for him when he visited Midoriya’s. She is ecstatic and the set about making them immediately. They are so caught up that they forget about dinner so when Natsuo arrives home hungry he has to run out to get take away for the trio. It’s all worth it though because they all share the dessert and enjoy it very much. 

One of their best memories together was when they came out to Rei together. Fuyumi told Natsuo ages ago but before Shoto he was the only one who knew. Shoto didn’t come out as much as told her about Midoriya until it was clear he was in love. He was really grateful to have Fuyumi to talk to him about it even if she could get a bit overexcited about her brothers’ love lives. After a while they started planning to tell Rei together, they did it when visiting her and it went really well! 

sometimes when it’s just them for dinner (eg if Natsuo is studying and they have no guests over) they will eat in the living room and watch tv. They were never allowed to do that as kids so they feel a bit rebellious at first but soon it just feels habitual.

She tells Shoto all her funny stories about Touya and Natsuo so he can get to know his brothers. The first time they visit Touya in rehabilitation they actually go together because they both needed some emotional support while Natsuo wanted to talk to him alone. After however then they tend to all go together quite often.

One day Shoto finds himself telling Touya a funny story of a day he spent with Fuyumi and in that moment his face lights up because he realised he’s finally got a normal sibling relationship and he can do it again with Touya.

[marslovesdaisies]

Look what you made me do || P.S.H

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

Minors do not interact.

WC: 2.6k

Pairing: Mafia! Seonghwa x Mafia!OC

Warnings: Death, murder, violence, gaslighting, manipulation, mafia themes, weapons, angst, gore, eventual smut.

A/N: The question isn't am I late or am I late. It's what are you gonna do about it?

Chapter 3

2 years ago:

I had blood on my hands.

I could vaguely feel its stickiness gently running down my fingertips, like some sort of forgotten, korean version of lady macbeth. Though I didn't know who hated it more, me or her. A small voice inside me said it had to be her, she most likely did not know just how heavy the price of a life is. As if I did, I mused. I had thought I had. I had paid it regardless.

I numbly walked out of the hotel room and brought myself to find the bathroom ensuite. Purely mechanical movements got the water running. I washed the pigment off, rubbing my skin till it was redder than the blood. I registered feet shuffling outside the door and a knock. "Boss, should we clear out? The work here is done." I let a second pass. "Yes." "As you wish." With that, he walked off and muffled orders were now audible, no doubt to the others outside. The words as you wish kept playing in my head like a broken record, an irony that refused to leave me alone. As you wish. It really was as I wished it in this city, wasn't it? I had always loved to play god. I got off on the thrill of infallibility it brought me. Of course, my fall was long. And if matters were any indication, I was yet to hit the ground. I hardly tried to stop the shudder that went through me at the thought. Images of crashed skulls and swollen bones kept flashing through my mind, but the face wasn't mine. I retracted my hands, the automatic tap turning off. I dried them and opened the door.

The room was empty save for the smell of disinfectant. I walked to the entrance, my uncle's men all waiting for me to exit. None of them spoke a word to each other as I marched on and out of the suite, them following some distance behind. "Jihun." I called out his name without looking back. "Keep this under the covers. Exclude it out of your report to my uncle or father. If he asks, I was out moping." "Whatever you say." And there it was again. Words that usually stroked my fragile ego into contentment had the opposite effect today. They made my hackles rise, if anything. "Leave the twins behind with me." Jihun, the man this group of people answered to grunted his acknowledgement. We parted ways at the main foyer of the hotel, Jihun's group heading to the parking lot and my steps turning towards the main entrance, the twins following.

I threaded through the throng silently, the buzzing nightlife of the city greeting me and the two men accompanying behind. The twins, Daesung and Daewon tailed me often, so my asking for them to stay wouldn't increase my father's already uncountable worries. They were both lithe, dressed casually to blend in.

"Get two cars. I'm driving myself back later." I got along well with the twins. They were battle hardened, years of military service and habit of discipline obvious. Both specialized in close range combat, but were decent marksmen too. Physically, they were in their late twenties but death had aged their mind. They moved silently, didn't ask questions and had no issue omitting things I asked from their reports to my family. Unlike Jihun, who I was sure would last a week before his sense of loyalty made him confess everything he previously hadn't once shit hit the roof. The twins moved as a unit, and anyone hardly ever used their individual names. They were simply the twins.

Two minutes later, I heard heard two cars coming towards me. I got into the first without looking. It was Daesung. He kept his eyes on the road, the radio connected to his younger brother's car 2 metres behind. "Where to?" Daewon asked, the red blink of the radio coming to life. I thought the question over. Where did I want to be now? Definitely not home. Not in my penthouse either. Currently silence scared me more than my mother did. "Wherever there's life." I sighed.

Twenty minutes later, I was standing in front of a party. Some daddy's princess was having her 21st birthday bash, and the noise was almost deafening. I knew this bar and I knew the girl, though only barely. I had no intentions of gatecrashing, so I entered the gates without attaching my tab to her bill. I didn't drink either way.

The lone chairs were scarce, and lone tables nonexistent. The twins followed suit, getting to keep their weapons after a hushed discussion with the security and pointing a finger at me. Understanding the situation, he let them in.

The bar, Perles D'argent was a rare french investment on this road otherwise lined up with buildings owned by various Korean families from the underworld. The investors and owners both had formal relations with all of us, which made it a neutral venue. Both Daesung and Daewon took their places in the crowd, seemingly deciding to enjoy their nights because I sure as hell wasn't in the mood. They immediately turned heads in their direction as they went, their height and build drawing attention to them. I gave Daewon a knowing look, and he just shrugged with a half smile. I shook my head in return. My mother had always liked the twins, especially the younger one. She had once tried to set us up. Daewon had been horrified, not used to my mother's matchmaking endeavors. He had avoided me for a week later. I hardly felt sorry for him though.

In reality, I had asked the twins to follow only because I knew that would buy me more time till Jihun ran his mouth. He trusted his two subordinates and probably thought I was sleeping with one of the brothers. It usually played into my favor as people didn't enquire further when I asked for the twins, and both of them knew it.

I snagged an empty stool from a leaving patron and dumped myself unceremoniously on it. My mind had stopped registering my surroundings hours ago, the static of numbness the only sound I heard. My head was pounding. A lone shake of my head had the bartender look elsewhere. The day had been tough and my body ached without actually feeling pain. I was completely content with silently shutting every thought out and ignoring everything going wrong in my life, when I took a fleeting glance at the bar's occupants.

I saw him then.

Lee Jong In, sitting at a corner table, surrounded by two blondes and a brunette with his head resting in the blonde's lap. Completely oblivious to what was taking place in our city. There must have been a world record for the speed with which one could see red, and it must have had my name on it.

I was off the stool and walking in his direction without second thought. A hand grabbed me from nowhere and my temper soared, already having slipped twice in eight hours. It was one of the twins, who had followed my gaze and figured out where I was going.

"Leave me." I seethed at Daewon. His grip only tightened in response, dragging me out of the noise and into a less crowded place. " Let me go, soldier. You do not call the shots here." The younger twin didn't even blink.

"Iseul. You're far from in your right mind. Don't do something you'll regret in a week." A laugh escaped my throat at that, cruel and mirthless. "We're 72 hours too late for that, don't you agree?" His jaw tightened and he let go of my hand.

"Will it make you feel better?"

"Absolutely."

His expression said he knew I was lying, but he didn't say it. Instead, a snap of his fingers and Daesung was with us, looking at his brother and then at me, then back to his brother and finally towards the man that had started this conversation, now lapping at the brunette's shoulder. It clearly disgusted Daesung as well, because his expression soured instantly.

"What do you want to do?" "I want him to suffer," I looked at my hand, ghosts of the blood I had washed off still making it feel warm. "And I want him gone."

"That is hardly a call in your paygrade, Iseul." "Gone." I repeated with finality. The twins sighed in exasperation, Daewon running a hand through his dark hair. Daesung pulled his brother aside, clearing a path for me. "You know we have your back, right?" I nodded my head. What people didn't know was that I was friends with these two. Their loyalty was primarily with me, and my uncle or father second.

"We'll clean up after you. Just don't dig a bigger hole than you already have, Lin." He didn't need to remind me just how big a mess I had orchestrated, I wasn't forgetting it anytime soon. Still, with that warning echoing between the three of us, I made my way towards the shitty excuse of a man and a shittier father whose innocent son's blood I could still feel on my hands even hours later. And it was all his fault.

My mess could be dealt with tomorrow.

4 hours later:

I unlocked my car and got in. The party had long since finished, and I was far from the city. Lee Jong In was gone, a wet, soggy bed he had made for himself. The twins were gearing up to leave, their shared car behind mine.

A screen lighting up had me reaching inside the cup holder, my phone showing a power low reminder. I hadn't checked it for more than a day, I realized. I unlocked it, simply because I had nothing else to do. I had a series of texts that I ignored, but the latest two names were the only ones that actually mattered.

Wooyoung: Iseul call me back. [today, 2:02pm]

Wooyoung: WHAT THE HELL LIN [today, 1:32pm]

Wooyoung: Lin this better be a fucking joke [today, 1:29pm]

Few from San, minutes prior to his friend's texts.

San: You're. fucking. dead. [today, 1:23pm]

San: SHOW YOUR FACE. I DARE YOU. [today, 1:23pm]

San: Iseul, I am going to ask once. Where is she. [today, 1:17pm]

San: You're sick in the head. Fucking sick. You and your fucking need to control everything like the self-absorbed shit you act like [yesterday, 11:30pm]

Wooyoung: WHAT KIND OF A SHITTY PERSON ARE YOU??!!? [yesterday, 3:45pm]

Wooyoung: YOU BURIED HER??? [yesterday, 3:44pm]

Wooyoung: You have 23 missed call(s) from this user [received yesterday, 12:24pm]

San: You have 87 missed call(s) from this user [received today, 9:40 pm]

Wooyoung: Last call(s)- today, 6:14pm

San: Last call(s)-today, 9:00am

Every text was more desperate than the last, and my heart ached some more with every word I read. I didn't know if she would have forgiven me. The one person I had done all of this for. Someone whose secret I would die protecting, especially from Choi San. And someone she had now left behind, someone I would love enough for both of us.

Distractedly, I scrolled up some more. The older messages didn't even make sense, gibberish strung together by no doubt shaking hands. I closed the chat midway, not wanting to read further. It was no use anyway. Choi San may have loved my best friend, but this was my call to make. I switched the device off and threw it back in the cup holder. The gates of the cemetery outside glinted like a sharp knife, and I was tempted to get out of my car to see if it actually did draw blood. I deserved that pain at least. It would serve as a good reminder of my mortality.

My head leaned against the steering wheel, eyes closing for some time. The thought of the incident which had started these three days of absolute horror refusing to now stay suppressed in my head. My hands had started shaking on the sides of the steering wheel and I could feel the salty tears lining my eyelids as I opened them again, now freely flowing which I had held in for a long time.

Mirah was my gentle half. My closest friend. My confidante. The only one who kept me in line, my everything. And now she was gone.

I had buried my now dead best friend less than 24 hours ago.

Present:

"Then why don't we start by you telling us what exactly happened between you and Lee Jong In's son two years ago?"

Seonghwa's question echoed through the room as he himself lounged on the chair, relaxed and looking totally in control.

"Why do you care?"

"Answer the question, Lin. I am not a patient man."

I gritted my teeth. Who did he think he was? "Listen, Park. I don't know what you want. I don't want to know what you want. I don't know what Lee Jong In wanted when he sent me that invitation. I have no idea what happened to his son," I took a look at everyone in the room. "And I am not going to speak a single word or answer any further questions before I get out of this chair. So spare me this stupid display of power. I want no part in whatever game you are trying to start."

He stared me dead in the eye for what felt like an eternity. "Twenty minutes. I will give you twenty minutes to gather your bearings before my man escorts you."

"The way I see it, you want information that only I can provide. So, Mr. Park," I leaned forward, tone completely serious. "I would be far more accommodating to me than you are currently being. "

He didn't even dignify my outburst with a response, he gracefully got up from his chair like it was some throne, buttoned his suit and left the room without a glance in long strides. I watched him go with hooded eyes, massaging my wrists and running my hands through my hair in an effort to civilize them. Yunho and Mingi left next, the latter saying something in a hushed voice.

I got up on shaky legs, steadying myself against the chair as I buttoned my shirt, the hints of a tattoo on my torso that Seonghwa had been staring at vanishing underneath as I finished dressing. San's furious expression had turned into unreadable, Wooyoung nudging him to move with his own jaw clenched. Kang's face was closed off as usual as he averted his eyes to give me privacy. I scoffed internally. He had my phone casually in his pocket while he offered slivers of mercy to me, acting like some Victorian gentleman.

"Iseul."

Kim Hongjoong was still inside, his expression one of contemplation. I raised my brow at him.

"Have you met Seonghwa before?" Huh. I met his question with silence as I started to walk out. His extended hand stopped me, but his expression was what made me want to find out more. "I know who he is." I said to him after a pause, not understanding what he meant by his question. He nodded, making way for me to leave.

Hongjoong fell into some silent discussion with Yeosang, and I took the opportunity to get out of the room. The guard near the door immediately fell into step ahead of me.

With a forlorn sigh and resignation in my bones, I followed the man to whatever grave I had dug for myself with this man.

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4

A/N: This is shorter than I would have liked, but I didn't want to end it on some lame note. Happy reading!

[the-widow-sisters]

Thankful Thanksgiving

Summary: All of the Avengers are gathered for Thanksgiving, and Natasha, Yelena, Kate, Carol, Darcy, and friends all take the time to say what they’re thankful for when gathered around the Thanksgiving table.

Word Count: 2006

A/N: Happy Thanksgiving to all of you! I hope you’re spending time with friends and/or family and having lots of amazing food and good times together! 🥰💗 This one was a little short (it was originally going to be longer until I transferred a scene to my ongoing Christmas fic instead) but hopefully it was still enjoyable! 💖

I am so thankful for all of y’all, and I hope you guys enjoyed this one! 😊

  “And that’s why I’m thankful for Bucky’s arm,” Sam explained, and Bucky just groaned deeply and exasperatedly. Everyone around the room was in varying expressions of amusement, complete disbelief, and speechlessness.

   It was Thanksgiving, and all of the Avengers had come to gather to enjoy a feast with one another. They had finished their food, and they had just started going all around the table to share what they were thankful for. Sam had been the first to go, and his had so far set the bar for some really bizarre explanations.

  “Man, what are all y’all looking at? Ain’t any of you ever been thankful for Bucky’s arm before?” Sam questioned defensively as if it were the most utterly obvious thing in the world.

  “Because it makes perfect sense to be thankful for someone else’s prosthetic arm,” Shuri spoke up from where she was currently seated, sarcasm deeply rooted in every accented word. Okoye simply passed a somewhat disapproving glance in her direction but did not say a word. Shuri raised her hands defensively, and Sam just eyed her with narrowed eyes.

  “It does make sense. Look, wouldn’t you be thankful if somebody’s arm could pop off and you could use it as a literal Wonder Woman bulletproof band?” Sam told them, and Shuri just huffed a little, looking at him as she remained unimpressed.

  “You seem to forget that we literally have vibranium, which just happens to be as bulletproof as this comic book character’s very much fake braces,” Shuri argued, and Sam just scoffed unhappily, shaking his head.

  “She just don’t get it,” Sam complained, and Bucky did not even bother gracing him with a response as he groaned tiredly.

  “Okay, look, seriously, guys, let’s get back on track,” Steve pointed out from where he was seated between Bucky and Carol.

  “I guess I’ll go now,” Steve started, clearing his throat as he prepared to state what he was thankful for.

  At Bucky’s request, Steve had skipped over him. He only heeded requests for skipping when it legitimately had to do with some manner of trauma or something, and in Bucky’s case, he knew it had been.

  However, before he could speak, Yelena started loudly clearing her throat. Steve leaned forward a little, trying to look around all of the people as he fought to meet her gaze. Yelena peered from where she was sandwiched between Kate and Natasha, and she scoffed.

  “Why does Bucko get a free pass?” Yelena demanded, and Bucky flashed an irritated glare in her general direction. Steve swallowed, trying to explain.

  “Because he specifically asked and after reviewing the reasoning, I decided it was acceptable,” Steve explained, trying to remain professional and avoid as many details as possible.

  “Pfft… Just because he’s your boyfriend doesn’t mean you can just make excuses for him,” Yelena declared, and Steve just sighed deeply. Yelena loved to poke fun at their friendship when she could mostly because she hated Bucky’s guts, but he tried not to let the boyfriend comments get to him. After all, she was well-aware that he saw Bucky as a brother.

  Carol, of course, did not let the comments get to her either and would actually even join in on Yelena’s teasing at any given time if it seemed humorous to her. Carol ultimately chose not to throw in her opinion this time since Steve was floundering a bit already with trying to explain why he had excluded Bucky but had not heeded anyone else’s requests to be excluded.

  “As for what I’m thankful for! I am thankful for this team. For our perseverance, and all of the good hearts gathered here at this table,” Steve expressed, and Carol leaned into his side, squeezing his arm before straightening just a little.

  She knew she was next, and she honestly was not quite sure if she was ready. She released him carefully, looking beside her at the amazing, incredible person that she had brought for Thanksgiving.

  Monica looked at her carefully, a surprising warmth in her eyes despite the fact that she did not know what Carol was thinking. Carol swallowed hard, reaching her hand out and placing it over the top of Monica’s as she squeezed it softly.

  “Carol?” Steve prompted, and Carol cast him a very much forcedly casual smile before speaking up.

  “I’m thankful for… Having the opportunity to fix some broken relationships and hopefully having the opportunity to get to know the person all over again,” Carol explained, and Monica’s eyes were shining with something that was positively and absolutely touched as she gazed at her.

  Carol mustered a small grin, trying to avoid the urge to cry. The emotion and the pure love that was swelling within her was almost more than she could take. In an attempt to suppress the emotion, she simply lifted her hand and squeezed Monica’s shoulder lovingly in lieu of hugging her on the spot.

  Monica cleared her throat, mustering some manner of confidence as she spoke up despite being exceedingly uncomfortable at the sheer amount of important people that she either did not know at all or did not know that well.

  “I’m thankful to have a special person back in my life again,” Monica stated vaguely, but given how her gaze was glued to that of her aunt’s, there was no question who her statement was about.

  Kamala then proceeded to move forward a little, grinning ridiculously as she remained just a little speechless despite her best efforts to the contrary. She tried to get a good look at everyone at the table, honestly just excited to be there in the first place.

  “Oh, gosh… I’m honestly beyond thankful that I could get to meet all of you and start training to be a real life Avenger,” Kamala explained, instantly kicking herself for the last part of her statement, dreading how stupid it might have sounded.

  Everyone, however, seemed thoroughly endeared, and she let out a soft breath of relief as it moved down the line to Darcy.

  After a small silence, Darcy blinked, realizing more fully that everyone was waiting for her to speak. She had honestly been so concentrated on trying to avoid Valkyrie’s gaze and ignore Valkyrie’s presence from where she was sitting directly across from her that she had missed the fact that it was actually her turn to talk.

  “Oh! Uh… I’m thankful for becoming an assistant here for Mr. Stark! And getting to know this awesome group of friends I have,” Darcy explained with a smile, leaning forward to get a look at Carol, Kate, Natasha, and Yelena. Carol smiled fondly, and Kate grinned widely. Natasha’s eyes sparkled with something affectionate in her reserved manner, and Yelena, as much as she tried to look unhappy, had a smile that was threatening to tug at the corners of her lips.

  It was then Clint’s turn, and he looked at everyone, smiling a little as he shrugged.

  “I’m thankful for my family, Nat, Yelena, and even Kate sometimes,” Clint quipped, fully enjoying his comment as he glanced in Kate’s direction.

  “Thanks, Clint. I feel loved,” Kate commented in an attempt to muster some sarcasm. Instantly, she tried to hold back how her eyes went wide at the fact that she had actually used the l-word in relation to him. He just huffed in reply to her, grinning a bit, and she could not help but smile in response.

  “I guess like Darcy, I’m thankful for the group of friends that we have made together, and I’m really thankful for Natasha, Yelena, and Clint. They’ve helped me feel really welcome here ever since I came. And I’m also thankful for finally becoming an official Avenger-in-training with the ability to go on missions, so,” Kate shrugged.

  Darcy made some noise of encouragement, clapping momentarily, and Kate laughed a little with slight embarrassment. Natasha reached out, softly touching the back of Kate’s head as she stroked the flowing locks. Yelena honestly just looked utterly surprised at Kate’s admission.

  Kate then looked to Natasha, and Natasha moved her head in a gesture of acceptance as she looked at everyone around the table.

  “I’m thankful for all of us being together and in good health. I’m thankful for Clint, Kate, Carol, and Darcy, and all of you truly. Clint has been here for me through the worst and best of times, and Kate has become someone that is so special to me. Carol’s the best friend anyone could ask for, and Darcy has been someone that I hope to get to know even better over time,” Natasha paused for a moment before gazing at Yelena. Yelena just looked back at her with an adoring glint in her eyes. There was a gentle smile on her face, and nothing but pure love written in her features.

  Natasha took in a small breath, trying to prepare herself to expose more emotions that she would ordinarily dare to show in front of people that were outside of a select few in her world. However, in that moment, looking into Yelena’s eyes, there was only the two of them in this universe.

  “And I’m really thankful for my baby sister. I don’t know what I would do without her there as a constant supporter and friend,” Natasha explained, and Yelena swallowed hard, tears starting to form in her eyes as she moved forward and tried to hide at least part of her face in Natasha’s shoulder. Natasha held her for a moment, and Yelena forced composure within herself as she turned her face so that half of it was buried in Natasha’s arm.

  “And I’m thankful for all of the friends I have made. For Little Peter, the Boomer, Little Bishop, Lewis, and several others. Little Peter is my favorite out of you morons, though, with Boomer coming up as a far second,” Yelena admitted, and Peter from his end of the table instantly shrunk down from where he was seated next to Tony, utter mortification overcoming him at the fact that Yelena had uttered the nickname in front of everyone.

  “I’m most thankful for Natasha. I’m thankful she is safe and that she is still here with me. I am thankful that she is my sister, because there is no one else in the entire world that I would rather have as moya starshaya sestra,” Yelena confessed, the Russian words soft and offering the tenderness that she could not quite muster in English in front of an extended audience like this. Granted, she knew Bucky and Clint could also understand, but she was most concerned with Natasha being able to understand.

  Natasha’s eyes softened and they glinted with the slightest presence of tears. Natasha swallowed hard, and Yelena could not stop looking at her. All she wanted to do was just crawl in her lap and cuddle with her right now, but since they were at the table and literally every other Avenger in existence was around, she knew she could not quite do that just yet.

  “Aww, short-stack, I knew you loved me. That Christmas spirit is really making you sweeter than usual,” Carol called out, affection in her voice as she successfully broke the moment. Yelena knew that Carol had done it to dispel a bit of Yelena’s emotional mess that she was threatening to fall into, and Yelena was truly grateful.

  Therefore, to continue playing it casual, Yelena just scoffed in disdain, lowering her head back down to retreat into Natasha’s side as she chose to focus on her affection for her big sister. Natasha raised her arm, bringing her closer as a warm chuckle resounded within her and vibrating near Yelena’s ear.

  After this, they continued to move around the table, each person continued to express what they were thankful for, and Natasha and Yelena simply remained absorbed in their own world, focused on one another. Kate leaned into Natasha’s other side, and Natasha wasted no time in opening her arm to bring her into her side as well.

  They were thankful for one another, and that brought the truest happiness that they could ever have.

[kyberphilosopher]

Rᴀɴᴄᴏʀ

While the Titans make their way through the district of Trost, a wounded soldier makes an unexpected discovery.  Word Count: 4098 Requested: yes!  Warnings: violence. 

“The word rancor is best when you're not just talking about anger, you're talking about a deep, twisted bitter type of anger in your heart. The open rancor in political discussion prevents cooperation between political parties.

The most helpful way to remember rancor with all its dark, miserable bitterness is to think of how rancor rhymes with canker, as in canker sore, the horrible painful burning on your lip. Or, you might want to remind yourself that rancor has its roots in the word rancid meaning "rotten." Rancor refers particularly to the sort of ill-will associated with resentment, envy, slow-brewing anger, and a very personal sort of hatred.”

.✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ✫*.

Fuck. It hurts.

You collapse into a kneel. Your left knee scuffs against the damp, cold ground, dirtying the leg of your pants and the top of your boot. As your right hand prods the side of your torso, hot, burning pain courses through your veins with a spark. It feels almost as if the entire area is on fire, which you’re able to identify from the time your friend Jean accidentally caused you to burn your elbow over a candle at dinner. 

Still, this is like nothing you’ve ever felt before. This pain... your ribs must be broken. Fuck. 

“Shit,” you hiss to yourself through tight teeth. The hand on your abdomen strengthens its grip against the skin as your head rears back to look up to the sky. It’s cloudy grey, with absolutely no light from the sun peeking through. At first glance, the clouds appear to you as a muddy shade of blue. However, the longer you stare at them, the more you think they might be a cool purple-gray. It’s going to rain, soon. 

It’s too dangerous, being on the ground like this. The tall buildings surrounding you, added to the isolation of the entire premises, makes you feel like you’re at the bottom of a valley. If only you’d been able to catch your balance on the roof. 

Squad 29. Part of the vanguard, although the six of you had only been cadets. None of you were within the top ten. In fact, you’d chalked up your assigned position to just being extra bodies used to buy extra time. Completely expendable. 

Although you’d managed to graduate 15th in your division, the other members of the squad hadn’t heeded your advice. They were a rather close knit group of friends, excluding you and one of the other boys. But those four had been committed to barreling head first into the titan’s mouths, regardless of what better plans there could’ve been to come up with. One of them died immediately. 

You, the most physically adept of the group, killed two titans on your own, and aided in one assist. Then, you and Finn were attempting on taking down a thirteen meter, when an abnormal swatted the both of you like mere flies. You cleared the air, smacking into a distant tiled roof before you could fire an anchor to steady yourself. Even though you attempted to physically compose your legs, you rolled over the side and onto an abandoned market stall. When it broke under you, you dragged yourself to the middle of the street- where you are now. 

But you can’t move. Every intake of air is a piercing stab to your lungs, a thorn in your side, literally. Beads of sweat are beginning to break across your temples, intensified with the concentration of your knitted brows. 

If your ODM gear isn’t broken on some miracle, then how will you survive? You received basic medical lessons, but you’re no healer. If you ran into a healer, would they even help you? Compared to Hanna and Franz, or those friends you’d been assigned with, your life wasn’t worth much. You weren’t associated closely with anyone in the 104th, and you’d neither written, nor received letters from your family in well over three years. The irony is that you’d always thought being a lone wolf had more pros than cons. And now, you may pay the price for it. 

Pop. A single drop of rain erupts in the center of your eyebrows. The first promise of an oncoming storm. 

Your eyes flutter to a close briefly, before reopening. The smell of petrichor floods your senses, invigorating you with memories of spring and dirt. It’s enough to make you want to stand up and finally anchor your way to the high ground, but the slightest movement inflames your ribs all over again. And so no matter how much you wish you weren’t, you clutch the left side of your stomach in the middle of a lonely stone street, crippled in on yourself as you tremble in silent pain. 

Sheets of rain begin to fall, reminding you that natural forces are never far behind. However, it’s not colorful like spring, or pleasant to associate with, like dirt. It’s icy and stark, drenching your hair and clothes in a matter of seconds. 

Get up, you order yourself, but your body does not obey. Get. Up. 

You’ve got more problems than just your ribs. The stiller you are, the more body parts you begin to realize are worse for the wear. Your left wrist feels stiff, like a wheel that can’t rotate full circle. Your right ankle feels limp, like a glass structure on the verge of shattering. But the main problem is in your lungs, because of the damage to your bones. It’s possible that you stabbed your own innards, and now you’re slowly dying. You need that medical attention. 

A particularly sharp inhale turns to a wheeze. “Fuck,” you mutter hoarsely, digging the soles of your boots into the ground beneath you to solidify yourself. 

Little pebbles between the cracks of the hard surface begin to bounce softly, like little tremors. A steady pace of booms fill the air, and the stench of death walks around the corner. 

Lifting your head slightly and craning your neck to the right, you see the shadow of a large, ten meter titan lumbering towards you. With matted, dusty blond hair to its shoulders, you can make out the stain of thick redness running down its potbelly stomach, slowly washing away in the rain. 

“No,” you struggle, now clambering to force yourself off the ground. “Come on- fuck.”

You’re going to die. You’re going to die- you’re going to die. You’re going to die, and they won’t even find your body. You’ll be labeled missing in action, and nobody will know what really happened to you. Not unless you get up. 

A shooting cry for help springs to your veins. Every breath is agony. Your heart lurches, your ribs shaking and burning without any pressure anymore. Your left hand reaches to the ground to hold yourself up, unable to keep yourself balanced on your own. 

No, this is it. You’re done for. 

“Fuck,” you sigh out finally, the acceptance of defeat freeing you. 

The titan’s coming closer. Your head falls back again, and you look up into the pouring precipitation. Quickly, your eyelids blink at a rapid place from the micro knives of wetness piercing into them. The sweat you previously worked up has run away, turning your skin cold.

You wait for your final thought to turn into ‘it was a good life’. But it doesn’t come. In fact, no thought comes to you at all. Your mind is blank, even when you turn to stare in the face of death, whose enormous hand is reaching out to you. 

No thoughts. Just... fuck. 

A fist erupts through the maw of the ten meter. With an explosive pop, something thick showers over you, glooping in your hair and dripping down your nose and into your mouth. Something in your ears click as a hollow, electric roar amplifies itself into the air. As you open your sticky, goo ridden eyelids to look at your grim reaper, you find the beast lifted off the ground by an incredible force. 

Another titan- a muscular one about fifteen meters, with his hand straight through the smaller ones mouth. With long, dark brown hair whipping harshly in the wind and rain, emerald eyes glow like a flame of grass. He is... vicious, and what splattered on you was blood, and it’s burning but you’re too shocked by the sight ahead of you to care. 

The fifteen meter pushes the ten meter off of his wrist with his other hand, before gripping him by the nape and throwing him through the air like nothing more than a ball. 

Your free arm covers your head with fear as you flinch. For a split second, you are shielded from the rain, and can hear the whistling sound of something flying at a quick speed. Even with shut eyes, your vision darkness with the shadow of a large body. And then the ground shakes as the monster collapses with a boom. 

What the hell?

Out of breath, you widen your eyes as you stare at the steaming hulk of flesh. Salty water slips in drops off of strands of your hair. The titan blood covering you begins to evaporate just as you turn to the other titan, breathing through your mouth despite the oncoming pain. 

What the hell?

The fifteen meter leans back on his heels to observe his work of the other titan. His toned, muscular form shines in the glint of the wet rain. His dark hair clings to his neck tightly. When his two rows of teeth open, warm puffs of steam hiss out in a flurry as easily as air. 

Abnormal. He’s gotta be... an... abnormal...

And then he meets your eyes, and it’s all over. 

You watch a large, muscled hand reach out to you. There’s too much pain to move, or panic, or even think. Your life isn’t flashing before your eyes. You’re not thinking of home, family, anything like that. You’re thinking about how the icy rain has stopped falling against you for a brief moment, stopped by the skin of your killer. 

Eyes shut tight as you keep applying pressure on your ribcage. The hood of your sweatshirt lifts up, choking you as your body follows limply. There’s only a few seconds before you can’t feel the rough ground anymore, and you know you’re up in the air. The rain sparks against your skin again, adding to the weight that’s gone straight to your throat and ankles. 

And then...

Your feet touch against a solid again. The hood falls back against your shoulders. Your weight returns to your entire body. That’s a sharp stab against your ribs that makes you grit your teeth and pop your eyes open, but you find that there’s no gaping mouth in front of you. There is no, absolutely no chance, threat of death. 

You’re... on a roof. The Abnormal is drawing his palm away from you, looking down through his dark hair that’s soaked in the salty water from above. His eyes are piercing and intelligent, but they’re not angry. He’s not going to kill you. He’s not going to hurt you. 

As your eyes continuously widen, the Abnormal finally turns away from you. Great booms ring out into the air, the flats of his feet crush the ground beneath him with no effort at all. All the muscles in his back are tensing and shifting, drawing further and further away from you. 

He didn’t kill you. The biggest, strongest titan you’ve ever seen didn’t kill you. Even when it had you between its fingers. And the way he looked at you... it was showing something more than other titans. It was showing intelligence, awareness. If something of this caliber has a bone to pick with its fellow titans, are you really going to slip away this easily?

If you could possibly steer the thing to find your way back to your squad, you could use it to your advantage in the battle. How many humans could you save with this? Could this be enough to take out the Colossal? Or the Armored, even? There’s only one way to find out. 

You’ve made a discovery. This realization alone gives you the motivation you need to push yourself to your feet with a whimper. It’s time to catch up to that thing.

Limping as you pick up your pacing, trying your best to work up an acceleration before firing the anchors of your ODM gear. One hand still held tightly against your side, your fingers squeeze the triggers of your gear. The anchor latches into the skin of Abnormal with a click, albeit just barely, and you fly towards him with as much care as you can. 

You clamber to the top of the muscle, trying to find your footing while still holding your abdomen. One of your hands reaches out to grip onto a lock of brunette hair on the beast like a kind of rope, hoping to steady yourself. Luckily, your ride comes to a stop, shifting its head to acknowledge you. Once more, you hold eye contact, but this time you’re quick to overcome your disbelief. 

Could it understand communication? 

You go to say something, but the pressure on your lungs makes you wince and hiss instead. A gasp falls from the back of your throat- a strangled cry that confirms how serious this injury really is. Something is broken, something is wrong, and you pull on the titans hair as you try to keep yourself steady from falling off and injuring yourself further, and for a split second you think you’ll hurt it. 

“Fuck,” you wheeze out with shut eyes. 

Beside you, you feel the rumbling of a growling breath. The shoulder you stand on shifts, reminding you that your ankle is also pained. When your eyes open again, there’s a hand beside you, reaching out once more. 

You scoot away from it best you can, tugging on the things hair for leverage. It’s grimy, and dirty, but long and soft and slick at the same time. Weirdly enough, it’s better than most of your fellow soldiers hair. 

The Abnormals fingers come into range, and with as much might as you can muster, you slap it away. It barely moves, of course. There’s another growl. The fingers extend again. Another push to shove it away. 

“No,” you strangle out weakly. “Stop it.”

And then he does stop. You twist your head around to meet his eyes once more, but they’re right where you left them- on you. 

“I can stay,” you say hoarsely as your ribs crack uncomfortably. “I can stay.”

The drum of the rain fades into silence. There is only you, and whatever he is, staring at each other with desperation and analyzation. Nothing else exists. Not the battle around you, nor the lives being lost at this very moment. It’s just the promise of life that pushes you to keep going. It’s the new chance of hope that you’ve been given, purely by chance. 

The rain around you comes back to life. It shudders with the wind, loud and clear and explosive. It seems to be on the verge of turning to hail, popping and pricking against rooftops a million times over. It’s making the air colder, more violent. But it’s nothing compared to the way the Abnormal bows its head shortly. It’s nothing compared to the way the Abnormal nods at you. 

“Okay,” you breathe out with disbelief. “Okay.”

A loud, shrieking roar pulls the both of you from your gaze. At the end of the road is a nine meter, with messy short hair and a wide mouth splattered with blood. Beside it is a smaller titan, maybe four meters, on its hands and knees like it’s about to pounce. With those stupid, hated expressions, you can see where your new partner got the strength to rip off a head. 

You pull on the Abnormals hair in preparation. He rears his head back, breathing out steam to the sky. Beneath the soles of your shoes, you can feel its strange skin heating up like a fresh fire. 

At once, your fingers squeeze the triggers of your ODM. It anchors into the wall of a building to the left of the smaller titan. At the same time, your Abnormal companion steps forward, cocking his fist back. 

It takes a lot of strength and teeth gritting to pull both of your blades out. The hand leaving your side makes you feel the inside of your ribs pop. But you hold them behind you, twisting as you turn and make quick work of slicing the nape of the four meter before it can make any moves. It’s still, and then it collapses, smoking. 

Your partner shoves the nine meter into a building. Both his hands pull back into fists, pommeling the thing repeatedly. You click the trigger again, jumping up into the air far above the rooftops all around you. You’re soaring, and coming closer and closer to the titan until you swing out with a whisper. Its head falls back, while your Abnormal lifts his leg to knee it in the chest. 

The Abnormal shows emotions. It shows anger- even after he sees that his foe has been finished off. Prompting you, as you twist to aim your ODM gear again, to wonder if he is even an Abnormal. For all you know, he could be something completely different entirely. But then what is it? What have you discovered here?

You fall back to the shoulder of your partner gracefully. You sheathe both swords, grip onto his hair with one hand, and onto your side with the other. He stops his movements, still breathing out like a rancor human would. 

You learn quickly that it’s better if you don’t try to control him. He’s more efficient when you treat him like a partner, and split up to clear a path for him. So you do. You spring from his shoulder to take out whatever slow, stupid creature crosses your path, though occasionally he moves before you can do so as if he’d rather do it himself. It’s not easy at all with your ribs in the condition that they are, and every movement makes your ankle and wrist click like they’re on the verge of snapping away. They probably are. Breathing, again with your rib problem, is becoming increasingly difficult, and there’s no sign of your squad in sight. 

There’s no soldiers to be seen at all, actually- not even using ODM gear above you. It’s almost like the entire battle has just ended. Maybe everyone died. Everyone, except you, who did not even make the top ten and should be dead anyway. 

You clutch your stomach as you think about this. The great being you’ve come to rely on in the past few minutes cranes his neck to look at you. 

Your eyes close as you breathe as steadily as you can. The stabbing, electrical, unimaginable pain is becoming more and more unbearable by the second. You could’ve pierced a lung, and now you’re slowly dying, with only a foe who’s not even a foe to comfort you. At least you’ve started to like the strange rows of teeth he possesses. Looking at that as you die might make you feel better. 

In one motion, the shadow of a hand covers you. The little pricks of rain have ceased once again, so you open your eyes to look up. Sure enough, a behemoth of a hand shields you like an umbrella, keeping you from soaking any further. 

You look to meet his eyes. Before, they were all emerald green. But now, you can see flecks of teal in them. They’re strangely beautiful, almost otherworldly. And they remind you of something you can neither define nor place. Something you’ve never seen before. Cool toned, but also... warm. 

“What the hell are you?” you whisper out, half to yourself. 

Large fingers brush against your hood softly. It’s tugged up and placed over your head as gently as the giant can muster, the raindrops stuck to the cloth falling into your eyes. Maybe you won’t die. Maybe you really, really won’t. 

The Abnormal growls again, though it’s still distant and none threatening. It’s more like a vibration, really. This thing is the embodiment of anger and vengeance, and yet its saved your life multiple times. You should be... you should be dead. How many times have you thought that today?

Your ribs bring you back to reality. Breathing a little too inwardly proves to be your undoing, nearly collapsing over as you grab at the area. It stings, it stabs, and you choke on your own throat with tightly shut eyes. 

Yes, I should be dead. The proof is right here.

There’s one movement. It’s slow and fluid, as if something gentle was about to happen. But that, like all other gentle things, dies fast. Because there’s a second motion, a quicker one and a more abrupt one. And then there’s something slamming into you, your head going hot, the wind in your ears, and finally your back bursting open on something rough. 

You can’t think. You can’t move. But only one thing comes to mind: The Titan. 

“Y/N?!”

You groan in response, eyes closed as pain tingles up from your toes slowly. 

“Where did you come from?! Y/N?!”

...

You’ve never liked waking up. You might’ve tolerated it in your youth, before the titans came, but since you’d enlisted, it was hard to be an early bird. It made you grumpy. Luckily, you weren’t social enough to have people around you to witness you doing so. Except for now, and the man in front of you with intense eyes and a long face. 

On his jacket is the sigil of the military police- a green unicorn shining like bravery. His lips are slightly snarled, despite the charismatic voice that you barely bother listening to. 

He tells you his name- Nile- and asks yours. You don’t answer. He has to get the report from the nurse, who only has your first name listed because nobody else in the corps knows your last. He keeps overusing it in some strange attempt to make you feel at ease, unaware that your intelligence has a built in bullshit detector. 

What an idiot, you think behind your bandaged head.

Nile asks you if you can tell him what happened to you, but you can tell he doesn’t care. You keep it short and anonymous. (“I was assigned to the vanguard. I already know my squad is dead.”)

He asks if you know someone with the last name Jaeger. You do. But it feels wrong to say so. (“Probably.”)

By the end of it, Nile’s stupid looking eye is practically twitching. He asks about your injuries, which you learn more about. your ribs were broken, as you’d expected. There was internal bleeding, your appendix had been removed, a few broken fingers on your right hand. Twisted ankle, broken wrist. Then Nile asks how you got them. 

(“I fell.”)

And he asks how you fell, like he’s looking for a specific answer. 

(“I landed on a roof and lost my feet.”)

He also questions if you ran into any Abnormals. If maybe they were responsible for your injuries. 

You narrow your eyes. 

(“I only ran into one.”)

And finally, if that one hurt you.

(“No.”)

You know that he knows. But it doesn’t matter. Something inside of you tells you that you can’t tattle on your Abnormal discovery. If he was responsible for knocking you off his shoulder, which he probably was, you still weren’t going to say a word. He saved your life. Considering he’s alive and well, maybe even captured, it’s only fitting you save him in return. 

Nile leaves at least, foaming at the mouth in frustration, masked only in a thin layer of politeness. Rain drops hit the window behind you. You crane your head around to watch them, the thunder booming lowly. Last time you were in this weather, that great beast had shielded you from it. Once with his hand, another with your own hood. And if you squint hard enough through the pain, you can just make out the silhouette of a rancor titan, and the tiny human on its shoulder, eager to return the favor. 

.✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ✫*.

Did I reread this? I skimmed it. Why? Because this took over a week or 2 to get out and I have to start finishing requests before i lose my mind with all these drafts oh god. i always so i’ll go back and edit but i never do lmao. my bad. 

Fun fact! the original draft showcased the reader being separated from eren, and losing all gas. surrounded by titans, they yell at the titan for help, but he is distracted by a titan nearby after leading him to Mikasa. While the reader finally dies, eren sees them from over the buildings and roars, begins to stomp on the nape of the titan, and is infused with a new rage. The reader is listed missing in action, and Eren can’t remember what happened to them, but remembers seeing them. Another happy ending!

[the-expose-on-girls]

Deceived by the New Girl Trope

We've all seen it in movies and in real life more times than we can count: new girl in a new town, feeling nervous and a little shy about making friends as she enters a new school or a new church. The movies always depict her newness as making her vulnerable, since she knows nothing of the social groups/hierarchy or the backgrounds of people in the new environment. Often, the mean girls take advantage of her vulnerability to bully and/or manipulate her.

My own experience in middle school when my family moved to a new town was much the same. The older mean girls all took one look at me and blocked me out of their cliques. During group activities, they would talk amongst themselves, blatantly ignoring me as if I wasn't there. They made it clear I was not welcome. It was a long time before I made any friends, whom were fellow outcasts and misfits like myself, for our "lame" clothes and frizzy hair.

Flash forward a few years to when I finally got my social footing in this new town. I knew everyone and everyone knew me. Then, in walked a new girl. She had the same "lame" fashion, the same frizzy hair, and was wearing the most "uncool" glasses ever made. The way the mean girl cliques had treated me still stung like it had happened yesterday. With that in mind, I went out of my way to befriend the new girl, take her into my circle, and make her feel welcome like no one had done for me. I didn't want her to go through the same loneliness I did.

The possibility that my efforts could backfire in my face never occurred to me. Prior to moving to this town, I had never been bullied, so I was pitifully naive. The new girl and I emailed back and forth for many months. It was all pretty normal at first. But as time went on, she became increasingly "judgy" about everything I liked. I would tell her that I liked a certain singer and she would counter with, "Oh, I would never listen to music like that." I would say that I liked a certain dessert and she would write back something along the lines of, "That's okay for you, I guess. I don't eat things with that much sugar." Looking back at those e-mails, now, her tone was dripping with condescension, but at the time I was just so happy to have a friend to talk to that I didn't notice.

One day, she stopped replying to my messages. She stopped sitting with me at church. She started hanging out with the cool girls. From that point on, in all of her interactions with me, she treated me with a haughty, superior attitude. This sudden change coincided with her becoming "fashionable", though she now posts old photos from those days and laughs at how dorky she looked even after her "glow up". I learned years later that she also formed a clique at her school and excluded other girls so she could feel superior to them. Exactly the way I had been treated when I moved here. I felt so defeated. I tried to welcome her, to help her adjust to this new place, and she just used me as an in-road to form her own cliques.

Jump ahead a few years to early high school. Another new girl crossed my path. Still shockingly naive and forgetting what happened last time, I did the very same thing: I took her under my wing and tried to help her settle in. Wouldn't you know she did almost the exact same thing as the first girl? Except this one manipulated me and tried to come between me and my best friend, as she formed her own toxic little clique. That's a whole big story of its own and it doesn't end well.

You would think I would have learned my lesson by then. But it took once more to traumatize me enough that I would have a healthy wariness towards newcomers. Same thing: new girl, I befriend her, and she uses that position to backstab me before forming a clique that excludes me.

Third time's the charm. I've been backstabbed by enough newcomers that now I give them distance and a cold attitude until they prove to me they are safe to be around. It's sad that it has to be that way.

Don't let movies lie to you. The new girl isn't a damsel in distress or a helpless sitting duck for bullies. More often than not, in my experience, she is a wrecking ball with the destructive capacity of a hurricane.

[be11atrixthestrange]

The Luckiest (19 Years Later)

I wrote this as an epilogue to my multichapter fic, Completely Mental, but it works as a standalone drabble too. So here it is! I just love these boys (men!), and I love their friendship.  #HarryAndRonBrotp

--------------------------------------

19 Years Later

The soft autumn sun smiled down on the Burrow’s grounds, its reflection illuminating the windows like a lighthouse. A crisp breeze whistled through the garden, bringing with it a hint of cooler days to come. Inside, the smell of dinner sizzling on the stove, butterbeer bottles clinking, children playing, and adults laughing filled the room, but it was still too quiet for Harry’s liking.

Harry always loved September. Growing up, September marked the transition from 4 Privet Drive to Hogwarts, and it came with a sweeping feeling of relief knowing he’d finally be able to see his friends again. Every year, his anticipation for September would grow stronger and start sooner, until summer eventually became something to endure rather than enjoy.

His love of autumn — and by extension, his distaste for summer — persisted into adulthood, even when life moved on after the war. Although there were no more shopping trips to Diagon Alley, journeys on the Hogwarts Express, or sorting hat ceremonies reinforcing Harry’s eagerness for the fall, his feelings remained. Harry would wake up on September 1st giddy and eager, like a child on Christmas Eve, and then proceed to make breakfast for the kids and floo to the Ministry for an Auror meeting, just like any other day. There was no longer anything particularly exciting about September, but he kept a tight grip on his memories of the scarlet steam engine, trolley snacks, and welcome feasts.

That all changed two years ago when James began his first year at Hogwarts. That year, September 1st brought a change that he wasn’t ready for — watching his son board the Hogwarts Express. James’ eyes sparkled with excitement, but Harry shared none of the enthusiasm. Instead, Harry’s stomach felt heavy with dread as he watched the train roll away, smiling and waving at James’ anxious face in the window while holding back tears and desperately wishing it was still August.

The following year wasn’t any easier, and today was even worse. When Albus joined James on the train, it took all of Harry’s effort to reassure him that everything would be okay because, for Harry, it probably wouldn’t. It was funny how Harry could defeat Voldemort at seventeen, but he was still convinced that saying goodbye to his kids on platform nine and three-quarters was the most difficult thing he’d ever do.

Harry was half-listening to the hustle and bustle of the Burrow and trying not to get too comfy in the extra spaciousness in the living room, made possible only by the absence of the older children when he spotted a flash of red outside in the garden. Ron was sitting alone on a bench, cradling a butterbeer, his hair a stark contrast to the muted green of the overgrown lawn.

Without a second thought, Harry moved toward the Burrow’s exit, following the narrow stone pathway that curved into the garden. It didn’t cross his mind whether or not Ron wanted to be alone, and even if he did, there was an unspoken agreement between them that ‘alone’ didn’t exclude being with each other.

Ron smiled ruefully when he spotted Harry approaching, but it only lasted a second before his shoulders slumped and his smile vanished. “Hey, mate.”

“Hey,” said Harry, plopping down beside Ron on the bench. Ron shifted sideways to make room for him. “You okay?”

“Dunno,” said Ron, before bringing his butterbeer to his lips and taking in a long gulp.

“Thinking about Rosie?” asked Harry.

Ron nodded and coughed, clearing his throat from his oversized sip. “Bloody hate that she’s gone.”

“I know the feeling,” said Harry. “Was even worse this year with Al going too.”

“I bet. Sorry, mate.”

A few comfortable moments of silence passed, as both men knew perfectly well that there was nothing to say to make the other feel better.

Ron gulped down the rest of his butterbeer before speaking again. “I just hope she’s okay.”

Harry smiled, remembering how he said that about James his first year. When James turned out fine, better than fine, Harry had to admit his concern was for his own loneliness rather than James’ safety. “She’s probably fine, but you know that,” he says, earning a moment of confused eye contact from Ron. “It’s us you should worry about.”

“We almost died at Hogwarts. So many times,” said Ron, a wistful smile forming on his lips.

“And thanks to us,” said Harry, “they have it better than we did. Either way, she’s a tough girl. Smart. You raised a good one.”

“Thank Merlin she takes after her mum.”

Harry laughed. Hermione always said that Rose took after Ron, not her. Harry thought it was both. They probably saw the best traits in their daughter and assumed they were from the other parent. “Rosie takes after you a lot more than you think.”

“That’s what Hermione says. But thanks, now I’m even more worried,” laughed Ron. “Think Rosie and Albus’ll be in Gryffindor together?”

“No doubt about Rosie,” said Harry, as the memory of Rosie’s first time on a broomstick resurfaced. Rosie’s face was scarlet-red with excitement as she took a nosedive toward the ground, followed by a frenzied and panicked Ron. The cushioning charm he just barely cast in time turned out to be unnecessary, as she swerved at the last second to avoid a collision, but Harry was pretty sure Ron’s blood pressure had never returned to a normal level.

“Yeah, stupid question,” laughed Ron. He smiled, and Harry wondered if he was recalling the same memory or one of the many other times Rosie demonstrated Gryffindor courage, even if it meant disregarding her own safety. “What about Albus?”

“Honestly, no clue. I could see him being in Gryffindor or Slytherin,” he said, noticing Ron wince at ‘Slytherin.’ Ron’s reaction filled Harry with a parental defensiveness he wasn’t expecting, and he added pointedly, “I’ll be proud of him either way.”

Ron nodded in agreement, maybe a bit too eagerly, but it momentarily settled the passing fear that Albus would be sorted into a different house than his siblings and cousins. It wasn’t that Harry didn’t want him to be in Slytherin, he just didn’t want him to be alone.

But maybe Albus wanted to be in a different house than his family, and Harry was just projecting.

“I wonder who they’re sitting with on the train,” said Ron as if reading Harry’s mind. Then he flashed his lopsided grin, still goofy and youthful even at the ripe age of thirty-seven. “You know those unfortunate souls will have to be their friends for the rest of time.”

Unfortunate souls. Harry smiled at the insinuation that becoming Ron’s best friend was determined as soon as they found that empty compartment together on the Hogwarts Express. Maybe Neville was meant to lose his toad, and Hermione’s subsequent intrusion was no accident. As far as Harry was concerned, prophecies had only caused him trouble, but maybe he owed destiny a token of gratitude, too. “Whatever souls they’re sitting next to are extremely lucky.”

“The luckiest,” added Ron with a nostalgic smile.

It was unclear if Ron was still referring to the kids at this point, but it didn’t matter. It was all the same to Harry. They were the luckiest.

--------------------------------------

For more moments like this, read Completely Mental on Ao3 or FFN. Now complete! <3

[togetherwearerapture]

Boundary (Ethan x MC x Tobias?)

Pairing: Ethan Ramsey x MC (Elle Valentine) x (hints of) Tobias Carrick

Description: Tobias and Elle get to know each other while working on a case. Tobias pushes some boundaries.

Warnings: A few curse words, underlying health problems. Most characters belong to Pixelberry.

Word Count: 5.9k

Notes: Something a bit different, but I very much enjoyed writing this. There’s no overt Tobias x MC, so this is hopefully something Ethan stans can enjoy reading too. If PB won’t give me what I want, I guess write it myself lol 

*********

It’s early Fall, yet despite this fact and the hospital’s ‘Bloom-and-improved’ ventilation systems, the diagnostics office feels uncomfortably hot. Elle feels a prickling heat across her back, one that she has become accustomed to of late. The façade she’s wearing is beginning to feel like an actual mask, all clinical-scented and restrictive and artificial.

And yet, this is not a mask she’s wearing on a crowded, sweltering T carriage. Her discomfort is unwarranted; there are, after all, only three of them in the room.

Oblivious, Ethan and Harper continue their conversation. She’s tuned out long ago, but she catches the premise- something that Dr Yannick once said at a conference in New York several years ago.

If she really tried, Elle knows she could search for a moment to join in the discussion. But if she’s being honest with herself, she’s tired of searching for sidegates to enter their house of conversation, instead of ever being invited through the front door.

She tries her hardest to appear relaxed, unbothered, indifferent. But her uneasiness spills into her mannerisms, like water through a cracked pot. Manicured nails drum erratically on the top of her thigh. Her top teeth tug, over and over again, at her lips. The apex of her stiletto heel taps the diagnostic office floor like a furious knife.

She likes and respects Harper very much, and her feelings for Ethan, both as a diagnostician and as her romantic partner are unfathomable. But as juvenile as it sounds, she’s so tired of being shut out.

A whooshing of the sliding doors breaks her out of her reverie, and she and the two other occupants of the room look up. Tobias Carrick strides in, all beams and bravado.

Her own notion takes her by surprise, but somehow, she thinks, his arrival is the breath of fresh air she so desperately needs.

“Goooood morning team!” he chimes brightly. Once again, his arms are laden with a trayful of drinks.

“Morning,” Elle offers him a warm smile, Harper echoing her words.

Ethan nods towards the drinks.

“Another round on you?”

“Sure is, but this isn’t just any old round, Ethan,” Tobias replies. “Now I’ve spent a week on the team, I take great pride in this being the first drinks order that’s just right, for all of you.”

Ethan quirks an eyebrow.

“Oh?”

Tobias grins, and plucks the first drink off the tray.

“Harper,” he presents her with an extravagant looking drink. “Chocolate frappucino. Double the sugar, double the caffeine. The Friday OR schedule is always jam packed, so I reckon you’ll need it.”

“You got that right, I’ve got two laminectomies today,” she sighs, although the passion for her job shines through her eyes. She takes a sip from her drink. “No complaints from me!”

“Excellent,” Tobias grins. “Ethan- a Vienna for you. Classic, refined, and,” he winks, “only a little pretentious.”

Ethan accepts the drink with a roll of his eyes, as Tobias moves around the desk to Elle.

“And now, for you Elle,” he hands her the third cup. “I must admit, for you I went out on a whim. I just hope my guess is a lucky one.”

Curiosity piqued, Elle presses the rim to her lips. She is aware of the eyes of both Tobias and Ethan following her action with interest. Mild, pleasant citrus swims onto her palate.

“Lemon balm?” she asks Tobias. He nods. “You going to elaborate?”

He shrugs.

“Well, I’ve noticed that I’ve never seen you with a coffee before 4pm, so I figured you like to limit caffeine earlier in the day. And I’ve seen you make up a couple of herbal teas before. I took a gamble and figured you’d like this one.”

“Impressive guess, Carrick,” Elle nods, amused. She takes a sip. “It’s good, thank you.”

“Those are some very…astute observations” says Ethan stiffly, as Tobias takes a seat beside Elle. “Maybe you can put your perceptiveness to better use for our next case.”

He slides three manila envelopes across the table, and the team begin to peruse.

“Jake Adams. 17-year-old male admitted last night, with multiple cardiac arrests,” Ethan begins. “He collapsed at school, was unresponsive, no signs of life, but luckily a fellow student was able to perform high-quality CPR until the paramedics arrived. Heart rhythm on their defibrillator was ventricular fibrillation, he was shocked, back to normal sinus rhythm. Between the scene, being loaded onto the stretcher, in the ambulance and arriving here, he arrested and was shocked again 5 more times.”

“Jesus, poor boy,” murmurs Elle, a crease forming between her brows.

“Cardiology have asked us if we can determine the cause of the arrest, which will of course determine the treatment,” Ethan explains.

“This case only came in last night and since he’s now on life support, we’re able to bypass Bloom’s absurd judicial performance and get straight into it,” Harper adds. “Actually, Ethan and I discussed it at length before you both arrived, and we have some solid ideas.”

Elle looks up from the file, quirking an eyebrow.

“Oh?”

“So I’m thinking Long QT syndrome, or maybe Brugada,” says Harper.

“They would definitely explain the spontaneous cardiac arrest,” Ethan adds, “Harper and I have ordered genetic testing for both on immediate family members already.”

“Any family history of sudden cardiac death?” Tobias asks.

“Not that we know of,” says Ethan. “But that wouldn’t rule it out.”

Elle frowns slightly as she browses the file. The tests ordered so far are scant, and in her mind, there are several pieces of the diagnostic puzzle missing. But this didn’t seem to stop Harper and Ethan steamrollering ahead, and seemingly settling on a diagnosis before the case had even been presented.

“Does Jake have a-”

“Do you remember that patient with Brugada syndrome who came in for a study a few years ago, Ethan?” Harper turns to Ethan suddenly.

“Ah yes, Paul?” Ethan chuckles, “he was quite a character.”

As Harper and Ethan drift off once again, Elle glances up to see Tobias looking at her quizzically. She lets out a heavy sigh.

Tobias clears his throat.

“Hate to interrupt your…uh…stroll down memory lane,” he begins. “But Elle was about to ask a question about the case, and you both spoke over her.”

The three other diagnosticians turn to Tobias, and a tense silence hangs in the air. After a beat, Harper speaks up.

“I’m sorry Elle,” she says, sincerely. “That was out of line, please continue.”

Tobias turns to Ethan expectantly, who meets Elle’s eye.

Something flickers across his face for a moment, a mixture of shame, guilt, embarrassment, perhaps? It’s a look that Elle can’t quite place. Then, his eyes skim to Tobias and he coughs awkwardly.

“Yes…thank you Tobias. We did speak over you, Elle, I apologise. What were you saying?”

“I was asking if he had a 15-Lead ECG.”

“Not yet,” Harper replies.

“Then until he has one, I don’t think you can consider Brugada syndrome,” says Elle. “We’d need to do an ajmaline challenge too. I can see from the echocardiogram reports in here that he has a structurally normal heart, so we can definitely exclude congenital heart disease as the cause. But for me personally,” she gestures to the file, “there’s a lot missing in here. About what actually happened.”

“How do you mean?” Ethan asks.

“About the context of the cardiac arrest. All we know is that he was at school, but what was he doing? Was he doing anything strenuous, did it happen at rest? There’s a lot more I’d like to know.”

The rest of the team nod thoughtfully.

“I agree…if it happened during exertion, there’s a few other things we could rule out,” says Tobias.

“Exactly,” says Elle. “I think we should consider catecholaminergic polymorphic ventricular tachycardia.”

“You’re thinking CPVT?” asks Ethan, interested. “It’s a possibility.”

“Yes, and it’s one I’d like to investigate more by visiting the school, and finding out more about what happened” says Elle.

“I think that’s a good idea,” Harper responds, twirling her fountain pen between her fingers. “But unfortunately, I won’t be able to join you on your expedition. Like Tobias said, I’ve got a full day in the OR.”

The rest of the team turn to Ethan, who hesitates.

“I…have a meeting with Naveen and the board until lunch,” he says. “Which-”

“-means it’s just you and me, Valentine!” exclaims Tobias, clapping his hands together. “Oh boy, I’ve been looking forward to my first house call with the diagnostics team. We’re going to be on some scooby doo shit, Elle!”

“I beg your pardon?” says Ethan, scowling. Elle can’t help but burst out laughing.

“That settles it then, me and Elle will go to the school,” says Tobias, standing up from his chair. At the same time, Harper gets a page that her surgery is starting and bids them a hurried farewell.

“I was going to say, which means the three of us can go this afternoon once I’m finished,” Ethan says stiffly, as Harper heads out. Tobias shoots him a bemused look.

“I’d rather not wait,” says Elle flatly.

Ethan has wasted enough time in their meetings by bringing up pointless anecdotes with Harper, and she’s very keen to revert her focus to the patients, to diagnostics- the things she loves.

“Me and Valentine will be just fine, E. After all, I’m sure what happened with Jake is still pretty raw to the kids and staff, we’ll need to handle it delicately. Two’s company, three’s a crowd, right?” Tobias flashes Elle a smile.

The same look as before flashes across Ethan’s face, although this time, Elle thinks, it has less of the awkwardness and embarrassment and more of the…something else. His bright blue eyes seem to narrow a fraction, as he looks between Tobias and the woman of his affections.

“Alright,” he sighs finally. “We’ll reconvene when you’re back.”

“Let’s get this show on the road!” says Tobias happily. “To the mystery machine!”

He crosses the room to retrieve his car keys from his bag, while Ethan turns to Elle, and this time, the look of concern is undeniable.

“If you need anything,” he closes some of the distance between them and lowers his voice just a little, “just call me.”

“I think we can handle it,” says Elle, not unkindly. “Enjoy your meeting. And tell Naveen I said hello.”

And with that, she and Tobias leave the office.

********

A short while later, Elle and Tobias are riding in his blue Mercedes S-Class on the way to Jake’s school, a short drive away in South Quincy.

“Not exactly the mystery machine, huh?” says Elle, glancing around at the plush interior.

Tobias shrugs.

“The same colour, at least.”

Boston blurs by as Tobias pulls into a main road, and Elle turns to look at him. His side profile is unmistakably handsome. He drives one handed, the other resting on his thigh.

“So, how’s June?”

He gives a wry half smile, and glances at her.

“Is that your way of asking if we’re still sleeping together?”

“No!” says Elle, honestly. “I’m just wondering how she’s fitting in at Mass Ken. I mean, she left Edenbrook when she thought the ship was going to sink. I got the impression she was pretty keen to be working on your team, now I can’t help but think now you’ve come here, Aurora too…don’t you think she’s been left kinda high and dry?”

“In all honesty, I haven’t seen her for a while, and don’t expect to again anytime soon,” Tobias admits. “But trust me, Hirata will be just fine. She’s head of the team there now.”

Elle raises her eyebrows, impressed.

“I’d say she moves fast, but actually, that doesn’t surprise me in the slightest.”

“She was pissed as hell when I said I was leaving, don’t get me wrong,” says Tobias. “But she’s the strongest diagnostician on that team, and the strongest player too.”

“Player?”

“She knows how to play the game. She’ll have no trouble asserting herself as the new leader, running the show the way she wants to.”

Elle thinks back to her time working with June. The way she changed her personality to gain patients’ trust…and Elle’s. Distant anger simmers at the back of her mind, as she remembers how June stole her employee file.

“I agree…office politics was always child’s play for June.”

“Speaking of,” says Tobias as they stop at a red light. He turns to look at her. “The meeting this morning seemed very…uh…political.”

Elle pauses as feels the uncomfortable tingling rise in her chest. She could ask “what are you talking about?”, but she knows exactly what he’s talking about. And there’s something about Carrick that makes her want to cut the crap, to be upfront. So she is.

“You mean Harper and Ethan…”

“Yeah, that. Whatever the hell that was.”

Elle is silent.

“Does that…happen a lot?”

“More often than I’d like.”

“Well, good job I’m here then,” he grins.

Elle’s head whips around.

“Excuse me?”

“C’mon, you can’t tell me you didn’t appreciate the out.”

She rounds on him.

“Ok, let’s make one thing clear, I don’t need you to fight my battles” says Elle angrily. “Since Harper joined, every time the two of them have gone off track, I’ve steered them back on. I’m here for the patient, to solve the case, and nothing is going to detract my focus from that. That’s the way it’s going to stay, with or without your “outs”, Tobias.”

Tobias chuckles.

“You’re feisty Elle, I like it.” His eyes sweep over her from head to toe, which makes Elle feel more angry, but also, inexplicably, makes her stomach flutter a little.

“What I mean is,” Tobias speaks more seriously; sensing her anger, but mercifully oblivious to the other sensation, “I hope you know you’ve got someone else in your corner Elle. I know how much you care about your patients, and I know Bloom’s going to make life for the team difficult, and try and undermine our every move. That’s not helped when it feels like you’re not listened to by the actual people in it. You’re an excellent doctor Elle, and I value your input. The others should too.”

Elle is dumbstruck. She still doesn’t know what to make of Tobias Carrick; she had picked up pieces and hints from the scattered stories she’d heard from Ethan, most recently in their walk through the rose garden. But while considering the perspective and feelings of the man she so deeply cares for, she acknowledges it is biased. Elle knows that she has good reason to be wary of Tobias; it was not just Ethan he had toyed with, after all- Aurora had been burned by him too.

But, Tobias had helped to save her life. And the genuine smile that he gave her through the contamination screens of that cursed room, on the worst day of her life, had always stayed with her.

So, with a pinch of salt ready between her fingers, Elle decided from the moment he joined the team, that she would form her own opinion of him.

It occurs to her then, just how much Ethan sees the world in black and white. But Tobias Carrick is very much a shade of grey.

Before she can respond to him, the GPS on Tobias’ dash declares that they are arriving at their destination, and sure enough, Elle sees the school up ahead on the right.

“Here we are,” murmurs Tobias as he pulls in through the school gates. “Looks like we’re expected.”

They park up and head over to the school steps, surrounded by blossom trees, where a middle aged woman offers them a watery smile and extends a hand.

“Ah, hello…the doctors from Edenbrook, I presume?” she asks. “I’m Helena Brady, the principal of Greenview High.”

“Yes, we spoke earlier on the phone,” says Elle. “I’m Dr Eleanor Valentine, and this is Dr Tobias Carrick. We’re here to speak to the people that were with Jake when he collapsed?”

“I’m afraid it’s just the one person,” says Helena gravely, leading them through the school. “His friend Charlie was the only one who saw it, and then ran for help. How is Jake doing?”

“He’s still in a coma, but stable,” says Tobias. “The most important thing for us to help him, is find out from Charlie some more about the collapse, and go from there.”

Helena nods, as they come to a stop outside a small office.

“We’ve all been praying for him, it’s so tragically sad…nothing like this has ever happened to a student before,” she sniffs stoically. “Thank you for your work doctors, but please, be gentle with the boy. He’s still very shaken.”

Elle smiles at her reassuringly.

“We will be, don’t worry.”

As Tobias and Elle knock and enter the room, the boy springs to his feet, eyes wild.

“You’re the doctors…how’s Jake, is he-oh god is he-is he dead?” he cries.

“No, Jake is ok. He’s been through a lot, but he’s recovering,” says Elle gently. Charlie sinks back into his chair, though his knees are still quaking.

“It’s Charlie right?” Tobias asks, pulling up a chair. “I’m Tobias and this is Elle. We’re Jake’s doctors. Do you know why we’re here today?”

“Y-yes, that’s me,” Charlie sniffs. “Principal Brady said you were here to talk to me about Jake…I was so scared, I thought, I thought that meant he had died.”

Elle kneels in front of him, laying a gentle hand on his knee.

“I’m really sorry that us coming made you think that, Charlie,” she says. “It must have been really tough watching Jake collapse like that, I’m not surprised you’re thinking the worst. But we think we can help Jake get better, we just need your help.”

Some of the tension seems to leave Charlie’s body upon hearing this; his shudders subside. He pulls anxiously at the strings of his hoodie, unruly teenage bangs falling over his forehead.

“So, Charlie,” Tobias asks as Elle pulls up a chair beside him, “do you think you could tell us a bit more about what Jake was doing when you saw him collapse? Had he been running, exercising, working out?”

“No,” Charlie says quietly. “He wasn’t doing anything like that.”

“That’s really helpful Charlie, thank you,” says Elle. “Can you tell us if he standing up or sitting down? Did he lose his balance or seem dizzy? Did he complain of feeling ill, or funny in any sort of way before it happened?”

Charlie stiffens.

“No. He was-we were-we were arguing.”

Tobias and Elle exchange a quick look.

“Is Jake your friend, Charlie?” Tobias asks.

“No! No he’s not, and I’m so sick of pretending he is!” Charlie shouts. “Jake’s my boyfriend!” Tears begin to roll down his cheeks.

“Oh Charlie, I’m so sorry,” says Elle. “You said you were pretending…does anyone else know that?”

Charlie shakes his head.

“No. That’s what we were arguing about,” he accepts a tissue that Elle offers, blowing his nose.

“Take your time, Charlie,” says Tobias, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms. “It’s ok.”

After a few deep breaths, Charlie steels himself.

“We’ve been dating for three years, kind of in secret, kind of not,” he explains. “My parents know I’m gay, and they’re fine with it. They’ve met Jake before and they love him, they know we’re together. But he’s not even out to his parents, they just think we’re friends.”

He sniffs.

“Now we’re in senior year, we’re both looking at colleges, and we want to go to different ones. We’d be living five hours apart. I don’t know if we can make the long-distance work, especially if his parents don’t know about us. In the times we’d both be back home, they wouldn’t understand why he’d want to spend a lot of that time with me. But the one thing I just really, really wanted, was for us to go to senior prom together. As a couple, you know? To just dress up together, get photos together, dance together, one last time before we leave.”

“And Jake…wasn’t on board with that?” asks Elle.

“He was,” says Charlie. “He said he really wanted to. He just…wasn’t on board with the part of that which meant he’d have to come out to his parents.”

“I see,” says Tobias.

Charlie’s eyes begin to fill with tears again.

“I was saying, before he collapsed, that he didn’t love me,” he cries. “That he must not love me if he’s not prepared to come out. He was getting so upset, begging me, telling me of course he loved me, he was just scared, and then-” he sobs. “Then he was on the floor.”

Elle kneels beside him again, taking both his hands in her own.

“I’ve been googling stuff that could have caused it,” Charlie sniffles. “I saw there’s this condition, some long one beginning with, a C, I think, that means people’s hearts can give out when they’re stressed.”

Tobias raises an eyebrow, somewhat impressed at the boy’s diagnostic skills.

“What if-what if I could’ve killed him, because of the argument? And I told him he must not love me, I didn’t even mean it, I know how hard it is to come out, I didn’t mean to-” he buries his head in his hands.

“Charlie- Charlie listen to me,” says Elle. “It’s true, that we think Jake might have a condition called CPVT. It means that certain situations, like exercise, or stress, can cause the heart to go into an abnormal rhythm. But that does not mean, whatsoever, that any of this is your fault. We all say things we don’t mean in the heat of the moment, when we’re angry. If Jake does have this condition, and we’ll have to run a couple more tests to know that for sure, then it means that we can treat it, and stop it from happening again. It could have happened to him at anytime, anywhere, but he was lucky enough to be with you. You’ve helped him have a lucky escape.”

“R-really?” asks Charlie.

“Really,” says Tobias, who is on his feet. He lays a hand on Charlie’s shoulder.  “Your principal was telling us earlier that you did CPR on Jake while you got others to run for help?”

“Yes,” Charlie mutters, looking up at Tobias.

“Well Charlie, I think you saved his life.”

Charlie’s eyes gleam with hope.

“What are you applying for at college?” Tobias asks.

“Um..cardiac nursing,” he says.

“Very fitting. You’ll always be welcome at Edenbrook for some work experience.” Tobias smiles, genuinely. It’s the same smile Elle remembers from after the attack.

“Do you think, then, that he’ll be ok?” Charlie asks tentatively.

“Yes, I do,” smiles Elle. “And I think that you and Jake will be ok too.”

****************

Some time later, Elle steps out of the school. After speaking at length with the school counsellor, she had made sure that Charlie had some extensive therapy sessions in place. Tobias is waiting for her at the foot of the steps, beneath the blossom trees, and she is surprised to see he has a cigarette in hand.

“You smoke?” she raises an eyebrow at him as she approaches. “I thought you’d know better, Tobias.”

He takes a drag.

“Vices, Valentine,” he quips. “We all have them.”

Elle vaguely remembers Ethan had once said the same thing about butter.

“Carcinogens, though. Really?”

Tobias chuckles.

“I’m dirty, what can I say?”

He dutifully puts out the cigarette, as Elle gives him a reproachful look, and turns to her.

“You were good in there, with him,” says Tobias.

“Thanks…so were you.”

“We make a good team,” he smiles, and his expression softens a little. “That was kinda heavy though. You bearing up ok?” he asks.

Elle nods.

“I’m fine. I just hope Charlie will be ok, I really want to make sure he starts therapy as soon as possible.  I know how much of a difference it made for me, after the attack.”

She trails off, and Tobias seems to sense the darkness clouding over her eyes. The mild September breeze sifts through the blossom trees above them with a gentle sigh.

“I don’t think I ever actually said this to you,” says Elle quietly, “but thank you. For helping to save me and Raf, that day.”

“No thanks needed,” he responds. “I wanted to do everything I could to help.”

He pauses only briefly before continuing.

“You know, out of everything that happened that day, all the work we did in the lab trying to find an antidote…the one thing I remember most is how Ethan was in that room. In all the years I’ve known him, I’ve never seen him like that before. About anyone, or anything.”

A sudden chill trickles down her neck, goosebumps erupt on her forearms; a million tiny foothills.

Since their conversation in the car after Danny and Bobby’s funeral, Ethan had never really spoken in depth about his own feelings during the attack. Sometimes, in early hours when they laid in bed together, with the rain hammering against his window, she would mention it.

And every time, she would see his eyes darken with so many unsaid words. He would fix his gaze desperately on her like she was evaporating steam, set to vanish from existence in a matter of moments. His hold on her waist would tighten, fingertips tracing her soft skin as if to remind himself she wasn’t a ghost.

There had been whispers in his bed in the stillness of the night, when they were both half asleep. He had uttered sleepy confessions and declarations to her; some so heartfelt and moving, she still questioned whether they were real or if she had dreamt them.

More often straight after the attack, but still now sometimes, she would wake in his arms to find him already looking at her, his eyes filled with wonder, pain, and something else that she was starting to place.

‘Why are you awake?’ she would gently murmur.

‘I couldn’t sleep. I-had a nightmare.’

She would press herself closer to his chest, feel his strong arms encircling her as he pressed a kiss to her forehead.

‘I’m here, Ethan.’

‘I know. I’m…so glad you are.’

She is jolted to the present with Tobias’ voice.

“Even if he didn’t show it this morning…Ethan’s got it bad for you, you know.”

Elle cranes her neck to look up at him- at the man who shares so much history with Ethan. He’s almost as tall as her lover, but slightly less built, shoulders not quite as broad. Alike in many ways, but different in so many others.

“Why are you here, Tobias?” she asks, without breaking eye contact. “You had it all at Mass Kenmore. You’re an excellent diagnostician, you could have gone anywhere. Why, of all people, would you want to come and work for Ethan, someone you have such a complicated past with?”

Tobias’ hazel eyes, a contrast to Ethan’s azure blue’s, look into hers deeply. She knows that there’s something hiding beneath their golden depths; either earnestness, an ulterior motive, or perhaps something more complicated- a mixture of both.

He takes a step towards her, raising his hand towards her face. Her breath hitches, then climaxes in a soft exhale, when he simply removes a lone blossom petal that has settled on the lapel of her white coat. She wonders what exactly she had been expecting him to do.

Tobias twists his tongue between his teeth, a half-smile playing on his lips. Once again, his eyes roam over her from head to toe. This close, Elle can smell his cologne. It’s good; notes of leather and pine and exotism drift to her olfactory nerve. It’s a contrast to her favourite aftershave of Ethan’s, which smelled like bergamot, cedar, and home.

Tobias drops the petal to the floor, his eyes never leaving hers.

“I’m here Elle,” he murmurs, “because I want to push boundaries.”

********************

Ethan leans against his desk, fingertips drumming impatiently. His meeting had been finished for a while now, but he was still waiting for Elle and Tobias to return.

His old rival’s keenness to go on an outreach call with Elle had stirred something within him. Something in his head had switched on. A distant alarm bell that had been silent for some time, had started to ring.

Lost in thought, he mulls over the events of the morning.

He’d done it again.

He, and Harper, had spoken over Elle when she was trying to talk about the patient. Not only that, he recognises now, but before Tobias had entered the room, the two of them had been reminiscing about something that didn’t involve Elle in the slightest.

He doesn’t know why he keeps slipping up. He harbours no romantic feelings for Harper whatsoever, but he’s been enjoying the chance to work more closely with her, the friendly conversations, to share stories and experiences.

But they haven’t just been work related, he thinks. Did I really need to bring up the flamenco lessons? Or Gaston’s? He recalls the look on her face when he’d told Elle he planned to take her there because of its intimacy, immediately after discussing it with Harper. Before Elle’s forced smile and her gracious reply of “I’d like that,” he’d always thought he had caught a flicker of dismay, of hurt, on her features.

Now he’s certain it was more than a flicker.

I don’t deserve her, he thought.

With a swoosh, the doors of the diagnostics office open. He sees the familiar head of immaculately coiffed blonde locks, and as his eyes travel down to Elle’s beautiful face, his heart soars, and he can’t help but break into a wide smile.

“Elle!” he says happily, pushing himself up of the desk.

I missed you, he foolishly finds himself wanting to say, despite the fact that like most days at work, it’s only been a few hours since he’s seen her. But as his eyes travel to Tobias following her in, he keeps the admission to himself.

“We have an answer,” says Elle triumphantly. “We’ve listed Jake for an ICD insertion tomorrow morning.”

“It was CPVT?” Ethan asks.

“Yep,” says Tobias. “Elle’s hunch was right. Turns out it was an argument with his boyfriend that brought on the cardiac arrest. We ran a test for CPVT as soon as we got back, while you were still in the meeting, and it’s positive.”

Elle smiles brightly.

“Jake’s going to be okay.”

Ethan beams. He’s exceptionally proud of her.

“Excellent work Elle,” he leans forward to squeeze her arm, as bold a gesture as he dares while they have company. “And thanks Tobias, for helping out.”

“The pleasure’s all mine,” says Tobias. He looks pointedly at Elle, then adds, “believe me.”

An unpleasant sensation coils in the pit of Ethan’s stomach. He tries to push it down.

As Tobias crosses the room to take a phone call, he steps closer to Elle, lowering his voice.

“Listen Elle, about earlier. I’m sorry,” he says sincerely, tentatively taking her hand in his own. He caresses her tiny fingers with his thumb. “It’s unacceptable for me to talk over you in meetings, and I…know that this isn’t the first time it’s happened, and that there are, uh, other things. I’m sorry if my actions have ever made you feel excluded.”

Elle’s bright green eyes look into his thoughtfully, though she says nothing; silently willing him to continue.

“I’d like to make it up to you. I think a date night between us is long overdue. Can I take you for dinner tonight?” he asks. A flash of hope, along with the tinge of dismay he remembers from before, travels across her face. “Not Gaston’s,” he adds quickly. “I want to find somewhere new with you. For us.”

Her face floods with warmth, eyes gazing into his searchingly. He desperately scans her beautiful face, seeking some inkling of her true feelings; the ones he knows she’s bottling up.

“You’re right, it is long overdue,” she says finally, her gaze steady. “And I’d really like that, to find somewhere new to go to dinner with you. But I can’t do tonight.”

His heart sinks a little, and as if sensing this, like she always seems to, she squeezes his hand reassuringly.

“I’m out for drinks with Si, Aurora and Jackie tonight. But we’ll go soon.”

She offers him a soft smile, which he returns.

It doesn’t quite quell the slight but unmistakable feeling of anxiety in his stomach. It’s guilt, it’s the gnawing thought that he will never be good enough for her, the idea that he’s taken her for granted.

Worst of all, there is the completely irrational, but terrible notion that he could lose her.

And somehow, the thought that he could lose her in living rather than in death, as he had once feared, is almost more terrible.

She gently lets go of his hand. On the other side of the room, Tobias hangs up the phone.

“I’m going to go and speak to Jake’s parents,” says Elle, slipping off and readjusting her white coat.

Ethan’s eyes travel over her form-fitting pencil skirt, clinging to her delicate body in all the right places.

He doesn’t miss the way Tobias’ do the same. Then, as if knowing he’s being watched, he looks up at Ethan. His eyes narrow, and the corners of his lips twitch.

Ethan wants nothing more than to sock him in the jaw.

“We’ll check in later, once Harper’s finished surgery?” she asks, breaking the two men out of their reverie.

Ethan nods, and Elle bids them goodbye. The click of her heels on the linoleum echoes into the tense silence. Then, he can’t hold it in any longer.

“Could you be,” Ethan begins through gritted teeth, “a little more fucking subtle, Carrick?”

Tobias chuckles.

“I can’t help it, Ethan, and clearly neither can you. A woman like that, body like that…we’re just as powerless as any other red-blooded male.”

Ethan curls his fists in the pockets of his coat.

“Don’t talk about Elle like that. I won’t have you disrespecting her in that way,” he spits, taking a step towards him.

“You want to talk about disrespecting her?” counters Tobias, unflinching. “Because I think taking a stroll down memory lane with your ex, every five minutes, is pretty disrespectful to the woman you’re currently fucking.”

Ethan is stunned. Had she told Tobias that it had happened before? Did she tell him they were seeing eachother, or had Tobias clocked it himself? What exactly had they talked about while they were away?

“Elle is- she’s off limits,” he snaps, the only response his seething mind is able to come up with.

Tobias smiles, satisfied at seeing the other man riled up. Then, infuriatingly, he turns away.

“Who decided that, Ethan?” he says quietly over his shoulder “Her or you?”

And with that, Tobias turns and leaves.

*******

Author’s Note: Thanks for reading this far! I wanted to explore the dynamic between Elle and Tobias, and the way I wrote him in this fic reflects my own thoughts about him; I think he’s a good guy, as demonstrated by him helping to save her life and his thoughtfulness, but I’m definitely suspicious of his ulterior motives and his past actions. I also wanted the sexual tension between Ethan, Elle and Tobias, and was hoping that PB would make Tobias call out Ethan shutting her out of meetings. They didn’t deliver so I did it myself lol Also wanted Ethan to start feeling insecure about the way he’s been treating Elle since his behaviour has been trash thanks to the OOC writing, but I still love him

[alittleimagine]

just a favor- prologue

derek hale x reader

derek would love if his family would stop hounding him about dating again after he’s unceremoniously dumped. he doesn’t mean to lie to his sister about a girlfriend that doesn’t exist, but it’s too late to take it back now. 

“Have you considered just telling Laura the truth?”

“He can’t tell them the truth now.”

“Why not?”

“Because then they’ll freak out about him being a big sad-sack who hasn’t gotten over being dumped half a year ago.”

“Hey!” Derek cut in. He had been content to let Scott and Stiles argue back and forth for the last few minutes, but he drew the line at being called a sad-sack. 

Stiles didn’t even look sorry. “I’m not saying you are a sad-sack, I’m saying that’s what they think.” He said.

“That doesn’t help as much as you think it does.”

Scott snorted to himself. 

Stiles was not deterred. “What we need to do is just find you a date. Erica would probably be down to go.” He said. 

Derek sighed, deep and dramatic. “Laura knows Erica is dating Boyd. Just like she knows Allison is with Scott, and Lydia is with Jordan. Malia is obviously bringing Kira to Thanksgiving. She knows all of you.” He’d already given this a great deal of thought. 

And he was screwed.

“Melissa?” 

“Hey!” Scott shot a betrayed look at Stiles. “Leave my mom out of this.” 

Stiles flailed, his arms flapping in Derek’s general direction. “I am just trying to help the sad-sack!”

“Hey!” 

Derek grabbed the nearest pillow from Stiles’s bed and chucked it at him. Years of bench-warming on the lacrosse team had not served Stiles well and the pillow hit him full force in the face, sending him tumbling backward into his desk. 

When he’d regained his balance he threw the pillow back at Derek who caught it without a problem and set it back on the bed looking not a little smug. 

Stiles didn’t seem to notice or care for Derek’s obvious physical superiority because he was snapping his fingers rapidly. Both Derek and Scott recognized what the gesture meant- there was a thought trying to make its way out.

“I’ve got it!” He said. There was a mildly manic look in his eyes. “I know the perfect person for the job. She loves these kind of shenanigans. I bet she’s a good liar, she looks like she’d be a good liar. But I don’t know if she’ll have the days off. That could be a problem.”

With every second Stiles kept arguing with himself rather than name the person he was talking about Derek could feel his tolerance slipping. He gave him an annoyed impatient look, but Stiles was too far gone in his own head to even notice. 

Scott, who had been trying so hard not to look too amused, bit his lip to keep from laughing at Derek’s frustration. 

“Stiles,” Derek said in a warning tone, “if you don’t just spit it out-”

“Y/N!” 

“Yes?”

The three of them jumped at the voice from the door. 

And there was Y/N herself. She looked like she’d been there a while, enough time at least to make herself comfortable against the door frame, a men’s dress shirt on a hanger looped casually in her hands. If she wasn’t amused before she’d scared them, she certainly was now. 

“What are you doing in my house?” Stiles squawked. “How did you get in?”

She rolled her eyes and stood up straight to dig in through the leather backpack slung on her shoulder, finding and jingling a key ring at them. “I had to pick up a shirt for your dad’s hot date tonight.” The waggle of her eyebrows was 100% intentional and successful if Stiles’s quiet “yuck” was anything to go by. “He gave me a key months ago.” 

“Of course he did.” Stiles didn’t even sound surprised. 

When Y/N had moved to Beacon Hills a little under a year ago she’d known no one in town and had described the move as an impulse brought on by a typo on a job search site. She’d been looking for jobs in Sacramento, but the zip code she’d entered was just one digit off. Instead, she’d been shown jobs in Beacon Hills, but most especially had been a listing for a Receptionist/Admin Assistant at the Sheriff’s department. 

Sheriff Stilinski had interviewed her and Kira had helped her find an apartment upon the Sheriff’s recommendation, but when she moved to town they were the only two people she knew. 

It hadn’t taken her long to settle in. Through work she’d become fast friends with Jordan and Boyd, which led to meeting Lydia and Erica. Through Kira she’d met Malia and then Allison and rounding back to Lydia.

Which was when Derek had met her. 

He’d been dating Jennifer at the time and there’d been a part of him that was concerned when he spotted the girls plus one Y/N having dinner at the local diner and he realized they had never in the past invited Jennifer to do so. In retrospect it was obvious they saw something in Jennifer that he hadn’t and they’d been right to exclude her. 

Jennifer hadn’t been too fond of her.

Derek had never spent much time with Y/N though, and it was always in the company of their other friends, but he considered her a friend- or friend adjacent. He enjoyed the way she messed with Stiles most of all. 

“It’s not my fault I’m your dad’s favorite person.” Y/N said, a teasing smile on her face. It was no secret that torturing Stiles was one of her top favorite things to do. 

But, however much teasing she had planned was not going to stop Stiles. He had a determined look in his eyes that usually spelled trouble for Derek and Scott. The look Scott sent Derek told him he’d had the same thought.

“You should date Derek.” Stiles said without preamble. 

Derek couldn’t recall ever having seen Y/N look so surprised. She turned away from Stiles to look at him and he could feel his ears start to turn pink. He was going to kill Stiles.

Her eyebrows were still high on her forehead when the look became less shock and more amusement.  

“I think if I’m going to go out with Derek he’s going to have to ask me himself.” She said like they were discussing the weather and not Stiles pimping him out. Or pimping her out. Derek wasn’t sure which.

“It’s not like that.” Derek rushed out. 

“So you don’t want to go out with me?”

Derek was going to kill Stiles. 

“Just for Thanksgiving.” Stiles said.

Y/N had a wicked gleam in her eye. It made Derek shift in his seat. 

“You want me to go out with Derek just on Thanksgiving,” she said, slow and deliberate, “and it’s ‘not like that’.” She made air quotes with her fingers. “So you want me to fake date you for, I assume, family reasons?”

It should have worried Derek that she’d put it together as quickly and gleefully as she had. The burning pink of his ears and neck should have worried him. Every part of this half-baked plan should have sent him spiraling into a panic. 

He gulped and nodded. “Yes. Please.”

The seconds before she spoke again seemed to stretch and stretch. She was watching him intently. 

At last she shrugged. “I can do that.” She said. “I have to get back to the station, but I’ll text you so we can plan. We have a lot to do in the next week.”

And just like that she flashed them a peace sign and left the doorway, calling a bye behind her. 

“I can’t believe that just worked.” Scott said.

Derek had to clear his throat before he spoke. “What did she mean by plan?”

[nostuntmanneeded]

I have to admit being ignorant as well about CA. I am Asian but to be really honest, I'm not THAT offended about her Asian night post....at least not so much as to hate her to the core. I do try to understand why others are offended though. However, she has not done any recently, so I don't know how to feel about that. // Hi, I appreciate you admitting that you are not entirely familar about CA or not finding the post that offensive and this might seem like I'm attacking the anon who sent this but I'm not lol. I'm Asian (my mom is half Indonesian and Filipino and my dad is Japanese) and I was born and raised in Queens before moving to Toronto during my senior year then to Valencia for my studies before moving back home here in Indonesia with my parents and to say that I am damn grateful that I was able to move here to Jakarta when COVID broke out because my time in Canada was pretty much okay given that 'Canadian' is more of a nationality instead of a race/ethnicity just like 'Singaporean' and is a very diverse country so I didn't have that much issue with racism there but the racism I had witnessed and endured when I was in the US and Spain was traumatizing. The tasteless "Asian jokes" that everybody (includinh teachers) at school found hilarious and harmless was exhausting and so was being stereotyped and excluded and don't even get me started with the bigotry. The way white people so casually throw insults about Asians being cheap, low class, filthy++ is disgusting, like leave us tf alone we're not the ones who had toilet paper issues here when COVID started because we actually clean our asses with water (go ahead and get triggered Im not even sorry for this I'm so done lol) 🤷‍♀️ Also it's so damn hard to find a job regardless of how impressive your resumé is and when you do, respect seems to be non-existent. Most of my family works in healthcare particularly as nurses/medtechs and lmao boy do superiors love to make Asian employees who picks up the slack of their lazy and sloppy ass white employees as their punching bag and not to mention patients who are so damn appalled by Asians that they refuse to assistance from them 🤩 Studying in Spain wasn't any better, kids in my class were apparently so proud for colonizing the Philippines for over 300 years and found Filipinos stupid, weak and pathetic and also for some reason thought that every single citizen in the PH were dirt poor and uneducated 🙃 I have never seen anyone dress up as an "American" or a "Spaniard" for Halloween/costume parties and I would ask why buy the answer is obvious: it's stupid and it's not a real costume because it's a damn ethnicity. So why shouldn't this principle be applied to people of color? I remember a tip that was sent months ago and the gist was that you're only supposed to host game and movie nights, no one ever hosts an 'American Night' or 'British Night' because it's stupid as hell and is a clear proof how objectifying and dehumanizing the whole Asian night bullshit was. News Flash: Asians are people and Asians have their own unique sacred cultures and that's that. They are not articles of amusement and aesthetic. Appreciation my ass, white people don't get to indulge on the culture of the very same people they treat with so much inferiority and abuse taking into account that they either actively contributing or fully complicit to racial injustice and the oppression of people or color. There might not have been any recent reports about them actively participating in racism and cultural appropriation but never forget about how the violence against Asians spiked last year and yet this aSiAn NiGhT people didn't bother to show any sympathy/support for the Stop Asian Hate movement. And that is fucking repulsive as fuck. 👊🎤

Thank you, anon, for sharing your story!

It's stories like these that really educate people and give others a different perspective.

I think that we should start looking at cultural appropriation as disrespectful rather than offensive. It can offend people, but it doesn't have to offend everyone. (And even if one person if offended, it's still wrong.)

But it still is disrespectful. It's not OK to take a culture that isn't your own and act like you know everything about it and that you're a part of it.

[mellometal]

Hi, everyone.

I have something extremely important to talk about that is NOT fandom related. I really do hope this can reach everyone on here, especially since it's still Autism Acceptance Month.

A few quick questions for anyone who happens to see this before I dive right into this: Have you ever heard of Dhar Mann? If so, have you ever seen his videos? What do you think about them?

If you don't know who Dhar Mann is, he's a content creator whose main platforms are Instagram and YouTube. He makes these videos about various scenarios from a couple on the brink of divorce, to kids bullying one of their peers, even about Autism Spectrum Disorder. All of his videos have some kind of message at the end that really drives the point home. One of his most recent videos is about ASD, which is what I'm going to discuss today.

Personally, I think some of his videos are interesting, despite the concepts being reused and recycled over and over; however, how I feel about the video he made about ASD is the complete opposite. I'll summarize the video he made so you don't have to watch it. (If you really want to watch it to see exactly what I'm talking about, I'm not gonna stop you. Do what you need to do in order to form your own opinion.)

The video Dhar Mann made about ASD is about this boy who excludes his autistic brother from participating in activities with his friends at school. The boy bullies his autistic brother and does pretty much everything to make his brother's life Hell, even going as far as to pretend that he doesn't know his own brother. The boy "instantly regrets his decision" when their mom is called into the school to discipline her son for bullying his autistic brother. What his mother says is what REALLY upsets me. The message of this video in particular is this, WORD FOR FUCKING WORD. I wish I was kidding. But here's the message below:

How the video concludes is the boy reluctantly includes his autistic brother in every single activity, the boy sees his brother's potential, and they live happily ever after. Whoop-dee-fucking-doo.

As an autistic woman who works with disabled people for a living, that message Dhar Mann put in this video specifically is not only extremely ableist, but is also spreading misinformation about ASD.

News flash to all the people who still spread misinformation about ASD: Not every single autistic person is a little white boy in elementary school, nor is every single autistic person a young white man who's a Super Genius™️. (I could go on all day long about how the media stereotypes autistic characters and autistic people in general, but that's a whole other topic.) No autistic person is the same, meaning we all fall on the spectrum in different places and all that jazz. There's no "look" to autistic people either because no autistic person looks the same.

Autistic women exist.

Autistic girls exist.

Autistic nonbinary people exist.

Autistic BIPOC and AAPI exist.

Autistic people who are completely nonverbal exist.

Autistic people who are completely verbal exist.

Autistic people who are in the middle of being nonverbal and verbal exist.

Autistic people who require minimal to no support exist.

Autistic people who require moderate support exist.

Autistic people who require full support exist.

Autistic LGBT people exist. (Reason why I bring this one up is because the media almost always shows cishet autistic men and I don't see autistic LGBT representation very often, if ever.)

Autism isn't something you can "catch". People have this same mentality about ADHD and Tourette's Syndrome too, which, by the way, you can't "catch" either.

Autism doesn't "go away" when you reach adolescence or adulthood. Why? BECAUSE AUTISTIC TEENAGERS AND AUTISTIC ADULTS EXIST. Autistic kids grow into autistic teenagers, then into autistic adults.

You can't "cure" it either. Unless you can build a time machine and a device to go back in time to change how a person's brain develops, there is no cure. ABA therapy is a fucking shit show in itself that does more harm than good.

The title of the video is a real squick for me too. It's mostly because I don't particularly enjoy people using person first language (the "boy with autism" part). I've seen many other autistic people on multiple other platforms sharing that same sentiment and preferring identity first language (autistic person). There are also others who prefer using person first language and those who don't have a preference. That's all perfectly valid. Whatever you prefer people using when referring to you, or whatever you refer to yourself as, in this case, is totally valid and I love you. This goes for disabilities in general, not just Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Regarding the message in this video, here's my response to it! A quick heads-up, my response is VERY long and VERY passionate. I was VERY close to making a response video where I tear that video apart AND tear Dhar Mann a new asshole. Unfortunately, it worked me up so much that I was really struggling with what I wanted to say and I had to stop multiple times because I kept stumbling on my words. That's how angry this message made me. I'll try my best to explain whatever parts you have questions about. I put my response in the nicest way I possibly could, despite me seething with rage, wanting to go OFF on him.

(The first part of my response are the first three screenshots, and the second part are the last three screenshots.)

The first part of my response, I did forget to add that the message is offensive and disrespectful to autistic people as a whole. I apologize. My initial comment got way too long. I pretty much covered that when I told him the message is ableist. I wanted to clear that up before anyone asks about it.

The second part of my response is me opening up about my experience with being diagnosed with ASD, formerly known as As//per//ger's Syn//dro//me, at sixteen years old. I also went into how not calling ASD what it truly is (which is a disability) and calling it a "different ability" instead is extremely harmful and is treating being disabled like it's a bad thing.

By the way, saying that a disabled person is disabled isn't a bad thing. I'm disabled. It is what it is. Does it have its challenges? You bet. Does it help me with certain things? Hell yeah. I can really absorb information about my favorite bands, characters, shows, books, etc., and tell you a lot about those things. For example, I can tell you that Su can't ride a bike or read manga and she's okay with that. I can also tell you she can't tie her shoes very well, which is why her boots don't have laces and are slip-on and/or zip-up. But that doesn't mean my struggles are nonexistent or that I never struggle. I do, and it makes my life Hell at times.

The narrative that autism is a bad thing to have, every autistic person is somehow broken and they all need to be "fixed" is also super fucked up and not true. That's the narrative that I received when I was diagnosed by a therapist I had. I'm gonna be real here, I cried when I was first told that I was diagnosed with ASD. I felt like I was broken. I already felt like a total outcast. Being told about my diagnosis made me feel even more broken than I already felt. I was so ashamed of myself, despite me not doing anything wrong whatsoever, that I masked for SEVEN YEARS of my life. I masked for so long that I forgot I was even diagnosed with ASD in the first place. I wasn't taught how to really put my special interests into good use. I kinda had to figure that out on my own. I was pretty much under the assumption that me being interested in anime, cartoons, music, comics, theatre, writing, etc., to the point of obsession, was somehow weird and hurting people around me. You know, despite those things being harmless. Despite me being able to separate those things from other things that are important (like work, for example). Despite my only surviving parent, other family members, and the woman he was dating at the time completely overreacting and not bothering to see exactly what makes these things so special to me.

(By the way, having a disability does not completely make who a person is. There are a lot more things that make who a person is than that.)

It's kinda shocking that I wasn't able to come to terms with my diagnosis until this year. Considering that I masked for so long due to being ashamed of myself, plus being treated like a burden for being disabled, it's probably not very surprising. I initially thought at the time that it was the worst thing to have, as I was already struggling with enough shit back then, but came to realize it's not a bad thing. It doesn't change who I am. But I'm glad I came to terms with it finally nonetheless.

This is getting way too long, so I'm gonna wrap things up here. If you've read this far, thank you so much. I'm sorry this got so long!

If you watched the video, what are your thoughts on it? If this is your first time hearing about Dhar Mann, how do you feel about him? If you're a Dhar Mann fan, did this change your opinion on him in any way? Feel free to sound off in the comments!

Have a great day, everyone!

[honeysidesarchived]

THE LAND OF GODS AND DEVILS, a sequel.

—part ii.

word count: 9.2k

rating: m for now, rating will change in later chapters as things develop, tags will be updated accordingly.

warnings: naughty language, massively canon-divergent, roman gets his own tag because he’s a fucking nutso, canon-typical violence, established relationship that might not be the healthiest, age gap, domestic murder family. if you’re here i imagine you know exactly what he’s about.

notes: hello! it has been a hot minute since i updated, but i promise i am not dead. i just went on a real vacation and juggling two longfic projects at once is (surprise) very time consuming! but i am here with chapter two. it's a lot of roman pretending not to be jealous when he's actually seething inside (we love to see it), as well as a few little drops of intrigue. yes, i know, i TOO wanted an entire longfic about roman and varya just making out between dramatic proclamations of their violent devotion for each other, but alas, alack.

special thank you to my beta @starcrier who of course helped me proof a good portion of this, and is eternally my cheerleader and the loml, as well as @shallow-gravy who put her eyes on the very very rough draft of this when i wanted to bash my head into the top of the desk a-la-roman's theatrics. without you this chapter would not have happened!

and thank you to everyone who has read this so far! carry your throne was truly my baby and so getting to write a sequel for it is the most incredible feeling. your support means the world to me. <3

Roman did not like sharing his things.

It was perpetually difficult enough to have let Varya waltz around the club so that she might have happily enjoyed being lavished attention on (attention that was, to be kept in mind, not his)—but watching a stranger, an interloper from her past, indulge himself in her, that was excruciating. Because that’s what it was, in the end; less about his girl enjoying herself and more about people enjoying her, realizing they would never have her, that she would always be his.

So as Irina took the twins back upstairs and Roman ushered her back into the throng of partygoers, he did so with intent; Roman watched Varya wind her way from person to person, lingering at their friend Dorian—dutiful member of the press always content to show her in a good light—before she and Maxim connected.

Roman watched them. He watched the way Maxim beamed at her, the way he ducked his head to hear her say something. He laughed and rocked back on his heels a little, and when Varya brought the glass to her lips, Roman saw it—saw Maxim’s eyes dart down to her mouth, their ascent short-lived as he busied his hand with sweeping a stray curl from her face. Maxim seemed very comfortable touching Varya, he thought. Men were never comfortable touching Varya. They were either—he had found, at least—aware of her proclivity for having hands cut off or (what he could only argue was the most correct deterrent) understanding of the simple politeness that came with not putting your hands on another man’s woman.

More than anyone, Roman appreciated having the things which others could not, so that he could be envied: but this?

This was treasonous. Poisonous. Heretical. Not in my fucking house.

Puzzling yet was Varya’s willingness to let her childhood friend conduct himself in such a way. She was a greedy thing, his girl; he knew that she so loved the attention, preening and glowing under the adoration. Greedy and hungry for love. Had she always been so active a participant in the act of touching, of being touched? Even by a stranger?

Not a stranger, he reminded himself tartly. Childhood friend, the man whose father she killed. That’s two fathers now, in her ledger—her own and someone else’s. And petulantly, he thought it a bit unsettling that it was a bond he could never have with her—dear old dad was already dead as a fucking doornail, wasn’t he? No chance Varya would want to ice him for Roman a second time.

He had determined to swallow his pride (impressive, gracious, generous) and make his way over when Dorian swept in; Dorian, preening and wrapping his arms around Varya from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder and making the noisy announcement, “Stealing her away, thank you!” just before he steered her past Maxim. There, the crowd shifted and scooted out of the way to reveal the birthday cake getting wheeled out on its little tray, decorated in gem tones and sparklers.

The determination to close the distance between himself and their newfound associate did not abate, even with Dorian’s well-timed interjection. As he wove through the crowd of milling partygoers, accepting compliments on his good work, he waited until he got within a foot or two of Maxim to stop. Everyone was applauding the cake. Everyone was having a great time looking at the expensive cake glimmering under the oh-so-obnoxious chandelier, but mostly he thought they were applauding his wife.

So, Roman clapped. He clapped, because the cake was out and the sparklers were fizzing and popping prettily, dancing golden light across his wife’s delighted face. He clapped, because everyone else was clapping, too. He clapped, and he flashed an all-teeth smile at Varya from over the top off the elaborately decorated cake (tasteful, not gaudy, of course).

Over the fizzing and popping, and without taking his eyes off of Varya, he said to Maxim, “Did you fuck my wife?”

Maxim clapped. He clapped, too, and he stood there for a moment and blinked a few times and replied, “What?” His accent was thicker than Varya’s, and thicker than Ilarion’s had been.

“You speak English, don’t you?” Roman snipped, his words and perhaps some of his annoyance masked by the party chatter. Varya shrieked delightedly when Dorian dabbed frosting on her nose. “I asked if you’ve fucked my wife?”

The blonde cleared his throat. He rubbed the back of his neck, apparently grateful that the attention had gone from clapping now to cutting the cake. In the corner of his eye, Roman could see Zsasz lurking—watching, keeping an eye, making sure he didn’t need to intervene on Roman’s behalf. Always a good man.

“No, Mr. Sionis,” Maxim replied, talking over the din of music and laughter.

Good, Roman thought. And then: “Do you want to?”

“Want to what?”

“Fuck,” Roman bit out, “my wife?”

Maxim barked out a laugh. He looked caught off-guard by the question—like maybe he wasn’t sure if Roman was asking to threaten or offering to join their marital bed—and then he said, “You have put me in an uncomfortable position. If I say no, I am insulting my childhood friend. If I say yes, I am insulting my new boss.”

There was something about this that flared a little spike of victory in Roman’s chest. Yes, that was right—he was Maxim’s new boss. And Maxim should be nervous about pissing him off, shouldn’t he?

“But,” the blonde plunged on, “I imagine having something that other people want feels good, does it not?”

His eyes narrowed. He smiled thinly. What the fuck was that supposed to mean? “Yeah,” he agreed, “it sure fucking does.”

There was a moment where it looked as though the other man was going to say something, his mouth opening but no words coming out, brows knitting together at the center of his forehead; but then silk and warm stretches of skin were filling up Roman’s vision, Varya having swept around to come to him, eyes bright. They’d only been at the party for a little while, but already his fingers were itching—he wanted, having stood by idly while greedy hands brushed against his Varya, and it was time to erase them all, he reasoned. Wipe her clean of them as best he knew how.

Still, she had not looked so happy in a while, he thought. Varya always beamed around the twins, practically glowing radioactive from the inside out, but it had been a long time since he’d seen her so delighted without them in her arms. And surely, this was a testament to his doing—his meticulous, flawless planning, regardless of whatever wrench Maxim Kuznetsov was trying to throw. Yes, Roman thought, he had done exceptionally, in this as in all things.

“Romy,” she said sweetly, “are you playing nice?”

“I’m always nice, kitten,” he demurred, sliding his arms around her waist and nosing the hair at her temple automatically. Every time she came around, the gravitational pull was inevitable—hands on, hands on, hands on, making sure everybody knew exactly who she belonged to. “But you can ask your little friend, if you’re worried I’ve hurt his feelings.”

He said, you can ask, but he kissed her after he said it, purring against her mouth and keeping her otherwise preoccupied; when she did pull away, still encircled in his arms, she smoothed her hand along the exposed skin of his sternum and looked inquisitively at Maxim.

Roman mimicked the tilt of her head. The blonde regarded him for a moment, and then Varya, and then smiled.

“Your husband is very accommodating, Varushka,” he told her, shrugging as if to say, and what else would he be? “I have never met a man like him.”

He felt his mouth downturn—Varushka, the same pet name Ilarion had used with her. It was one thing to accept that his wife’s twin brother would always be held in high regard in her memory, that he’d had to endure the Varushkas and the closeness that they had shared that purposefully, intimately excluded him.

“That’s because there’s nobody like me,” Roman idled, despite the venom thrumming in his veins. He was cool. He was cool and fine and totally cool. Varya hummed and planted a kiss against the slope of his jaw; her nose brushed the hollow of his throat, more than content to remain there.

But even though their exchange remained pleasant, for a second, the blonde Russian regarded him with the same deadpan, venomous gaze that Ilarion had so often. It was so close to the way his wife’s twin had looked at him, in fact, that the disdain which had been almost exclusively reserved for Ilarion himself now prickled up the back of his throat like a bile—instinctual, muscle memory.

He had seen the same look crossing the faces of the men from St. Petersburg, flown all the way to Gotham to meet their new pakhan, as Varya had put it: disdain. We’re not for you, those fleeting glances said, despite the acknowledgment in all other things that they were. What do we want with some American gangster?

He was vaguely aware of Varya and Maxim saying something, exchanging words, but their voices had dulled to the cartoonish wah wah wah of an old-time cartoon, with Varya’s occasional laugh vibrating against his sternum. Maxim waved a hand dramatically. There was ink, there; he hadn’t noticed it before. He’d been too busy inspecting the man’s stupid fucking face, trying to find the lip of his mask somewhere in there. False fucking face, that’s all it was.

And yet: Roman could not help but feel a little burn of intrigue at the sight of the inked Cyrillic letters on the back of the man’s hand.

“—stairs, my darling?”

Varya’s voice bled through the dull static that had overtaken his mind. He glanced at her, reaching up and tracing the slope of her jaw with his thumb, his other fingers splaying along the spine of her neck. Obediently, her chin tilted. She was complacent like this—docile, even; he could have snapped her neck if he wanted, dug his nails into that warm, dusky skin and watched the blood well, and she would have let him—so much so that he wondered at it for a moment. All of his hard work, all of his tempering, cupped right there in his hand; she was his.

Rather than admit to having checked out of their conversation, Roman pressed the pad of a gloved thumb against her lower lip and deferred, “Whatever you want, kitten.”

Briefly, the thought that he had agreed to let Maxim into his loft occurred. Oh, what a dreadful thought.

“Then it’s settled,” she replied. “You can stay while the party goes on, of course, Maxi.”

Maxim lifted his head, regarding them with a gaze that was no longer venomous, but playful. “Of course.”

“And you’ll leave the address of where you’re staying with Armazd?”

“If you want it, I will.” He cocked his head, smiling politely. “Goodnight, the both of you. I am happy to finally put a face to the name Roman Sionis.”

What the fuck is it with these people, he thought wearily, and with no absence of annoyance. This is just how it had been before—everyone saying things beneath the things they were saying, layers and layers and layers, piling up over each other. Didn’t any of these stupid fucking gun dogs say anything exactly the way it was?

“Yes,” Roman agreed, “I bet you are.”

With great purpose—and having determined that Varya was quite done with the evening—he planted his hands on her hips and turned her, steering her towards the doors which exited out of the club and into the hallway housing the elevator. It was her birthday, after all; there was nothing he could do except whatever it was she wanted.

“Goodnight, Maxim,” he said over his shoulder, steering the brunette in his grasp toward the door. A distressed ugh! sounded to his left, and he turned to see Dorian glaring at him accusingly.

“You get her all the time, Roman,” the journalist announced. “Surely you can spare her for a little longer?”

“Afraid I can’t,” he replied over his shoulder, squeezing Varya’s hip when she stifled her laughter. “You see Dorian, close to a year ago, Varya and I decided that we had plenty of other uses for cake to be explored on our birthdays—”

Another disgusted sound came, but it was too late; Roman was already nudging Varya through the doors to the hallway, and down to the elevator. Once the door clicked shut behind them, it was quiet; it was the one area of the building where it seemed like the air conditioning didn’t quite reach, having so many accesses to the outside, and so the air already felt a little humid and muggy.

“Oh, we forgot the cake,” Varya pouted, trailing ahead of him. She’d collected the hem of her silk dress loosely in one hand, keeping it from the floor as she wandered to the elevator to push the button. The neon red of the Exit sign cut across one side of her, illuminating her in half crimson and half shadow. It reminded him of the night he’d come back to the loft to find her covered in another man’s blood, kitchen knife in hand.

And mine, he thought. Varya Astakhova, the gem of St. Petersburg, only living heir to the Astakhov gun-running fortune, his wife.

“Darling,” she purred, breaking him out of his thoughts, “are you going to just stand there all night?”

“Maybe,” he replied idly. “Maybe I will just stand here all night and stare at my wife, hm? Who would stop me?”

“Well, certainly not me,” she demurred, turning to look at him fully now. “But you can hardly kiss me from there. And what am I suppose to do, go without cake and without your hands on me?”

The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Roman thought about the way Maxim had looked at him—just for that tiny split second—all of the disdain and venom welling in his gaze before it was wiped away. Your husband is very accommodating, I’ve never met a man like him. And that fucking tattoo on his hand. It nagged at him, dragged his attention away from the very, very delicious task at hand.

“Roman?”

“You go,” he announced. “I’ll be up in just a minute.”

A plush, ruby lower lip pouted out. Roman sidled over to the elevator, planting a gloved hand on the doorway so that the doors wouldn’t close, and she prompted, “What could you have possibly forgotten when all you need is right here?”

“You are most spectacular,” Roman agreed, reaching up and twisting a curl around his finger. “But it’s just a quick thing. Don’t worry that pretty head, kitten. I’ll be up in no time, and you had better—”

When he leaned in, their noses brushed; Varya hooked her fingers in the space between the buttons of his collared shirt and tugged a little, playfully, humming sweetly.

“—have this dress off,” he finished, voice pitching low and warm, “by the time I get up there.”

“And what if I don’t?” The cloying, saccharine tone of her voice belied the little spark of rebellion in her words. Roman made a pleasant sound against her mouth, a humid warmth plunging down his spine when she closed the tiny space between them to kiss him; it was entirely unhurried, and on instinct his free hand went to the small of her back, pulling her more flush against him as her lips parted prettily beneath his to sigh.

He said into the kiss, “Why don’t you try it and find out?”

“Is it a test?” Roman felt her smile. “I love tests.”

“Get upstairs,” he growled, unable to resist a final kiss. “Wicked thing.”

Varya did pull back, reluctantly and with a dramatic, long sigh. She’d always had a thing for the dramatics. “Fine, I will go upstairs all alone,” she drawled. “Don’t keep me waiting, Romy.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

He stepped back, dropping his hand from the elevator door and turning around to head back to the club. The party was still in full swing; people wouldn’t even begin to start leaving for another few hours, patiently and dutifully babysat by Armazd and Zsasz (well, mostly Armazd—Zsasz was not good at being ‘patient’ or ‘dutiful’ if it didn’t include face-carving). It was like having three nannies on payroll, instead of just the one.

The door swung shut behind him. People chattered brightly over the music, lingering around tables in clustered groups. He could see at least half a dozen mobsters and their families, associates of Varya’s from overseas, socialites she had charmed and wealthy businessmen determined to get into their good graces before the weapons chokehold came into full effect.

But there was only one man he wanted to see.

Dorian Young had been smitten with Varya since the moment they’d met, through Roman—and since then, they’d been nearly inseparable. Dorian had even done her the kindness of writing Ilarion a flattering obituary. It would have been annoying, if Roman considered Dorian a threat in the least. He did not.

“Dorian,” he barked out, catching the brunette’s attention. He smiled, full-teeth and as charmingly as he could. “Buddy-mine. I have a favor to ask of you.”

“Oh?” Dorian arched a brow loftily. “A favor outside of the eternal wisdom of Gotham’s madonna, Roman? How scandalous. You know I can’t resist a special in.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself.” Roman adjusted one of his gloves absently, glancing around the room before inclining his head and taking a few steps outside of the cluster of milling partygoers. He didn’t have many concerns about being overheard, given the noise level, but it was better safe than sorry. “You have access to certain records, don’t you?”

Now two perfectly-manicured brows arched upward before Dorian cleared his throat, dark eyes fluttering in a bat at innocence.

“I’m a journalist, Roman,” he intoned somberly. “If someone were to give me access to records that were anything but public, it would be a grave and disgusting infringement on the American Privacy—”

“Yeah yeah yeah, shut the fuck up,” Roman interjected, waving his hand. “I don’t give a shit about that. How about this: you don’t use the records you aren’t able to access, and you don’t dig up literally everything you can on Maxim Kuznetsov.”

“The ex-boyfriend?” Dorian tsked his tongue. “Roman, green is not your color.”

“Hey? Dorian? Don’t be a fucking moron.”

“I’m just saying.”

“Well just say you’ll do it.”

“You mean,” Dorian amended, “that I won’t.”

Roman let out an exasperated noise, clapping a hand onto the man’s shoulder and giving him a little jostle that was meant to convey he wished that he could instead be strangling him in that moment. Varya would have been upset if he did. Dorian flashed him a pearly grin.

“Consider it done. Or not-done, as the case may be.” He took a swig of his drink, sucking his teeth. “Anything I should be on the look-out for?”

“Any red flags. Suspicious shopping behavior. Outgoing calls to private numbers. He’ll likely have two separate phones—one burner, one not.” Roman dropped his hand from Dorian’s shoulder. “Armazd will have his address, if you want to get that from him before you leave tonight. And—one more thing.”

The journalist looked at him expectantly, waiting.

“Not a word,” he continued. “To anyone. But especially not to Varya.”

“If you’re sure,” Dorian ventured.

“The surest.”

It was when he turned to depart the party—for real, this time; he was tired of waiting to unwrap his wife—that Dorian said, “Roman?”

A deep, calming breath. I need Dorian, he reminded himself, and V’s fond of him. Roman pulled another one-eighty. “Yes, Dorian, beloved of my wife?”

“How is Varya?” Dorian’s eyes narrowed. “I mean, really?”

The question was not one that Roman had anticipated. Why would she be anything other than great, glowing, in love with her life? Sure, the last year had been full of turmoil—but they had come out of it fine. Better than fine. Roman had gotten everything he had wanted, and Varya—well, much the same, hadn’t she?

Dorian’s prying reminded him of the way Varya’s body had stilled, the way her expression had hardened, that dark, wild look slipping into her eyes when the lights in the club had blinked on to reveal the surprise party. She’d looked frigid, the softness wiped clean from her in that split moment.

“She’s fine,” Roman replied after a minute. “I mean—she’s great. What do you mean?”

“I can’t get a good read on her. You know,” Dorian pointed out. “And she did watch her supposed-to-be-dead daddy unload a round into her twin brother while she was drugged to the gills on ketamine.”

Well, when you put it like that, Roman thought dryly.

“Some of us, Dorian,” he said primly, “are able to rise above our trials and tribulations and come out better, hm?”

The journalist smiled. He didn’t looked swayed by Roman’s words, but eventually he said, “I’ll contact you as soon as I find out anything.”

“Good man.”

It was only a few minutes from the club’s main floor up to the loft, but those few minutes felt like an eternity; stretching out, impossibly long and endless in front of him. Varya’s birthday was supposed to have been a problem-less occasion, and now he had several problems lining themselves up in front of them. Chiefly, Kuznetsov. And the rest of them, too, but mostly Maxim.

Roman tugged the gloves from his hands and shrugged the suit jacket from his shoulders as the doors to the loft slid open, the gentle ding announcing his arrival. Faintly, he could hear the classical music that Varya favored to play in the twins’ room as they slept; there would be a little speaker on the table closest to her side of the bed, so that she could rouse the second either of them needed her, but they were good babies, like she’d said; it was rare when they didn’t sleep through the night.

He tossed the articles he’d disrobed from onto the long dining table as he passed, nudging the door to the bedroom open.

“Ah,” he sighed, eyes roaming expanses of warm, dusky skin exposed to him as Varya lay stretched out on the bed, “I see we went with behaving tonight?”

“I told you,” she replied demurely, “I love a good test. I can hardly resist the challenge.” Her eyes glittered playfully, and she propped herself up on her elbows, the silk of her underclothes rustling in a way that beckoned him—his hands, his mouth. “You didn’t bring any cake up?”

A quick laugh billowed out of Roman as he sidled over, stepping out of his shoes before climbing onto the bed. “It’s vanilla, you know. Not chocolate. It would have been sacrilege, in memory of our first big fight.”

“Was it chocolate?”

“Oh, yes,” he told her gravely. “I’d never forget. Don’t you remember? You were a terrible brat to me, and then you didn’t speak to me for a week, and then you showed up with a cake—”

“Terrible brat?” She laughed, feigning insult. “On my birthday, no less.”

He grinned. Leaning down, he pressed a leisurely, open-mouthed kiss to the top of her sternum, hooking one hand in the crook of her knee to yank her down the bed so that she was more firmly under him, eliciting a playful little shriek out of her before he tugged the tie of her robe loose.

“Your birthday, yet here I am, unwrapping a present,” he murmured, leaning down and pressing a kiss to the slope of her jaw. He rumbled, pleased, “I’ve been thinking about you all day, you know.”

Varya made a sweet little sound. “Is that so?”

“Mmhm.” Roman kissed down the pillar of her throat, dragging his tongue over a faded love-bite bruise. He’d need to renew that. “Especially when you put on that dress. Admittedly, I am a bit disappointed—I was looking forward to cutting it off of you if you misbehaved.”

“For someone who spent all day thinking about me,” she murmured coyly, “you certainly spent long enough coming up here.”

Roman paused in what he was doing—his fingers hooked in the top hem of her underwear, scandalous things that they were—and glanced up at her. He was trying to gauge where she was actually at, emotionally, but true to what Dorian had said, it was almost impossible to get a read on her.

“It’s just business, baby,” he replied.

“Oh. Of course.”

“You see? I told you not to worry about it.”

“Yes,” Varya agreed, “what would I know of business?”

Roman groaned, pressing his forehead to the smooth plane of her sternum. The scent of her jasmine perfume washed over him, and even though he was this close to indulging himself (which he, above all others, deserved the most), he knew Varya wouldn’t let go of the conversation so easily.

“It’s nothing,” he insisted. He let the fabric of her underwear snap back into place against her hip bone, sliding down her body to kiss down her abdomen. “Focus on enjoying your birthday,” he added, “and let your man worry about everything else, hm?”

Varya’s lashes fluttered lightly, eyes watching him hungrily as he worked his way lower and lower still.

“Ambitious,” she murmured, “to think that I will let go of it so easily.”

“Well,” Roman replied against her skin, “I suppose it’s lucky that I love tests, too. And I always—”

The thin, silky fabric of her underwear made the most delicious sound as it ripped, tearing satisfyingly. Varya made a soft, sweet sound, and he glanced back up at her.

“—pass with flying colors.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

In his experience, Roman found that the best time to approach Varya about things was first thing in the morning. If he was exerting any amount of true self-awareness, of course, he would have acknowledged that “approaching” Varya about anything was not about the time of day, but rather how it was done—a skill Roman thought he had only honed in their short time together.

It was nearly ten; they’d roused late, thanks to the previous evening’s festivities—including an after-hours indulgence that Roman was more than pleased to drag out— and now Varya was chatting conversationally with Zsasz, who provided minimal noises between mouthfuls of food. It was as though her annoyance from the previous night had faded with the glow of morning, which left only the bones that Roman had left to pick.

Therefore, in a show of good faith, he let the chatter carry on for a little while before he decided to Broach(TM).

“So,” he said, sitting in his usual spot at the head breakfast table, “Maxim is funny.”

To his right, the brunette hummed and idly stirred her coffee. The gentle clink-clink of her spoon against the side of the mug was almost soothing; little creature comforts Roman hadn’t realized very often that he truly liked.

“I don’t remember you ever mentioning him,” Roman continued casually.

“I do not like to talk about boring things.” Varya’s brow was furrowed, lips pressing into a little line as she read the newspaper. “Pass me the cream, my love?”

She was feigning disinterest, but he thought she might have been listening more closely than she let on; one wolfish little ear swiveled in his direction, always.

He did as she asked. “He has an interesting tattoo on his hand.”

“I did not notice.”

“No?”

Varya finally tilted her head to look at him, dark eyes inquisitive. She didn’t ask what it was she was thinking, not right away; instead, she waited, did that thing where she let him sit in silence, maybe in the hopes that he’d fill it with his own chatter. He didn’t, of course. He wasn’t stupid.

“Romy,” she said sweetly, setting the paper down and resting her chin in her hand as she gazed at him, “won’t you just ask me what you want to ask me?”

There was no room to stop the irritated noise that came out of him at her words. He scoffed and settled more comfortably in his chair, lifting his chin a little and watching her.

“Or we can play the little game,” she acquiesced, as though she were speaking to a particularly tedious child. “You don’t really care about Maxim’s tattoo. You just care what I think of him.” She fluttered her lashes. “Hm?”

“No,” he replied tartly. “I’m curious about the tattoo.” He paused. “And also what you think of him.”

“I think he is boring.”

“Well, I could have told you that.”

A smile curved her mouth, delicate and fine a gesture as gossamer spread across those soft, Renaissance-features. That painting of her that had been done in the ballroom of the Astakhov mansion was still around somewhere, wasn’t it? Not that he needed a painting when he had the real thing, but maybe he’d hang it in the foyer, as a reminder to anyone who just happened to pass by.

“As far as I’m concerned,” Roman continued idly, “this man of yours—”

“My man, is he?”

“—is just one more obstacle to getting what I wanted. How do you think he’s going to react when he finds out that you put his daddy in the ground?”

“If,” Varya replied. “And what do you mean, obstacle?”

Another scoff came out of him. “Varya,” he chided, voice welling with a patronizing tone, warm and buttery, “come now.”

“Roman,” she replied. Her tone mimicked his. “Explain it to me like I am five.”

“I know the oh-so-omniscient lords of St. Petersburg and Moscow are dragging their fucking feet because they don’t like me.”

“You are trying too hard.” She settled back, dipping a bit of cream into her coffee and stirring again. Clink-clink. It offered him no comfort now; it had become a way for Varya to dismiss him. Don’t you see, Roman, how busy I am? “They are like cats. If you try too hard to gain their affections, they will balk and bolt. They hate being coddled, except by a woman. It’s terribly outdated, but what can you do?”

“I’m—” A sharp, incredulous noise came out of him. “I haven’t spoken more than a handful of words to the lot of them!”

“You see? That is already too much.”

“Well, I don’t want them to like me,” he managed out, feeling the bubbling frustration rising up in him. “I couldn’t give a shit if they like me or not. I want them to accept that leadership is changing hands and they have a new boss to answer to, now.” He leaned forward, forearms rested on the table. “And I know Daddy Astakhov liked to brand his things, hm? So what’s Maxim’s tattoo mean?”

Varya leaned forward, too. “I do not know,” she replied evenly, “and I wish you would stop bringing that man up in my presence.”

“I can’t very well erase him from the conversation completely when I’m inheriting his business.”

“My,” she snapped out viciously, suddenly, “you are inheriting my business, Roman.”

It was just a split second. It was only a split second of venom welling up in her expression, suddenly so wicked that not even Roman was shielded from it; it was worse, now, than it had been before. Those times he’d seen the switch inside of her flip had been under great duress. Was this duress to her, now?

Women, Roman thought, watching her smooth dark hair from her face and collect herself. Perhaps motherhood had not made her soft, but rather emotionally volatile. He couldn’t afford to look more hysterical than his wife, so he waited—with great patience and grace, he thought—for her. She cinched the silk robe at her waist more snugly.

“You know that I am happy to do so,” she continued, as though she’d not just bitten his head off in front of Zsasz, “and that I have no problem with it. I just want...” Now, her voice trailed off, and she skimmed the pad of her index finger along the rim of her coffee cup before she picked up the newspaper again, as well as the red-ink ballpoint to her right. “I want it done right, that is all. And if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.”

A buzzing sound vibrated from the marble hallway leader to the elevator. Roman was waiting for Varya to issue her apology (which she was certainly going to do), and Varya wasn’t looking up from the newspaper.

“Who could be coming so early?” his wife idled, spurring on that molten-hot frustration inside of him as she continued to avoid the topic at hand. “Not someone you called on, Romy?”

The buzzer was the last thing that Roman wanted to think about, let alone deal with. He had much more on his mind; Varya’s elegant dodge of his questions, and—most importantly—her blatant dismissal of his concerns about their current timeline. She was all well and peachy over there, wasn’t she, drinking her coffee and reading her paper and not doing him the courtesy of looking at him?

She had always been a needler, Roman reasoned; she had always had a wild, stubborn streak in her. He’d watched her sit and push Ilarion’s buttons for an entire dinner, once, just to see him get to the edge of snapping at her. She was good at it. He liked it about her, liked watching her do it; might have even made a past-time out of the whole sport of it. How quickly can my little viper unravel a man? Place your bets, gentlemen, time ends when the idiot’s screaming his fucking head off in a public place.

And he would have been foolish to think that she never did it to him.

“Zsasz,” she said, without looking up from the paper, “be a darling and get that, won’t you?”

Zsasz, who had been sitting at the far end of the table watching all of this unfold the way a man might watch a trainwreck happen, moved to come to a stand. Roman barked out, “Stay,” and the movements stilled considerably, immediately. It was satisfying, at least, in an exchange which had been everything but up until then. He turned his gaze to the brunette on his right.

“Do you think I’m an idiot?” he said tersely. He gestured to Zsasz. “Sit.”

The blonde did. Roman could feel Victor’s eyes darting between them.

“Oh, darling, you are spoiling my morning.” Varya set the newspaper down on the table and smoothed it out primly, the thin paper edges fluttering between her fingers. “Why would you ever say such a silly thing?”

“Varya.”

“Surely you do not mean to.”

“V,” he snapped.

“Well, I do not know what you want me to say,” she replied after a minute, leaning back in her chair to finally look at him. “My father never deigned to share his operations with me. It was always ‘what a tedious child you are, Varvara’ this, and ‘since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved’ that. I mean, the man spent most of my life quoting Machiavelli at me. Do you think he told me what all of his little art projects meant?” She shrugged, picking her newspaper up again, ignoring the second sound of the buzzer. “You could just ask.”

The irritation spiked high and hot in his throat. Of course, he could just ask. Of course, he could, but he was the fucking boss, which meant doing things like asking an employee what a stupid fucking tattoo meant were below him. He replied tersely, “Why don’t you figure it out for me? Clerical work and employee management is your forte, after all.”

Varya hummed. It was a prim, musing hm, the sound she made when he’d said something she found to be particularly annoying. “If you wanted me to personally manage Maxim,” she demurred, glancing at him through dark, sooty lashes, “you only had to say.”

Somehow sensing this particular phrasing was not going to go over well with Roman (it wasn’t), Zsasz said, “Can I buzz ‘em up?”

“Yes,” Varya replied.

“No,” Roman insisted.

“Romy, there’s a guest.”

“I’m not through with you,” he snapped.

“I’m gonna buzz ‘em up,” Zsasz announced.

Roman felt the frustrated note rising in his throat, strangling it before it could quite make its way out of him. His jaw set; his eyes followed Zsasz on his way out of the main room and toward the elevator to—presumably—let up their guest (intruder). He drummed his fingers against the top of the dining table and said, “You think you’re very funny, don’t you?”

“Darling.” Varya leaned forward, elbows on the table, lacing her fingers together and cradling her chin atop them. She looked awfully pleased with herself, the little snake, that gigantic stone sitting on her finger. “If I knew what the tattoo meant, I would just tell you. Why not? I could tell you what the word is, but that is hardly ever what the tattoo actually means.”

Darling, she said, as though she hadn’t just snapped her teeth at him moments before. Roman sucked his teeth. Yes, it was very reasonable, he thought; Nikita had always cherished his son over his daughter, had always anticipated Ilarion taking over the business, as Varya had framed it—and even once, Ilarion had confirmed himself. He wanted you and only you, Ilya, and that’s why you couldn’t look at him when he died. That’s what she’d said, and the memory of that night—of Varya, needling the person she was closest to in the world, weaned from venom and taking so much pleasure from inflicting it on someone else—reminded him that there was still much about his wife left to be unearthed.

And it would be an unearthing. Roman had no doubt that it would be a graveyard he would be turning over, full of skeletons—not just a closet.

From the other room, the sound of an infant’s cry drifted down the hall. Varya’s gaze flickered to the space over Roman’s shoulder, behind him, and she came to a stand.

“I will ask, if you would like me to,” she told him, coming around the table and smoothing her hand along his shoulder in what was supposed to be a peace-making gesture. “But I don’t think there is a reason to bother yourself with the detail.”

He felt his mouth press into a thin line. Fine, he thought, fine, the tattoo isn’t a big deal. But what about everything else? “This is all taking a long time, V.”

“I know.” She paused, and then softened a little, all of her button-pushing and needling having dissipated for the moment; Varya leaned down and kissed his temple, and then the top of his cheekbone. “These things take patience, you know. It is not just a—used car business we are inheriting. There are processes, formalities, the like. The men have to know they can trust you.” She paused, tilting her head and regarding him with dark, inquisitive eyes. “You just have to trust me, Romy.”

Roman sighed. I do, he thought, turning his head to look at her. Don’t I?

Of course, he did. She was his wife, the mother of his children—and Roman hadn’t even wanted kids, not really. Not until he realized how much they, by proxy, made Varya belong to him. There was nothing quite so devoted as carrying someone’s child, was there? So yes; he did trust her, in the same capacity at which he supposed a man trusted a relatively-domesticated panther on a chain. Maybe just a smidge more than that. But enough to expect she’d bite off someone else’s hand, and not his.

“Fine,” is what he said, and the word still came out a little petulant. “I will. I do.” Reaching up, he snagged her wrist when she started to pull away, keeping her in place. She watched him expectantly.

When he didn’t say anything—just watched her, gauging her—she prompted playfully, “Are you going to scold me?”

Roman pressed the pad of his thumb to the pulse point on her wrist. His eyes narrowed. “I ought to, vicious girl. You just can’t resist pushing a button when you see it, can you?”

Her pulse jumped pleasantly under warm skin, whether by the term vicious girl or his touch, he didn’t know. It seemed that storminess had passed as soon as it had arrived; and though she hadn’t yet uttered the words I’m sorry, he almost preferred her like this. Coy.

“You would be bored, otherwise.” Her eyes glittered, mischievous. “Don’t you think?”

His fingers stayed curled around her wrist, but she didn’t try and pull away. Watching the flutter of her eyelashes, the way the corners of her mouth quirked upward in a smile, he felt nearly won over. How tedious, Roman thought, that even when he was irritated with her, he found her endearing. That’s amore.

“Don’t goad me,” he warned, and Varya smiled dreamily at him.

“I love you,” is what she replied, and then leaned down to kiss the corner of his mouth. “Let’s never fight again.”

He dropped his grip from her wrist and she stepped around his chair, the silk of her robe fluttering behind her as she started to the sound of babbling infants. The one or two cries that had roused her initially had melted down into baby-chat. Roman was reminded, once again, that they had a nanny on the payroll for seemingly no reason.

“Varya,” he called, taking the newspaper from where she’d left it on the table, “I mean it.”

Her voice drifted from down the hall: “Of course, Romy.”

The sound of the nursery door opening echoed, and then Varya’s voice; saccharine-sweet, honeyed and muffled by distance. He glanced over the front of the newspaper, but it was impossible to focus on the words—what did they matter, anyway? He didn’t give a fuck about what was going on in Gotham. He had bigger fish to fry. Bigger, Russian, potentially radioactive amalgams of different fish that seemed to be stalling on a deal that should have been up and done with already. Not to mention, one of those fish breaking off of the nightmare-fish and showing up, unannounced, sporting tattoos likely administered to him by Nikita Astakhov himself?

These things take patience.

Roman suppressed a scoff. Like he didn’t have patience. He’d been the most patient. Varya had dragged her feet for about a month after they’d put Ilarion in the ground, but after that, things had typically moved fast—the engagement, the twins. Everything except the thing Roman had been waiting for since the beginning. Of course, he’d never anticipated inheriting the business himself and had only gone into the whole thing wanting an exclusive deal, but now he knew better. He knew what was owed to him. He knew what belonged to him.

The elevator door down the main hall dinged. Roman didn’t bother stifling the sigh that wanted to come out of him; it was only ten in the morning, who could possibly need him and for what? He pushed the chair back from the table and came to a stand, sucking his teeth and prepping what he thought could only be the tranquil expression of a man ready to murder before Maxim stepped inside.

He blinked. The tranquility fled his face. Zsasz trailed in after him, looking uneasy. There was something about his expression that didn’t sit right with Roman, the hard lines of the blonde’s face setting him even further on edge. Would his suffering never end?

“Oh, Maximillian,” he greeted, keeping his voice the pinnacle of lazily annoyed. “Clocking in for work a little early, aren’t we? Over-achieving?”

“I am an early riser,” the blonde acquiesced. He looked genuinely apologetic, the fuckhead, in Dolce & Gabbana, no less. “I hope I did not disturb you.”

“A big wager to make, first day on the job.” Roman trailed Zsasz with his eyes, watching the blonde pace around the far end of the table. What had gotten into him since he’d gone to buzz their guest up? Idly, he sat back down at the table, resuming to glance over the words of the newspaper he couldn’t have given two shits about.

And he said nothing. He instead enjoyed, immensely, the act of letting Maxim stand there in silent uncertainty. It was probably almost a full minute before Maxim cleared his throat, prompting Roman to set his newspaper down with a sigh, as though it were very troubling that he had to stop this thing he didn’t even want to do.

“If you’re here to play catch-up with Varya, she’s busy today,” he deadpanned, turning his gaze reluctantly to where Maxim stood. “And every other day. Generally, I think it would be safe to assume she’s much too preoccupied to assist with whatever problems you might have; that type of work is beneath her now, you know.”

“I am sure being a mother and wife is more than enough to keep her busy,” Maxim agreed soberly.

“And transitioning the business in my name,” Roman replied pointedly.

The blonde shrugged, smiling a little. “Of course.”

He felt his eyes narrow. He leaned back in the chair, interlacing his fingers while his elbows rested on the armrests of the chair. It was impossible to figure out what it was about Maxim that Varya might have liked; the man was painfully well-mannered and non-confrontational, which Roman knew wasn’t her style at all.

Never mind that Varya had not once said that there was a romantic interaction between them. That didn’t matter. He knew how men looked at his wife, and Maxim had been a little too comfortable touching her for there to have been nothing at all.

“But, I did not come here to speak to Varya,” the Russian continued, taking a few steps toward the table. “I actually came here to speak to you, Roman.”

Roman blinked. Well, that wasn’t what he expected.

“What?” he asked flatly.

“I wanted to come and see if you were free today,” Maxim elaborated casually. “I was Nikita’s man. Now, I am yours. It only seems right I get to know you better.” He gestured with his hand. “I know you have more than enough help around here, and I was tied up in Turkey before, but...”

Roman’s lips pressed into a thin line. He saw no trace of yesterday’s venom in Maxim’s face, no indication that he was trying to be sarcastic or pull some kind of joke. Instead, Maxim’s face looked completely open and earnest.

“You’re here to ask me on a fucking lunch date,” he began, “and not Varya?”

“Varya,” the blonde replied demurely, “is not my boss.”

Huh, Roman thought. He swept his gaze over Maxim scathingly, and then looked at Zsasz, who remained unreadable. Well, wasn’t that just the most unhelpful thing? It did feel nice to hear Maxim say it, even if Roman would rather see him crying or begging or bleeding out.

“I’m busy today,” he replied after a moment, turning his attention back to Maxim. “But you can swing by the—”

“Maxim.” It was Varya’s voice. Roman turned to look at her. There was no baby in tow. This wouldn’t have been unusual, if Maxim had been a stranger; she tended to keep the twins as far out of reach of people she did not know as much as possible, nested away for safety. But Maxim had been her childhood friend, hadn’t he?

“Good morning,” Maxim greeted her warmly. “I was just asking Roman if he would—”

“I know what you were asking,” Varya interrupted. “You overestimate yourself, showing up to your boss’ home unannounced, don’t you think?”

Maxim looked about as lost as Roman felt; the sensation that he’d stepped into a fever dream very suddenly was washing over him. He looked at Zsasz. The blonde gave a little shrug, as though to say, Why the fuck would I know?

“Varushka,” Maxim ventured after a moment, “you know I did not mean...”

“I don’t know anything at all,” the brunette replied coolly. “You should have called ahead.” She paused, and then added purposefully: “Temka never showed up unannounced.”

Roman found himself in the very strange position of feeling...bad (?) for Maxim, standing there a little helplessly, the poor thing. Varya’s words had gutted him. He could only assume that she was referring to the blonde’s father when she said Temka, by the look on his face, and that—

Oh, you wicked thing, he thought, affection welling up inside of him as he looked at Varya, you know just how to unravel a man. Sticking a salted hot-poker straight into his grief-wound, aren’t you?

“I am sorry,” Maxim said after a minute. “I did not mean to be so thoughtless.”

“The transgression is not mine to forgive.” Varya swept around Roman then, sitting back down in her seat. She looked at him, expectant. “Roman?”

“Me?” he asked.

“It is as Maxim said,” she replied. “You are his boss, not me.”

He waited to see if there was some kind of strange undertow to her words, but he could find none; just Varya waiting, expectantly, for him to excuse Maxim’s showing up without having called ahead. It was odd, and he couldn’t figure out why it was that she was acting like this toward Maxim now—had it been the Varya is not my boss comment? Was she trying to make up for their little spat?

It was commonplace for nothing to be straightforward, with Varya. This was different.

“So,” she continued primly, turning to look at Maxim now, “apologize to your boss.”

“I am—” Maxim stopped, like he didn’t want to do it, drawing Roman’s gaze to him. Quite suddenly, Roman thought he knew exactly what his wife was doing; putting the blonde in a position where he’d have to put good faith behind his words. Varya is not my boss, he’d said, but did that matter if he couldn’t even apologize to Roman?

He finished, more smoothly now, “I am sorry, Roman.”

Roman beamed. “Insolence forgiven,” he replied, all thoughts of his disagreement with Varya gone now. He reached over the table, snagging her hand and dragging the pad of his thumb across the back of her hand. “As I was saying—I am busy today, but you are welcome to swing by the club later this evening. Before midnight. We get busiest just before the witching hour.”

Maxim ducked his head. “Of course.”

Varya’s nails skimmed Roman’s palm. She didn’t look up when she said, “Was there something else, Maxim?”

“I do not think so.”

“Then,” she replied sweetly, “have a lovely afternoon.”

A moment stretched where the blonde looked a little unsure, and then he cleared his throat and said, “Of course,” and excused himself down the hall. Varya circled something in the newspaper with her red-ink pen, her other hands still interlaced with Roman’s.

“Mr. Zsasz,” she began, “did you let Maxim up?”

Zsasz looked at Roman. “I didn’t,” he replied after a minute. “Armazd did.”

“Hm,” came the reply, even as she noted something in the margins of the paper.

“Were you apologizing for your tantrum, just now?” Roman asked. He would puzzle out why Armazd letting Maxim up was worthy of a hm later. Now, he could see the hint of a smile ticking the corners of Varya’s mouth upward, but she did not sway from whatever it was that had captured her attention in the news of Gotham; instead, she circled something absently.

Varya said, “Did you find it a suitable apology?”

He considered. “Well, I would have liked it better if you’d made him cry.”

“It would have spoiled my appetite,” she demurred, folding the newspaper primly and coming to a stand. “I am taking the twins to the park with Irina. And Zsasz too, if you’ll spare him. I won’t be back until late afternoon.”

“Late? Then you’d better come here, wife.” Roman tugged on her hand, watching her expression warm when he said wife. Once, he might have squinted at loaning Zsasz out to her. Now, he didn’t mind; especially if it gave a peace of mind that she and the twins be that more secure. “So that I can get my fill of you before you’re gone.”

The brunette laughed, letting him tug her down onto his lap. She carded the fingers of her free hand through his hair and brushed their noses together; it was all glowing affection, now, warmth buzzing under her skin.

“Oh, darling, now I want to leave quicker, and more often,” she murmured, “so that you’ll never have your fill of me.”

Roman supposed that was how she’d gotten him in the first place. Hooked him with being inaccessible, with being coveted—as if she had always known he was not a man could resist something considered off-limits—and now that he had her, he couldn’t get enough of her. He’d seen the way that others looked at her, and by proxy him; with want. With envy. Bruce Wayne could eat shit.

“Roman,” Varya said, “I want you to be careful when you are around Maxim.”

He paused, pulling back to look at her a little. She smoothed her hand over the slope of his collarbone affectionately.

“You are right,” she continued. “When Maxim finds out what I did—if he does—he will be angry about it. He is used to being the right-hand man, you know. Do not...” She glanced down, looking for the words. “Do not give it to him so easily. Make him work for it and prove himself to you.”

Tracing the lines of her expression—soft, concerned—Roman dragged his thumb across her wrist.

“I told you, doll.” He planted an affectionate kiss to her wrist. “Don’t worry about these things. I’ve got it perfectly under control.”

“I know,” she agreed. “I know you do, Romy—”

“Then stop this fussing,” he interjected mildly. “You’re spoiling your very charming apology. You know I love a good public humiliation. Which park are you taking the twins to?”

The dark eyes of his wife swept over his face for a minute, contemplative and impossible to gauge, before she smiled at him warmly.

“The one just a few blocks away. It has the most shade. Mr. Zsasz, won��t you bring the car around?”

And just like that, things were back to normal. Varya swept away to busy herself with getting ready and loading the twins, and Zsasz went to pull the car around, leaving Roman at the table for a rare moment of peace. Soon enough, he’d have all the information he needed from Dorian, and he could well-and-truly mitigate Maxim Kuznetsov as a problem, and everything would be back on track. He could bet money Varya didn’t think he’d had the foresight to dig up information on Maxim—it wasn’t his style to get his hands dirty, but extreme circumstances called for extreme measures.

Roman sighed, quite pleased.

Back to normal.

[im-just-a-random-fandom-girl]

trying to articulate my frustrations with Marvel’s treatment of female characters and characters of color

Hi, hello, hola, bonjour. I've been having a lot of thoughts about Marvel’s lack of diversity and of how they treat minority characters, so I'm taking a page out of Luisa’s (@its-tortle) book and just making a long, rambley post to get it all out.

Please bear with me while I try to encapsulate all of my frustration within the limitations of English language.

(ALSO, I'm white. I’m Spanish-American, but I do not have the ability to speak for fans of color and the other grievances they have. This post is just a combination of my own thoughts and what I've heard other people say on Tumblr, in YouTube videos, in articles etc.)

Now that we've had over week to collect ourselves after the WandaVision finale, because it was such a tearjerker and the end of a true masterpiece of a show, we really need to talk about how Marvel treats their their characters of color and female characters. I'll specifically be looking at Sam Wilson, Natasha Romanoff, and Monica Rambeau.

Let's start with Sam.

Until Monica Rambeau became Photon just a few weeks ago in WandaVision, Sam was THE ONLY Black superhero in the MCU.

He first appeared in Captain America: The Winter Soldier 7 years ago in 2014, and he's been in 4 movies since then (not counting the post-credits of Ant-Man).

Let's see what we know about Sam in the MCU:

He was a pararescue airman in the U.S. Airforce

His wing-man, Riley, died in combat, prompting him to leave active duty

He works at the VA to help other veterans adjust to civilian life

That's it. This is all we know about his backstory, separate from Captain America. However, the MCU decided to include these parts of his backstory, (and exclude others) because they make him a better supporting character to Steve.

Sam's a vet - so is Steve. They have the same, early-morning run routine that alludes to strict military training. Steve is still new to the future and hardly knows or approaches anyone, but Sam is wearing his VA sweatshirt, so there's some sense of connection, one that is furthered when they talk about their beds being too soft. Sam is someone who can understand him, aside from being a super soldier.

Riley, Sam's wingman, died in combat - Hmm, haven't heard that one befo - oh, wait. *Bucky waves from the abyss of the Alps*. Yeah.

I'm not saying that these connections are bad, in fact, I think the opposite. In terms of storyline, these connections are incredibly important for their friendship. Steve is lost and alone in the future. No one he knows cares about him for any reason other than the fact that he's a super soldier, nor can he relate to any of those people on any level. Sam just fits. He's funny and kind and although they are 60 years apart in age, he can, to some extent, understand what Steve is going through in a way they no one else can.

But for the last 7 years in the MCU, all he's been is Steve's supportive friend.

Almost immediately after meeting Steve, Sam is dragged into an end-of-the-world battle. He readily agrees to put his life on the line to fight by Captain America's side. After SHIELD falls, Sam gives up his life for 2 years to help Steve find Bucky. When they find him, Sam, without a second thought, becomes an international fugitive to protect Bucky and Steve.

I mean, he practically says that he lives in Steve's shadow himself: 

"Don't look at me. I do what he does, just slower."

Who does all this? Seriously? Sam is also a recovering vet. He, in theory, has a life, a family, a job, his own mental well-being to consider, but he immediately gives it all up to help Captain America, to follow in his shadow, to be his back-up and support in every battle. Marvel wrote him as a 2D character that lacks his own identity and agency.

Sam deserves his own storyline; he deserves to exist outside the orbit of Steve Rogers.

What Mackie has been able to do with the character is astounding. He took Sam off the page and truly brought him to life, turning him into a beloved character. I'm ecstatic that both Mackie and Sam finally (hopefully) get their time to shine in TFATWS, but it should have happened WAY sooner. Marvel has continuously overlooked Mackie, despite how much he brings to the movies and despite the significance of Sam as the only Black superhero. It's just so clear that they do not care about representation.

(And let's not start with the whole "Bucky should be Captain America" thing, thanks)

Next, let's talk about Natasha.

Nat has been in the MCU for 11 years, starting with Iron Man 2 in 2010. She was heavily featured in an additional 6 MCU movies (not including small cameos/post-credit sequences). She's one of the few female superheroes in the MCU, and the only one that's been there since the beginning. Nat was the only female superhero for 4 years until Gamora appeared in Guardians of the Galaxy.

Let's see what we know about Natasha's history:

She's a former KGB operative and assassin, trained in the Red Room project

When she was a part of the Red Room, she was sterilized

Clint Barton got her out of the Red Room and converted her to a SHIELD agent

THAT'S IT. The second point is actually nauseating because this is what she says to Banner when we learn about her infertility in Age of Ultron:

"They sterilize you. It’s efficient. One less thing to worry about, the one thing that might matter more than a mission. It makes everything easier — even killing. You still think you’re the only monster on the team?"

Like, actually, what the fuck? I remember watching this scene and having to rewind because I thought I mis-heard what she said. In truth, Natasha is probably referring to the terrible things she was forced to do as a KGB operative are what make her a "monster," but why in the world would they include this anecdote here?? It's just so distasteful and disgusting! It makes it seem like her infertility is what makes her a monster, perpetuating the misogynistic belief that the center of a woman's identity and purpose is to have children.

As Vox says in this article, the subject of Nat's infertility 

"rears its head sub-textually when Black Widow sacrifices herself for the Soul Stone. [...] It’s reasonable for Natasha to make the calculation that Clint’s kids deserve to have a dad when they come back to life after the Avengers complete their “time heist.” But because of that Ultron plot, there’s also an insidious implication that Natasha’s infertility renders Black Widow just a little bit more disposable than the rest of her teammates."

Furthermore, Nat's death in Endgame serves for nothing more than motivation for the other characters working in the time heist, WHICH ARE ALL MALE. Even then, the other characters talk about her death briefly (in a mostly unaffected manner), and by the end of the movie, she's been pretty much forgotten about,  completely overshadowed by Tony Stark.

I don't want to say that Nat shouldn't have died in Endgame. It caused me so much heartache and emotional pain, but I truly believe it was a great way to end her arc. CinemaWins on YouTube put it best:

"She needed to save her family, Clint included, finally wiping the red from her ledger. So much of her jouney in the MCU was trying to find her purpose, figure out which side she was on, and she finally feels like she's found it, just in time to die for it. 

"It's not wrong to feel cheated by her death, [but I think] she deserved this moment because of it's importance."

She says it in the movie: 

"I used to have nothing, and then I got this. This family. And I was better because of it."

Nat shouldn't have to die, but it's on her terms, and she is absolutely ready for it. Saving her chosen family... that is her purpose.

But altogether, over the course of the MCU, Natasha was cheated out of getting the storyline she deserved. Like Sam, she was relegated to the position of the supportive friend of Steve, but also of Bruce and Clint. For the audience, her identity is tied to this role that she plays. The identity and motivations she has independent from these other characters, her history, is skimmed over, and treated with immense disrespect.

It took 11 years, but it is thrilling that Scarlett Johansson finally gets to be the start of her own Marvel movie. There is no way that Black Widow will be able to completely make up for her and Natasha's mistreatment by the MCU, but I hope it will at least bring us some closure and allow us to have a better understanding of Nat's history and who she is away from the other Avengers.

Last, but certainly not least (despite what WandaVision may have you believe) is Monica Rambeau.

I spoke about this last week after posting about this review of the show, but it bears repeating.

Monica is a new character. You'd hope that, after 11 years of extremely limited diversity in the MCU, much to the dismay of fans worldwide, and after recognizing this and creating a movie with a cast like The Eternals, Marvel would try to get their shit together across the board.

Nope!

Monica was seriously the token diversity character of the show. It seemed like they would give her more depth after the episode during which they flashed back to the her during and after the snap, losing her mother, and seeing a little bit of what she's done as an adult since Captain Marvel, but that ended up being the most we got.

But why? Monica literally became a SUPERHERO. She became Photon! She deserved a much greater role in the show, especially in the finale, where she instead had maybe 5 lines and just stopped some bullets for about 30 seconds.

As the review I linked says, 

“There are so many black writers, fans, and critics noting how Monica got relegated to a complete lack relegated to meaningless best friend protector lacking in their own self agency and story except for making a shoehorned comparison of grief.”

Marvel made the same, bull-headed mistake that they made with Sam with Monica!

Let's do this again. Monica was snapped away for 5 years, and when she was snapped back, she learned that her mother had died. Losing someone you love and having the whole process of mourning and pain be complicated by the snap? What an interesti- oh wait. *Vision phases his head through the wall with a smile*

The only reason we got this backstory was because it made her a more sympathetic character towards Wanda. Her understanding of what Wanda is going through allows her to be the catalyst in the creation of the ideological fork in the road between herself, Darcy and Woo, who see Wanda as a victim of grief and loss, and Hayward and the rest of SHIELD, who see her as a dangerous threat.

How do you make the same, major mistake that you've been making for the past 7 years again? Guess what? You don't! Maybe it's not intentional, but Marvel, again, clearly doesn’t care enough about their characters of color to consider the roles they relegate them to in the MCU, realize what they've been doing is harmful, and then change it.

Hopefully, they will not continue to treat Monica this way and will remedy this in the next Captain Marvel.

In conclusion: MARVEL GAVE A FUCKING ROBOT AN ACTUAL ORIGIN STORY, A RELATIONSHIP AND MORE INDEPENDENCE THAN ALL OF THESE CHARACTERS.

But in all seriousness, Marvel needs to be help accountable for how they treat women and their characters of color in the MCU. I just looked at 3, but you could also make a similar argument about Rhodey, Hope van Dyne and Valkyrie, as well as Jane Foster, MJ, and Ned, although they are supporting characters and not superheroes. And I'm sure there are many others. Marvel (and Disney!!) has had an awful track-record, and change is long overdue.

[florbelles]

13~17 for Lyra and John?

thank you legend, i am once again sorry for my response time on this rip

xiii. what is their go-to for making a partner feel loved?

— this is something that's actually incredibly difficult for her; the enormity of it is something that nothing feels adequate to express. while she's very physically demonstrative, one of her greatest fears — particularly after he's gone — is that she never expressed it the right way, that he never understood, not really. she desperately hopes he does. she tells him, a thousand times, she is sorry for the way she is, even knowing that he loves her for it, even knowing that he knows what he chose. ( he did, of course, he tells her as much, but it still haunts her ).

she tries to makes him feel loved by what makes her feel loved; making sure he knows she sees him, understands him, accepts him completely and unconditionally. he doesn't need to be anyone else for her; he doesn't need to prove anything to her. she shows him she loves him by letting him simply be, by proving with time that she isn’t going anywhere, that she’s all in.

she shows him love the only ways she knows how. she's most comfortable expressing herself with her body, that she can give him, that she can do and do well ( sexually, yes, of course, but perhaps more pertinently — neither of them have an uncomplicated relationship or history with sex, elaborated on below under xv — with nonsexual signs of affection — running her thumb over his, nuzzling him when she comes up behind him, pressing her lips to his neck ). she’s always touching him if she’s near him. she’s extremely affectionate, both physically and verbally, especially in the mornings and at night when they’re lying limbs-twined.

the simplest answer is, however, synonymous with the answer to xv below; she expresses her love through her trust and willingness to render herself wholly vulnerable. she expresses it through quiet, subtle intimacies that might not be immediately evident to anyone who doesn’t know her ( it’s been stated many times before, but to lyra, the use of a first name and familiar language is the greatest sign of intimacy she can verbally give — her enemies are darling, her husband is john ). “hi, john” is her “i love you;” “i’m so glad it’s you” is her “i love you.”

xiv. what makes them feel loved? would they build up the courage to ask for it?

— the small efforts he makes to meet her at her level. when he says “you love me.” when he manages to drag his ass out of bed for her in the morning to watch the sunrise even though they’re on two hours and he needs his beauty sleep. she doesn't expect accommodation. she doesn't expect anything. one of her most prevailing thoughts early in their relationship is that it would have been enough for him to simply see and understand her; she would not have asked him not to hate her, she does not ask him not to forsake her, but he chose not to. he gave her acceptance. he gave her love. she would never in a thousand years ask for it.

for john, it’s that she lights up when she's around him — is truly simply that happy just to see him and be near him without needing or expecting anything from him, which isn’t something he’s necessarily had in his life from figures who aren’t obligated either by familial bonds or being his subordinates. she could not disguise it even if she wished. he will always make her flush. he will always make her stomach drop and her teeth flash and her eyes gleam. it is simply the way it is: it is incredibly fortunate they are not seen together by anyone outside of the project, because they would have known immediately. ( they do know immediately, when the time comes, before the end of everything ).

xv. what, for them, constitutes a level of intimacy that they would only rarely share with someone? this can be physical, emotional, etc.

— vulnerability, both emotional and physical.* quite literally, he is the only partner she's ever had that she has slept with, excepting some of her earliest girlfriends, generally bunkmates at school ( “i have never slept with a man in all my life!” is a favored gag of hers ). he is also the only partner with whom she hasn't kept her shoes or knives or some means of defense on her person ( john would argue the post-coital teeth and scratch marks he permanently wears make her true defenselessness sat any given time debatable, but it's the thought that counts! ).

( * for the sake of simplicity, this excludes all intimacy in relation to the project; while it’s obviously a major part of their relationship and a shared cause/belief system that deepens their bond, it’s complicated by the fact she would have joined the project and undergone those processes with or without him, whether or not they were lovers )

physical intimacy is, at first glance, something that is decisively not something only rarely shared, given that they both have hundreds of past sexual partners; they both have a complicated past with sex and their own respective baggage. john obviously has a history of self-medication and addiction that’s bound up with his demons and self-loathing; for lyra it's never been a particular vice — she has absolutely also used it to self-medicate in the past, usually as a way to blow off steam when her blood is running hot in a potentially more lethal direction, but it’s never been an instrument of self-destruction — an d is instead primarily is burdened with the fact that she used her sexuality to seduce targets; it's something she weaponized and exploited, so there are always going to be certain situations or circumstances she dislikes seeing john in ( she's reluctant to the prospect of restraining or binding him, for example, since she would use restraints on men she seduced with the intention of intimidating or killing them ). they both have associations they don't want to spill over onto the other.

having said that, the fact of that allows them a type of intimacy that might not be immediately evident to anyone else; she makes sure he knows he doesn't have to fuck her to hold her, he doesn't need to use his body to have that familiarity with her ( given that this is previously unexplored territory for the both of them, her saying so goes over about as well as can be expected — pardon him, he didn’t realize sex with him was such a fucking chore, sorry he is so sexually revolting, don’t do him any favors! — but they get there ).

sex is obviously still a big part of their relationship, and not one that john particularly feels the need to repent, since they’re married in all but name almost immediately and are married in fact within six weeks and otherwise has little difficulty john-justifying ( johnstifying, if you will ) it to himself ( she’s been entrusted to me, i’m bringing her closer to the project, she’s meant for me anyway, god brought her to me, this isn’t lust, she said so herself, this is a sanctioned union ), and she immediately casts off any notions of seducing or manipulating him as means of insinuating herself into the project’s protection ( it’s for this reason she stalls joining; she intends to right away, she believes joseph and desperately wants to believe that this is the reason and purpose for everything in her life up to this point, done both by and to her, but she flatly refuses until she can prove her complete commitment and good faith upfront, an opportunity afforded to her by the camera crew’s fortuitous arrival ) — this is also why she cuts off their first encounter and flees the ranch. she will never use her sexuality against him. in that sense, sex as a form of intimacy is reserved for each other.

( this is, in fact, how she knows she loves him; for all of her extensive sexual history, she has never actually wanted someone — not just release with them, not just a physical attraction to them — she is in fact unsettled on whether or not she is attracted to john physically; he's the most beautiful creature alive to her, but that's because he's him, she loves his nose because it's his nose, she loves his eyes because they're his eyes, his skin because it’s his skin — but actually him. she knew she had to have him. )

xvi. if they had the ability to just spend free time with their partner, what would they do? would they go out or stay inside?

— stay in ( not necessarily literally within the confines of their home, but within their own space ). lyra will probably coax him outside at some point because she doesn't feel right if she's indoors all day, regardless of the weather — no, the first seven years of the collapse are not looking well for her, thank you — but they won't necessarily stray from each other's companionship. if it's a day off, joseph is probably giving them space ( this is also his day off from their shared existence, how wonderful to be able to attend to the rest of the flock without worrying about what problems they're causing on purpose ), so while they'll occasionally have the company of one of their family members, it's more likely to simply be the two of them, possibly with the company of some of their closest inner-circle ( shaggy, holly, shaggy’s brother matthew, a few of their select chosen who are assigned to the ranch ) in the evening if lyra decides she wants a bonfire. otherwise, they take full advantage of their ability to absolutely nothing but laze around and talk and make love.

xvii. under what circumstances would they want to be left alone by their partner?

— this almost never happens, since they’re more inclined towards separation anxiety than a need for space, but lyra is the most likely to want it when she needs to sort out her mental state or let her fuse burn down ( like the time she locked herself in the shower to cry for an hour because he loved her or if they’re in an especially heated argument and she needs to clear her head before she says or does something she’ll regret). she rarely does so, however; she’s aware that from his perspective her walking out on him, no matter how temporary or how rationally he knows she’s coming back, exacerbates his angst and triggers his insecurities.

[cherry-valentine]

Summer 2021 Anime Season

What I’m Watching:

Shinigami Bocchan to Kuro Maid is one of the cutest, sweetest series I’ve seen in a while. The plot sounds rather dark, following a young duke who has been cursed by a witch so that anything he touches, from plants to animals to people, will die. Touching through clothes has the same effect. This naturally isolates him, to the point that his own family have shunned him and he’s forced to live in a separate home out in the woods, with only two servants who are kind (or crazy) enough to stay with him despite the danger. One is an elderly butler who takes on a fatherly role, and the other is the beautiful, busty maid named Alice. And this is where a show that could have gone really dark brightens up to an adorable romantic comedy. Alice is not the least bit afraid of the duke’s curse, and her teasing, cheerful disposition practically forces him to open up. Speaking of Alice, I really enjoy the way her character is handled. Just as the show could have gone dark, it also could have gone sexist and gross. Alice is very busty, as I mentioned, and the show does have some fanservice, but the WAY this fanservice is done makes all the difference. Alice is a flirty character who always seems to be an enthusiastic participant in whatever fanservice we see, rather than being an object to be leered at. She’s very much in control of her body and her sexuality, which I appreciated. Also, there’s a lot of restraint on display here. There are so many ways they could have ruined this by going too far, but they didn’t. The fanservice is restricted to some cleavage shots and Alice occasionally flipping up her own dress to display her stockings. It comes across more as “sexy fun times” than “male gaze oggling a woman”. Because Alice is an interesting and well-written character in her own right. On the surface, she’s unflappable, facing a dire situation with limitless patience and optimism. But we get a few small, brief glimpses of the emotional toll it all takes on her, which is refreshing. The duke himself is a fun character, forever flustered by Alice’s antics but clearly not wanting her to stop. There are some amusing side characters as well. The animation has been criticized quite a bit, as it’s CG. It’s not the best looking CG animation I’ve seen, but it’s far from the worst. For a simple, cute show like this, it’s fine. Recommended if you like romantic comedies with a somewhat dark setup.

Vanitas no Carte is based on a manga by the woman who did Pandora Hearts, so you have some basic idea of what you’re getting into: extravagant period costumes, gothic European scenery, dark and violent themes mixed with goofy humor, and a very complicated web of character relationships. This series features a vampire society that’s being plagued by “curses” which turn the vampires into mindless beasts that can only be saved by mercy killing them. That is, until a human named Vanitas shows up with the power to cure the “curse bearers” using a legendary book that most vampires doubted the existence of. He teams up with Noe, a kind and naive yet physically very strong vampire who has been tasked with finding said book and determining whether its power is real. The result is a bizarre buddy comedy with touches of gruesome violence and gorgeous art. Of the two protagonists, Noe is my favorite. He’s sweet and good-natured, naive but not stupid. He has a disturbing back story (as most of the characters do) but he can still look at the world with excitement and wonder. He also has a hilarious and adorable cat named Murr. Vanitas, on the other hand, is an insufferable asshole. And I don’t mean in the fun way. I mean he literally makes the show hard to watch when he’s onscreen. I normally like the smug bastard types in anime, but Vanitas really pushes the limits of my tolerance. In an early episode he forces a very deep, very long kiss on a woman he has rendered immobile and unable to defend herself, groping her all the while. I found the scene very troubling, and was even more troubled when I read the comments on the episode, almost all of which calling the kiss “sexy” or “hot” or, worst of all, “romantic”. It’s extremely obvious that the woman did not want or enjoy the kiss, but aw, she was all blushy and embarrassed afterward, so it was a cute scene, right? Ugh, no, gross. The woman, named Jeanne, was established as a very powerful, badass vampire. Yet she’s quickly reduced to a red-faced, crying mess by this absolute garbage character sexually assaulting her in front of several other characters. The whole scene was so bothersome I almost dropped the series entirely, because Vanitas never faces any consequences for this act. He just grins smugly after it’s over. However, I kept watching because, aside from Vanitas, the show is amazing. The art and animation are breathtaking. The plot is highly interesting. The characters, Vanitas excluded, are compelling. And then we have Noe, who is pretty much the opposite of Vanitas. Honestly, if Vanitas was the only protagonist, I would have dropped it, but he’s one of two. So... recommended, but with caution. Your mileage may vary on how much Vanitas you can stomach.

Heion Sedai no Idaten-tachi is.,. not something I expected to enjoy. It has a visual style that reminds me of Kill la Kill, a show I absolutely loathed. The overall vibe of the show is a little off-putting for me, but somehow I got myself hooked on it. The basic set up is that, hundreds of years ago, giant monstrous demons roamed the earth. All the gods of the earth got together, defeated the demons, and sealed them away, leaving one young god named Rin behind to watch over the seal and train newly born gods to fight, should the seal ever be broken. Flash forward to the present day, where Rin has only been able to train a very small number of gods because most of them can’t handle Rin’s absolutely brutal training (it mostly consists of her murdering them over and over and letting them regenerate, as they’re essentially immortal). Unfortunately, some demons have come back, and they’ve taken the appearance of humans. This revelation motivates some of the younger gods to resume their training with Rin. And that’s about all I can say for the plot without getting into some bizarre subplots. There’s a lot I don’t like about the show. I’m not crazy about its cartoony look given the subject matter. I don’t like that there’s basically a whole subplot that revolves around human women being repeatedly raped (side note: rape is never graphically shown, though it is made extremely clear what is happening and we see the lead up to it, also this is a rather small subplot that gets little attention after the first episode). And I absolutely hate that a character involved in this subplot, who encourages it, is presented as a character we should actually like. But! There are some things I really enjoy about it as well. I think the setup is really cool. The gods, and their role in the world of the story, are super interesting. They’re practically indifferent to humans, not even taking the slightest bit of interest when one country invades another and slaughters innocent civilians, because to them, it’s like a human intervening when one animal fights and kills another in the woods. So long as humans aren’t completely wiped out, they don’t get involved. Which is a neat concept. I also like the battles, which are frenetic and a blast to watch. And I totally love Rin, who is just a straight up badass in every single way. She’s one of those ridiculously overpowered characters we sometimes get in anime, most of which are usually male. Rin is so absurdly powerful that other absurdly powerful characters are terrified of her to the point that the mere mention of her name triggers panic attacks. Watching her fight is pure joy. Also the music is great, with an absolute banger of an opening theme. Recommended if you like wild, imaginative action anime and aren’t triggered by rape.

Carry Over Shows From Previous Seasons:

To Your Eternity Boku no Hero Academia Shaman King

Best of Season:

Best New Show: Shinigami Bocchan to Kuro Maid

Best Opening Theme: Heion Sedai no Idaten-tachi

Best Ending Theme: Vanitas no Carte

Best New Male Character: Noe (Vanitas no Carte)

Best New Female Character: Alice (Shinigami Bocchan to Kuro Maid)

[tunakaslana]

Aftermath fanfic after Hua's awakening

Kiana and Doodoo thing I wanted to do for a while now.

——————————

It was afternoon, most Schicksal staffs and Valkyrie are busy on carrying out their assigned tasks and missions. The hallways are almost empty if you exclude those doctors and researchers going around doing their things.

Kiana has been strolling around Schicksal, there really isn't anything she could do. Ever since she became the acting Overseer after she was met by Durandal when they got back Fu hua in Taixuan, her dull days just became duller.

Ever since Otto's "death" or disappearance, the higher council of Schicksal is in shambles. They need an Overseer, or an acting Overseer, to keep thing in path until Otto comes back. Theresa, the only Apocalype existing beside from Otto (even though it's only by name), is already considered as traitors of Schicksal and was already exiled from it. A Schariac would be a rather lesser choice than Theresa since to the eyes of most, they are nothing but guinea pigs to the Apocalypse family if not given credit for the "Holy blood" their house possess.

Don't even get me started with the Kaslanas, Schicksal looks at them like Schariacs, but a bit more. Main thing is because of Kaslanas' strong Honkai adaptability. They fear Kaslanas due to it and you caould trace it back during Kallen's era.

Durandal, not being able to bare seeing the disarray in Schicksal anymore, decided to sought for the best possible candidate as Overseer. Schicksal is a very traditional organization and would only choose candidates as Overseer within the three Houses.

Kiana Kaslana, or K-423, would be it. Even as a clone, she still holds relations between the Houses of Schariac and Kaslana, also the indirect connection between her and the Apocalypse after being regarded as Otto's creation. She more or less represent the 3 families on her own.

As Durandal was in the HQ database, looking for information on Anti-Entropy bases and possible locations for Kiana Kaslana, a large spike of Honkai Energy, roughly reaching 6000 HW was recorded in Eastern Asia within the Eurasian Plate. That amount of Honkai Energy released is similar to a Honkai Eruption taking place.

As much as the leadership issues in Schicksal is important, they can't ignore the possible birth of a new Herrscher.

Durandal assigned the other Immortal Blades that can still be deployed to her team that is going to go to the location of the spike. Rita and the other Immortal Blades that are severly injured during the Honkai Eruption in Coral City are still healing.

When they got to the location of the spike, which is located in the northeastern part of Shenzhou, what they saw is simply not what they expected.

In the coordinates they went, they saw the former Schicksal Agent that should be dead, a former Schicksal Valkyrie, and the person Durandal is looking for, Kiana Kaslana.

Eyes were thoroughly inspecting the surrounding, wondering what caused such spike and where it is now. Durandal speculated that it is from the person she fought in Schicksal that has a similar appearance with Fu hua. She asked Kiana and those present, aside from her squad, where is the Herrscher.

"The Herrscher is contained, it's now a hostless consciousness. It won't cause anymore damage. Her location is also unknown to us."

Judging from Fu hua's words, she ordered the Immortal blades to clear the Honkai Beasts around the area and return immediately to Schicksal to assist on damage control in the HQ.

She looked back to the group and it seems that the girl with a robotic phantom is now fine. She approached Kiana.

"May I have a word with you Ms. Kaslana? Private if possible."

"What is it about now? Fu hua and Bronya deserves a hear on whatever discussion we'll have.."

Durandal expected as much, but still decided to go on.

"It's about Schicksal's leadership... Overseer Otto is still missing, we're conducting a search operation within all of Schicksal's branches and other possible locations. As of now, no traces has been found on where he could have went or an act of kidnapping was done."

"I still don't see the reason why I'm concerned with this matter.."

A long silence ensued the group before Durandal decided to speak up.

"You are to act as an Acting Overseer until Overseer Otto is found. Feudal order in Schicksal will disarray if none will lead them."

The three were shocked by what Durandal had delivered. Fu hua decided spoke up.

"Even so, Otto has a council with enough capabilities to lead Schicksal even if he was gone, don't tell me they had fallen too?"

"Sadly... That seems to be the case."

Kiana pulled Fu hua and Bronya out of Durandal's earshot and conversed in whispers.

"Hey, don't you think this is a good a offer? I mean, surely, being an Overseer grants them access on all files and data around Schicksal and--"

"And you plan to fish out information in them while acting as Overseer?"

"Bingo!"

"Never knew Kiana Idiotka could think of that."

"Hey!"

"Anyway, that's also an advantage for our side. Otto still has many things hidden in the shadow, it would be good if we were to uncover even some of it."

"Da, Bronya will go back to AE to tell them and Theresa what happened here, I assume both of you will head to Schicksal?"

"Uh huh, tell aunt Teri that Kiana will be fine, she has Fu hua with her."

"Da, I will tell the rest of the details to Theresa. You should talk to Durandal now, I'll be heading to the Helios."

Bronya got better thanks to Kiana healing her. She then went to Helios to go back to AE.

Fu hua and Kiana walked to Durandal to discuss about the rest of the matter. Kiana agreed on becoming Overseer until Otto is found under the condition Fu hua will be with her. Durandal accepted her conditions and the three of them headed to Schicksal HQ to ready Kiana with the other things she needed to learn.

——————————

Kiana continued to wander around the base. She eventually found herself in the garden. There are benches in the garden, she's already walking too much for 1 day so she settled on one of them.

Fu hua is normally with her but she has things to take care of, something about keeping something away from human sight. It's been 2 weeks and still no signs of Otto.

Waaaah-- is there even anything left to do? I already signed off the paperworks Amber gave me

The white haired knight looked up to the clouds that are moving far too close in her vision. Maybe it's because of boredom? She got far too distracted in the clouds to even notice someone approaching her.

"Thought I could found you here."

The sudden rise of volume behind Kiana made her jump from her position. She looked up to see the owner of the said voice.

"Ah Durandal, you're already back, how did the mission went?"

"Smooth as ever, the Honkai in that area has been contained. We also managed to get some piece of info on what might be the cause of it."

"Is that so? I'll look into it later."

Kiana moved to side a bit and patted the space beside her. Durandal eventually occupied the seat beside Kiana.

Both of them sat in silence, staring at the sky above their heads.

"Sometimes, I wonder why you chose me as an acting Overseer, you never really told me anything aside from it being a wise choice and such."

The blond pondered a bit on the words of the woman beside her.

"Hmn, because you could make a wise decision. Our conversation back then when you where held by Schicksal when I captured you is enough. It's rare to see something bright in a world full of gray.."

"Mmmhm"

"Did that answer your question?" Durandal looked at the eyes of the person beside her as if seeking for her approval.

Kiana stood up and patted Durandal's head.

"Mah, mostly, anyway, that's enough deep talk for today, we should head back, the sun is already setting"

Kiana flashed Durandal a smile as she held her hand out to the blond. Durandal accepts it as she stood up.

Durandal then remember something.

"Oh right"

"Eh? Something wrong?"

"Not something like that. Rita asked me to invite both you and Fu hua for dinner tonight. Will you be available tonight?"

"If it's me, I am.. I don't know about Fu hua since she's still taking care of some things, but expect me to come later! What time should I go?" Kiana then brought a finger to her chin.

Durandal smiled a bit on Kiana's acceptance, "Around 7 would be sufficient."

"Alrighty, we should head back now, it's already 5:39."

This hand... Felt so familiar.. yet why can't I remember a thing?

Both of them left the garden, walking side by side with Kiana still holding Durandal's hand....