#to peeps from discord: you definitely saw this before

[onemaebee]

How come you're never on twitter any more? I miss you :c

HI BAL!!!💜💜💜

On a break! Unfortunately it was giving me anxiety attacks as well as panic attacks, being plugged in to The News and needing to be Aware of many things and raising awareness and boosting because there is so much terribleness happening everywhere and everything is getting worse why is so little getting better, where is this week's school shooting, what's the daily place trending where there was another shooting spree, why is there so little hope?

I'm a creature who is very very easily influenced by my surroundings and eventually this overwhelmed me a few times and my husband pointed out that hey, maybe twitter isn't helping that? Because I've spent so many years being outraged and terrified and scared, and twit was feeding directly into it because terrible news goes around the world before good news has even got its boots on, to bastardize a PTerry quote.

Also havent checked discord and stopped following news sites for the same reason. Definitely needing to adjust medication to also treat anxiety and/or change adhd meds, but my new doc that I just saw this week wants to refer me to another office to take a look at that and everything is backed up, sigh.

I miss being social. there is something so special about this lovely circle of people I've found via erasermic (and then aizawa and present mic and loud boi lovers in general). My favorite little corner of the internet.

Tumblr, in all its hellsite (affectionate) glory, is the closest I can come to disconnecting from news while also seeing posts from most of my peeps. (bal, come over here more often, yo! ;P)

Hopefully I'll be able to handle the rest of the internet/world in a few months, but for now I'm over here. :)

[kazayneo]

kny fanfic prompt list ready set gO

(keep in mind that its been around a year since i last read the manga so i might get some things wrong) also manga spoilers!!

- the idea that aoi was a lot more soft before kanae's death, before shinobu put on the mask of something similar to her sister. like- when shinobu started acting more like kanae, aoi started acting more like shinobu's old self. someone had to be the tough one. aoi hardened herself, became more assertive and stubborn, so that no one can hurt her again, so that she can bear the responsibility that shinobu once bore(since shinobu had to take on the responsibility of kanae), and so that no one can see how weak she really felt. idk if i overexplained this concept HSJDSKDHKSDS

- oh and adding onto that cuz my mind latched onto the kocho girls!! the idea that all of them had been split apart for a bit, after kanae's death. kanae was the mediator, the oldest and the one with most experience, the strongest. in a way, she was the mother figure for everyone in the manor. after she died, none of them knew how to react. one by one, they adjusted, taking on new responsibilities and roles and stuff like that, but it took a long time.

- also there’s a lot of potential for hurt/comfort for the prompt above!! cuz after kanae’s death, i imagine that there was a ton of chaos, and since the kocho manor is constantly busy with healing and taking care of slayers, there wasn’t enough time for mourning. and so the kocho girls just kinda. pushed aside their grief and emotions in favor of prioritizing their duties and responsibilities. there was a tenseness in the air, an uneasiness, a feeling as if someone is going to snap at any moment, that their fragile “calm” after kanae’s death would break. it was a mess. and no one knew how to fix it.

- shinobu and giyuu bonding time!! cuz they share the weight of their inferiority complexes and their feeling of a need to replace the person they lost, to make up for their lack of presences, but knowing deep down that they'd never be enough. there was a certain level of resentment, they are mirrors of eachother, reflecting the parts that they dont want to see. its unjustified, they're aware of that, but still there. then again, they were the only people they can relate to, and maybe there is a comfort in that.

- the idea of shinobu being the one who healed muichiro after the whole *gestures to his backstory*. muichiro may be cold and blunt to most, but hes soft  around a select few. shinobu is one of them

- giyuu and sanemi talking and bonding over being the last pillars alive. cuz beyond all the surface level differences, there are a lot of similarities. and even if the pillars fought beside many comrades, allies, and friends, no one knew the pillars on a certain level as other pillars. no one else shared the same feelings of comradery, fighting back to back with people who can match them, as they fight and suffer so the rest of the world wouldnt have to. no one else saw them the same way, after a massive battle took place, hurt and bleeding and vulnerable. the rest of the corps knew them as wise and powerful figures to look up to, invincible, always there to save the day. no one else knew the humans behind the front. giyuu and sanemi are the only ones left to carry those memories.

- i dont even know the correct terminology for this. but kanao teaches herself how to sew, to make a haori that matches shinobu and kanae's. oh!! and there's leftover fabric from shinobu's haori from her fight against douma, cuz im still in serious denial that all of it was eaten by him. kanao finds a piece of it and keeps it with her all the time.

i realize that these are all hurt/comfort prompts but shhhh. i would pay to read these if i wasnt poor

[withcolebrock]

Lovely

Corpse Husband x fem reader

Summary: Y/N surprises Corpse on his birthday

Warnings: a few swear words

Word count: 1,818

Author’s Note: happy early birthday Corpsey!! I thought about writing a birthday fic and this is what I cam up with, I hope you guys enjoy it. Also please tell me I’m not the only person that remembers Mario Super Sluggers, one of the best Mario games and I stand by that, that’s all. 

~~~

Corpse was never big on birthdays. He hated the attention it brought on him, he hated the idea of celebrating himself like that. He stopped recognizing his birthday when he was fifteen. Never acknowledge the day as something special. Until he met Y/N. Three years ago he met Y/N through social media and she was the first person he felt comfortable enough to show his face to.

The two were never romantically involved, per say, but they definitely had romantic feelings for each other. Their friends were big on teasing them about their feelings for each other, Felix and Sean always had a field day with this. Their friend group thought it was peak comedy. Even Corpse would admit that it was hilarious listening to Sean try to impersonate his voice.

Y/N and Corpse first met on his birthday, he invited her to come over and hang out. She happily accepted the offer. Ever since then Corpse has started to look forward to his birthday because he knew they would spend all day together. He knew he would be happy and smiling the whole day because of her.

He was laying in bed watching one of Dream’s Manhunts. He lifted his phone from his side table to begin to scroll through Twitter. It was the same old tweets and not a lot of tweets from his friends, quite boring. He reached to place it down when he saw a phone call from Y/N. His pinked lips curled up softly as he spent a few seconds admiring the photo of her in his merch hoodie that he took.

“Y/N, Hey,” he said while putting the phone on speaker. He cleared his throat while he rested the phone on his chest.

“I’m so sorry, Corpse,” she whispered, a small whimper left her lips. Corpse furrowed his eyebrows as he adjusted the pillow under his head.

“What’s wrong, Hun?” he asked.

“I can’t make it tomorrow, my car won’t start and my brother came to look at it and it looks like I need a new battery and possibly an alternator, I’m so sorry Corpse, I really wanted to see you,”

Corpse let her finish talking while he felt his heart sink at her words. She was all he was looking forward to seeing for weeks. He spent a few days cleaning his apartment, making it spotless. He went out to the store to buy her favorite alcohol and other snacks. “It’s fi-Don’t worry about it, it’s okay,” he whispered. He tapped his finger against his laptop while clenching his jaw.

“We will still celebrate your birthday, I promise, we will still have a good day, okay?” she offered.

“Yeah, of course, it’ll still be good. Yeah, we can-yeah we can do something over discord,” he explained while he tossed his computer to the other side of his bed as he slowly pushed himself off the bed.

“Are you mad?” she asked, her voice was barely audible.

“No of course not, it’s something out of your control, it’s okay I promise,” he responded while he left his bedroom. His gaze looked all over his freshly cleaned apartment, that never looks this nice and put together, “I was just excited to see you is all,” the words fell from his lips without realizing. His eyes widened as she was silent on her end of the phone.

“I was excited too,” she whispered. After a few more minutes they ended their phone call with a quick shared goodbye. He rested his phone down on the counter as he continued to frustratingly clench his jaw. His gaze shifted towards the bottle of Vodka in the corner of his kitchen. He sighed while he reached for it and quickly untwisted it. He brought it to his lips and took a quick sip of it. He cringed as he set the bottle down on the counter while twisting the lid back on.

“How does she like this shit,” he muttered as he shook his head again at the after taste. He walked towards his bathroom, while dropping his head slightly.  He rested his phone and his watch down onto the bathroom counter. He looked into the mirror briefly before shifting his gaze back towards his feet. He started to take off his clothes to get into the shower and to try and rush the end of the day. He wanted to try and sleep to get Y/N off of his mind.

~~~

He was surprised when he woke up when he realized he did in fact fall asleep for a while. It was late past nine o’clock when he reached for his phone on his side table. He opened Twitter to see hundreds of thousands of birthday tweets from fans. His face softens as his lips curled up into a smile.

Over the years his fans would tell him happy birthday, over social media but this year felt different. The constant messages rolling through slowly started forming tears into his eyes. The amount of endless love he always received from his fans always made him feel better and slightly more secure than last time. His eyes filled with more tears as he saw his friends tweet sweet little birthday messages. A few tears slipped his eyes as he began to reply to their tweets and private messages.

He raised his hand as he wiped his eyes. He shook his head as she slowly stood up from his bed while he kept his phone in his hand. The birthday messages and wishes were a quick and short distraction from the one person he wanted to see. The one person who made him excited for his birthday again. He sighed as he opened his fridge, taking a bottle of water.

The silence in his apartment was heartbreaking, despite the love and appreciation he felt from his fans and his friends, he was still alone. He never wanted to remember the feeling of being alone on his birthday again. He loved the joy and love he felt from Y/N when she would spent the day with him. He wiped his eye as he rested his phone beside his bottle of water when it started to ring. He quickly cleared his throat as he answered the phone.

“Open the door,” she spoke. Corpse’s eyebrows furrowed as he stood silently while he waited for her to elaborate, “Open the door, please,” she continued. He chuckled nervously as he kept the phone to his ear as he wandered towards the door. He looked through the peep hole to see Y/N standing holding a small cake. He chuckled as he pulled the door open. She smiled widely when she saw him. His smile was as wide as it could go as he was at a loss for words. His body was tense as he looked deeply into her eyes. “Happy birthday,” she whispered as she stared towards him. Corpse slowly brought his phone down into his hoodie pocket as he reached out for the cake.

“I thought you couldn’t come,” he said as he walked towards the kitchen. She placed her phone into her jean pocket as she kept her gaze on Corpse.

“Suprise?” she let out while she ran her fingers through her hair. He chuckled as he turned to face her. He leaned his body against the counter while he crossed his arms over his chest.

“Come here,” he said, barely audible. She rushed towards him delicately wrapping her arms around him as he slowly did the same. He took a long deep breath as he ran his hand slowly up and down her back. His eyes shut as he fought off the tears of joy filling his eyes. He sniffed, as she pulled away from him.

‘Are you okay?” she asked as she stood in front of him, anxiously playing with her sleeves. He nodded as he chewed at his bottom lip.

“I’m just happy you’re here is all,”

~~~

They sat together with a half eaten chocolate cake with a half a bottle of wine, with Mario Super Sluggers on the TV screen. She leane her head back laughing as she watched Corpse try and get Bowser to get to first base. “Come on, come on, come on, Oh fuck that!” he yelled through a few chuckles. Y/N gets Diddy Kong to get Bowser out. “Oh come on Bowser you’re supposed to be all strong and shit what is this bullshit,” he complained while he sat back down on the couch. She leaned her head back as she began laughing hysterically.

“I think it’s just you, Hun, this aint got nothing to do with Bowser,” she explained. He shook his head while laughing.

“I am so good at this game, it’s definitely Bowser for sure,” he continued. They played the game for a few more rounds, there was tons of trash talk and laughter shared. A full bottle of wine and a few vodka sodas later they were both drunk and still making their way through the cake sitting on the coffee table.

“I’m so glad you came, honestly would’ve been a shit day without you,” Corpse said as he took another fork full of cake and he slowly brought it to his lips.

“It’s been a great day, it’s always a great day with you, Lovely,” she turned her head towards him. He tilted his head to meet her gaze. A small chuckle leaves his lips as he stares into her eyes, admiring the color. “Why are you laughing?” she chuckled as she spoke quietly. He shook his head as he pressed his lips together.

“That’s a new nickname,” he whispered. She furrowed her eyebrows as she tilted her head back slightly, “Lovely,” he hummed before leaning slightly closer to her, “I like that one.”

“I’ll start using it more then,” she said while she turned her head away from him briefly, “Lovely.” He smiled widely as he rolled his eyes playfully. He lifted his hand and wiped his hair away from his eyes as he reached into his pocket for his phone. He opened his camera. “What are you doing?”

“Smile,” he said while he held the camera facing her. She furrowed her eyebrows and laughed nervously. She smiled towards Coprse. He took a few of the photos and held his phone up as he looked towards her through the phone. He admired her smile, the way her nose scrunched up slightly when she did. He slowly lowered his phone as he kept his gaze towards her.

“What,” she let out nervously, her lips still curled upwards. He shook  his head as he reluctantly shifted his gaze back to his phone. He went to Twitter and picked his favorite one. He captioned the photo, Great Birthday with my Lovely :).

He drunkenly posted without thinking about the repercussions that would’ve occurred.

[thefanficmonster]

Lucky Me (Sequel To Unlucky)

Corpse Husband x Reader (Female)

Warnings: Swearing

Genre: Fluff

Summary: You aren’t always born with luck. Sometimes, you meet people who bring it to you. In short, they are your lucky charm.

Requested: Yes, but not in a typical way. A big thank you to all the wonderful people who read, liked, reblogged and commented on part one - Unlucky.  

@susceptible-but-siriusexual  @simonsbluee  @save-the-sky  @hacker-ghost  @itsminniekat  @bi-andready-tocry  @imtiredaffff  @jazzkaurtheglorious  @hereforbeebo  @fandomgirl17  and many more ❤❤❤

They are the reason this story is being written. What was originally supposed to be an elaborate one-shot turned into the most liked piece I’ve ever written. I can’t thank you enough, guys. You are amazing and I hope you like this one just as much or even more than the previous. Love you ❤❤❤

Y/N’s POV

I’m grinning at my reflection in the mirror as I put on a pair of earrings. My face is already touched-up with a little make-up and my hair is looking on point. I can almost see my own reflection in the shine of excitement in my eyes. I take in my upper body via a quick once-over in the full body mirror opposite me, and I finally relax my muscles that I didn’t ever realize I was tensing.

“OK, now I’m ready.“ I say as a form of encouragement as I reach behind me for my phone that’s sitting on my bed.

You might be wondering where I’m going? Who I’m going with? What’s the occasion behind this many preparations and pampering?

The answer: Nowhere. No one. Nothing. I’m literally not even going to leave my house.

It might seem ridiculous to someone else, but to me, to my hypnotized mind, it’s perfectly reasonable to be getting so amped up over a FaceTime call. Yeah, you heard me correctly - a FaceTime call. 

Well, you see, this isn’t the first time we FaceTime, but it will be the first time we’ll see each other’s faces. I wanted to level the field so I didn’t let him on to what I look like, where exactly I live, etc. Basically, he only knows my name, which I am still prepared to call unfair, considering I don’t know his real name. 

A brief backstory to my first ever real interaction with Corpse: I was introduced to him by my friends. They are the ones I always turned to with all the scary shit happening in my life. Often times they didn’t know weather to comfort me or laugh at my curse. My friends suggested I start sharing it to a youtuber named Corpse Husband. You see, I love YouTube narrators and I’ve always been a fan of Mr. Nightmare and I, to be perfectly honest, always kept the idea of sending him my stories in the back of my mind. Nevertheless, I bit the bullet and checked out on of this Corpse Husband guy’s videos. And then another. And another. And before I knew it I was having a marathon after which I was too paranoid to get online, walk home alone at night, leave my curtains open etc. It wasn’t all thanks to the stories themselves. A lot of the fear factor these stories strike with should be credited to the way they are read. Let me tell you, this guy had it all figured out with the reading. Not sending him my stories would just be wrong. So I did, I sent him my first ever creepy encounter which was with a stalker from my high school and it took me only two days to forget about it. It only crossed my mind when my friends blew my phone up, demanding I watched Corpse’s new video. I kid you not, I got more scared by the story when he read it than when I lived it. That’s what settled it for me - I decided to send him each and every story.

And then one day, out of the blue, my life changed for the better in more ways than one. It got turned completely upside down, like a rollercoaster, and I just had to hold on and enjoy the ride, embrace the adrenaline rush and excitement, knowing full well that I chose to get on and there’s no way I can get off halfway through. 

I’m being too metaphorical. He sent me an email. He freaking reached out to me. And I was posed with a rough choice. Took me a minute, but I chose to reply to him, I chose to trust him, and I couldn’t just leave him on read one day simply cause I chickened out. Yes, I’m unlucky and these things don’t happen to unlucky people. I mean, they do, but they are nightmares disguised as a dream come true. I’ve lived all my life cautiously: if something sounds too good to be true it’s either not as good as marketed or not true at all. If it’s dark and late and there are no people around, FaceTime someone. If your Uber driver’s sketchy, cancel the ride. I take all the precautions and I still find myself in the worst situations. Or at least...

My thoughts are interrupted by the ringing of my phone. A simple ringtone I hear every time he calls me. A simple sound that causes me butterflies when I hear it and ultimate devastation if the caller ID doesn’t read the name I want. It always gets me excited, probably more than it should. This time is different, however. It’s scary almost. I’m nervous, anxious, scared, hesitant - all things I never feel when I’m about to answer his call. 

With shaky hands I pick up the call and find myself looking at the most beautiful person I’ve ever met. Now I know why I would have never initiated this meeting, because I know what color my face is right now. I know my voice has let me down before I even attempt to speak. I know I look like a mess. I know my obvious crush is showing.

Corpse initiated this meeting. He said he was getting too curious and he wanted one of his best friends to see him and for him to finally see her. It’s been about seven months since we first started texting and I haven’t let out a single peep about it to a single soul. It’s just between him and I. We are each other’s safe space away from the rest of the world.

“Thought you weren’t gonna pick up for a second there.“ His voice is not as confident as other times when we’ve talked. His trying to hide his own nervousness and all I wanna do is hug him and tell him he doesn’t have to. I kept telling him over and over again that we don’t have to do this if he’s not sure that he actually wants it. I even offered to show him what I look like, not expecting to see him in return but he declined, saying it was now his turn to even the field.

“I was in another room.“ I manage to say, my voice only shaking a little.

We spend a few moments just looking at each other. Admiring one another. For someone who prefers digital interaction, I am surprised to realize I wish he was actually standing in front of. I wish I could hug him. A long hug of comfort, mutual understanding and hidden feelings.

He lets out a short laugh, shaking his head which causes a few strands of hair to fall over his eyepatch, “I’m sorry...It’s just-...Fuck I’m stumbling.” He chuckles nervously, “I just...can’t believe you are real. You are a real person. And the most beautiful person I’ve seen. That’s corny, isn’t it.” He looks away from the screen, his face now a shade of red. “But I mean it. I’m embracing my corniness. You are beautiful, Y/N. Not that I’m flexing or anything, but I’m lucky to have met you.”

I laugh, feeling my eyes stinging from the tears that have suddenly formed. I don’t want to let them fall, but I don’t have much say in that. “Well, mister Corpse, I can’t begin to compare. I mean...that hair! I still cannot believe it’s you. You are not just a deep voice in my mind. You are....you are...”

“Everything you imagined and more?“ he jokes, making my whole body heat up. “I told you you could trust. I mean, if the hair doesn’t confirm I’m who I say I am, I don’t know what will.”

“Actually, I never tried to imagine what you looked like. I knew those visions...I knew they didn’t matter. Faces don’t matter to us, Corpse. I think you realize that.“

And just like that, all I’ve been keeping hidden is pouring out. I don’t try to stop it - you can’t stop a hurricane with bare hands.

“I never needed a face to imagine us. I always saw as talking on the phone, playing Among Us. Reading scary stories to each other on Discord. I never needed a face to imagine your company. To imagine what we could be...“ I trail off, letting the first tear slip down my cheek.

The most sincere look appears in his eyes, “Fuck, I wish I could hold your hand right now. Never mind, I wish I could hug you, Y/N. Hug you and not let go for a long time.”

I laugh halfheartedly, my chest burning from the intensity of this moment’s intimacy, “I can always tell you where I live.” I’m only half-joking. I really want to see him in real life, not just through a screen, but even this call is out of his comfort zone, let alone a physical meet up.

He surprises me yet again, “Saturday. I’ll bring the take out, you pick the movie.” he says with a smile that is literally saying ‘you didn’t see that coming, did you?’

“How are you sure I don’t live in a different state, or a different continent all together?“ I tease, making an attempt to put my composure back together.

He smirks, “I pay way more attention to your stories than you’d think.” I laugh, shaking my head as a pointless method of fighting the pesky tears that he has 100% noticed by this point. “By the way, just because we’re....” he thinks for a second, “in a weird zone between friendship and...something more, doesn’t mean you have to stop sending me stories. I absolutely love reading them for my audience. They love em too.”

I just realized I am yet to tell him the crazy miracle that has happened. “Well, the thing is...I don’t have any.” His eyebrows shoot up in shock which makes me laugh, “Yeah, I know, it’s crazy. Since the day we started talking I have not experienced a single scary thing. Deadass. I swear on my life.”

If I wasn’t so head over heels for this man already, the baffled expression on his face would definitely send me falling for him. He’s just that adorable. “Wow.”

“I know right.“ I nod, “Seems to me you have enough luck to share with me.“

His eyes light up at that comment, showing just how meaning full it is to him.

“You’re my lucky charm, Corpse.“

“I will never be more proud of any other title, Y/N. That I can promise you with no hesitation.“

“Deadass?“

“Deadass.“

[saltminerising]

The LFD Starboard situation

Yes it's been a couple weeks since this happened, but I was backreading and saw post 669212989694558208 and got mad about the situation all over again, so :)

The starboard situation! A bunch of us in LFD wanted starboard around so we could document some fun moments in time (for those who don’t know: Starboard is a discord bot that, when added to a server, creates a sort of “hall of fame” with messages that have gotten a star emoji react. Mods decide how many star emojis it takes for the message to be in the hall of fame).

Don’t remember exactly who screenshotted (bless you for having the foresight to though), but I’ll be including a couple censored screenshots.

This was the message that got starred.

(If the image breaks, the message is from a TC from Light, and reads: “i was right to kill that baby”)

If you click “Jump!” it takes you to the exact message, where it’s very clear in-context that they were talking about exalting a hatchling. If you’ve ever been in LFD, you’ll know that similar jokes aren’t too uncommon! “Stupid baby, grow up so I can stone you” from a few months ago comes to mind as an immediate example.

According to the timestamps, the message was there for an hour and a half before it got enough stars (12 or 15 I think?) to get pinned. Going off the screenshots I have, the timeline is:

Message sent at 3:38. Message pinned at 5:27. Starboard removed at 6:07.

On post 669212989694558208:

Post claimed that “Still kinda pissed that a group of 7 or so got the feature removed”. At the time of removal the message had 18 stars if I remember right. That’s definitely not 7 people. 18 people of their own free will reacted to the message with a star because they found it funny.

Post also says “bunch of the edgy kids started going "well we WANTED Starboard removed anyways, so we still get the last laugh" so basically publicly mocking the mods for their decision.” Also very untrue! Nobody said they wanted it removed, lots of people were upset about it! I’m assuming this person took the joking “Well, at least it went out with a bang” messages way too seriously.

On top of this, mods gave an official warning to all 18 people that reacted to the starred message. No warning or even individual messages, just “All of you have been given an official warning” (enough warnings get you banned). 

(If the image breaks, the message is from a GP from Light, and reads:

“we are not sending out individual messages but everyone involved in getting the star board removed has an official warning logged under their name this was not funny and you all have removed something others were excited to try out starboard is now permanently off the table for an option to be added back to lfd”

Also peep the “you all have removed something others were excited to try out” when there was no warning given, the mods could have easily removed that one message and allowed the bot to stay, but instead decided to nuke it altogether and blame a big chunk of people. If they had communicated at all that the message wasn’t good and it needed to stop, or even really said anything about the message in the hour and a half it took for it to get starred, I can pretty much guarantee it would’ve stopped. Instead they ~had~ to get rid of the whole ass bot and issue warnings on a bunch of people for “getting it removed”. Mods were the only people in charge of removing it.

Honestly I’ve lost a lot of my respect for the mod team and especially this specific mod (GP from Light). How hard would it have been for one of the many mods to have said something before the situation got out of hand?

In conclusion: Message was on the edgy side, and I do agree it should’ve been removed from being the first pinned message to avoid giving people the wrong impression of the server. However the mods handled it poorly and instead of actually warning people, opted to add strikes to our names and remove starboard permanently.

LFD is not an edgy server, we’re not edgelords (or kids, as the post seemed to think? I know of one active member that’s under 18, most of us are adults with jobs.), none of us intended any harm with pinning a funny message.

Also, just to clear their name, the person that sent the OG message (along with many of the people that starred the message) apologized after. 

[jokertrap-ran]

(光与夜之恋 Light and Night) Main Story Chapter 2-18: 时间针脚 The Patchwork of Time Translation

“Why do you look like someone who got caught red-handed with their hand in the cookie jar?“

*Light and Night Master-list *Spoiler free: Translations will remain under cut *Join the Light & Night Discord (＾▽＾)~ ♪ *Main story tag will be #For Light and Night

For the next one week, I threw myself into the making of Lin Yao's dress.

MC: It's finally done! Now all that's left is the fitting; but she's so busy, I don't know when she'll be able to schedule a fitting session.

Zheng Lin: You're lucky. Lin Yao will be coming down today for a shoot for "Neverland", a magazine that's under a subsidiary of Warson's.

Zheng Lin: You can contact her agent and check with them about it.

MC: Will do!

Because of her tight schedule, the fitting session ended up being slotted after the shoot.

The magazine's shooting location was at a studio near Warson. Brother Mao had already brought the dress over for me beforehand.

❖☆———————————★❖

By the time I finally finished my work on hand and headed out of the office, ready to cross the alley over to the studio, a spot of white at a corner of a wall caught my attention.

The person carefully looked around before slowly crouching down, seemingly in search of something.

MC: ...Why does that person look so familiar?

I approached the figure as I mused about that. A silver head of hair, dressed entirely in white; the answer clicked in my head almost immediately.

SARIEL!? What's he doing here!?

What surprised me, even more, was the fact that he was currently facing a couple of dustbins and a pile of discarded items.

Wasn't Sariel all about cleanliness!? The headlines were already flashing in my head. "The Black History of the Top of the Top Designer Scavenging for Rubbish".

I hurriedly shook my head and threw the absurd thought out of the window.

★Night Choice: Sneak away

I should hurry and sneak away before he realizes I'm here…

I lightened my footsteps and prepared to sneak away from him behind his back.

Sariel: You. What are you doing here?

MC: !

He saw me! I could only turn around and smile sheepishly at him.

MC: What a coincidence to meet you here, Director Qi...

He'd already reverted to his usual high and haughty self. He watched me with his arms folded.

Sariel: How coincidental, indeed. Why is it that every time I see you, not only are you not taking your job seriously, but also look like you're harbouring a guilty conscience?

MC: But, you were squatting on the ground doing god-knows-what earlier. Isn't that more…

Sariel: What did you say?

MC: Nope! Nothing at all! What great weather out today!!

The words had just left my mouth when a cloud gently floated past the sky above us.

Sariel raised his eyebrows, the contempt reflected in his eyes speaking larger than words. I had the nagging feeling that he was about to start berating me again.

Sariel: Don't change the topic. What exactly are you doing here?

☆Light Choice: Watch curiously

Logically thinking about it, I should sneak away while I still had the chance since he hadn't noticed me yet; but, I couldn't quite stop my curiosity.

Plus, seeing Sariel like that really gives people a lot to think about. Not only does he look terribly secretive about something, but he was also crouched by a dustbin in search of something.

MC: Just what is he looking for?

I followed his line of sight, but all I could see was a pile of yellow sand, a few steel frames, and two rubbish bins. I looked away in confusion, but my eyes were soon met with his inquisitive ones the moment I raised my head.

MC: D-D-Director Qi!

I was startled so bad that my words came out in a stuttered mess. Sariel had already stood back up, facing me with folded arms.

Sariel: What are you doing here? And why do you look like someone who got caught red-handed with their hand in the cookie jar?

MC: I'm only passing by for work purposes…

Sariel: Do I look that easy to fool to you?

MC: I'm not lying. I'm only passing by because of work! I'm headed to the shooting studio over there!

I hurriedly pointed to the shooting studio situated at the other end of the alleyway to prove my innocence. He glanced over before his eyes flickered back to me. He stared me in the eye for a while before finally breaking contact.

MC: Are you looking for something, Director? Do you need me to help look for it with you?

Sariel: ...What did you see?

He suddenly stiffens. That expression of his… Did I see something I shouldn't have?

MC: Nothing! Zilch, nada! I didn't see anything!

Sariel: I don't need your help. Hurry along your merry way now.

MC: Oh, okay… See you then, Director.

Sariel only released the breath he didn't know he'd been holding only after the girl's figure disappeared.

He picked up a small branch, meticulously giving it a thorough cleansing before surveying the area once more. After confirming that there was no one in the vicinity, he crouched back down. He poked the mound of sand. No reaction. He knocked on the trash cans. Nothing.

Sariel: …...

The sunlight shines upon the ground, highlighting the speck of dirt staining his shoe.

He resisted the urge to wipe it clean. Instead, he continued to poke the mound of sand near him.

And in the next moment, the mound of sand moved. The fallen leaves that had been above it letting out a crisp "crunch".

Sariel's brow furrowed as he used the stick to flick the sand away bit by bit.

Sariel: Come out.

A plump lizard poked its head out of the sand with great difficulty. One glance at Sariel was enough to make it burst into tears.

Lizard: Old Qi! You've finally come for me! Hurry and save me! I won't leave home again! I'm not complaining if you make me go vegetarian anymore!

Sariel: Silence.

Sariel unscrewed the cap of a bottle of mineral water, placing it on the floor before retreating a couple of steps.

Sariel: Wash yourself before you go. If I spot a single grain of sand back home...

Lizard: I'm gonna be turned into a braised lizard.

He let out a satisfied sneer before taking a big stride away, turning to leave.

Lizard: Hey! Wait up, Old Qi! Who's that human girl just now?

Lizard: I'd passed out, but I reawakened when I heard her voice!

Lizard: I can't help but feel like she sounds a little familiar. Like I've heard her before...

Sariel stops and suddenly turns back around.

Sariel: What did you say?

❖☆———————————★❖

MC: Achoo!

I consecutively sneezed thrice as I headed to the shooting studio. Is someone talking about me behind my back or something?

❖☆———————————★❖

I entered the shooting studio as I thought it over, only to see Brother Mao, who was standing by the entrance, the moment I looked up.

Brother Mao: You're here only NOW? Here, here. Come here!

MC: What's up, Brother Mao? It's still early, no? Why are you so panicky?

Brother Mao: The shooting ended early— No, wait. I suppose I should say that it's been forcibly postponed till tomorrow.

MC: Huh? But why?

Brother Mao: Because of Lin Yao's agent, of course!

Brother Mao: She said that the photographers weren't the ones that they'd chosen, so they weren't going to be shooting today. She said that they were going to do it tomorrow instead when the right photographers are here!

Brother Mao: You know how I'm usually fast to run my mouth? Well, the scariest thing was that I couldn't even put a word in...

MC: ……

MC: What did Lin Yao say about it?

Brother Mao: She only stood there, not a peep from her. From the looks of it, it looks like both mother and daughter are in agreement.

MC: Mother and daughter? The agent's her mom?

Brother Mao: Yeah. I think she pampers her kid too much. That's why she's being so picky and choosy with us.

MC: Well, that shouldn't be the case. All reports have said that Lin Yao is very sensible and easy to talk with.

Brother Mao: Hell, I don't know! Go take a look for yourself.

MC: And Lin Yao? Where's she now?

Brother Mao: She went to try out the clothes.

Brother Mao: I have a bad feeling, though. Her agent had a look of distaste on her face when she took the clothes earlier. I don't know if she—

BANG!

The door to the dressing room suddenly flung open with terrifying viciousness.

Brother Mao and I jumped in fright. A cold and shrill feminine voice sounded before we could even react in time.

??: You call these clothes wearable!?

Brother Mao: And that's the agent.

Following the rapid clicking of high heels, a woman dressed in a sleeveless dress walked up to him and stared him down with her hands on her hips.

Agent: Our Yaoyao is sincerely and earnestly putting in the effort for this cooperation. She even especially delayed her flight!

Agent: All for the sake of trying on her dress!

Agent: Yet, how dare you give us this half-hearted dress that's not even suitable!? I want to see your Designer!

MC: ……

MC: Hello. I am (Y/n), the Designer.

Agent: Is Warson treating us as fools? You're so young; you must be an intern! Warson can't just ride roughshod over its customers like that!

Brother Mao: Who says that being young equals being an intern!? She's one of our best Designers!

Brother Mao had a vein protruding on his forehead in his ire. I quickly reassured him that everything was fine.

MC: You can feel free to tell me just what about this outfit you're unsatisfied with. This is what this fitting session is for. I will try my best to modify it.

The agent coldly contemplated us for a good long while before turning and walking back into the dressing room. Brother Mao and I followed after her.

❖☆———————————★❖

Although I had a calm facade on the outside, I was a whirlwind of emotions within. I most definitely didn’t know what Lin Yao looked like, wearing those clothes.

Upon seeing her, I felt my heart plummet to the ground with a loud thud, as if it were a stone.

She stood there indifferently, positioned between light and shadows. Her skin was so pale that it appeared as if light could permeate through it. She looked like a dark elf emerging from the depths of the moonlit waters.

She slowly turns around at the sound. She had an expressionless look on her face. Was she in a bad mood?

Agent: What’s with this gloomy colour? Pink is what suits our Yaoyao best! Get it? Girly pink!

Agent: Also, this dress is way too short! It should reach below the knees at least so that it can highlight her pureness and innocence.

Agent: These metal tassels are inappropriate as well! God knows if they’ll think that she’s a bad girl wearing these!

Agent: Also, Yaoyao got injured while filming beforehand, so her scar must be covered.

Brother Mao: But, you never mentioned anything about scars beforehand…?

Agent: Who would want to be injured? It’s an accident.

Looking at the scars on Lin Yao’s forearm and wrist, I couldn’t help but feel a pang of pity.

MC: I will think of something for her scars. The other aspects of the design were designed to suit the character she portrays, that's why I didn't go for the innocent and soft look.

MC: I also hope that Miss Lin Yao here will be able to portray a different image to the masses with this outfit.

Agent: You are a Designer, are you not? It is your DUTY to help us make these adjustments.

I ignored her, walking straight to Lin Yao.

MC: Miss Lin Yao, may I ask if this dress is satisfactory to you?

MC: If you do not like it, then we can shelve this and I'll start designing a new one right now. You can just tell me if that's the case; there's no need to feel bad.

Lin Yao was silent. She seemed to be looking at me, yet not quite. She gradually pressed her lips into a thin line, as if making a hard decision.

I was just about to take her silence as a “no” when she finally spoke.

Lin Yao: Mother. This style is what's been recently trending. You can't deny that this might open more doors for me in the future.

Lin Yao: And, have you already forgotten the interview by the media the other day where they were asking when I'd be able to change my image once in a while?

Upon hearing this, her agent shot her a long and profound look, as if she’d wanted to say something, yet it wasn’t too convenient for her to do so seeing as we were also present. Eventually, she gave a reluctant nod.

Agent: Fine. I’ll go ask about the photographer issue again. Hurry and change back out of your clothes.

Brother Mao shot me a look before following after her.

❖☆————— ⊹ For Light & Night⊹ —————★❖

Previous Part: (Chapter 2-15) | Next Part: (Chapter 2-21)

[tracle0]

happy sts!! (?) or maybe just a happy saturday? nonetheless, question time! since I got to read recently about the inspirations behind the wip4 main characters' names, I was wondering what the motivations were behind the names of the main characters of your other works! maybe both from your perspective as a writer and from an in-story perspective? and how do they feel about their names?

Happy?? STS?!?! Saturday is good and happy and it is STS, whoop! I like this question but it’s gonna be a very underwhelming answer and I apologize for that. 

Sonder was. Very dull, not gonna lie, it’d just be looking for mostly generic names that seemed to fit the brand haha. The most notable backstory names are probably Andy and Atlas. 

Andy came from an inside joke with a friend that no villains can be named Andy. I wanted to prove her wrong, so Andy was named Andy and now I do not trust Any Andy’s. Full name Andrew Peep, which he does not like and prefers Andy. Probably a family name, which is sad because he does not see his family. 

Atlas came from me being like ‘wait shit I haven’t named this character yet’ and asking a friend for a name. She spat out Atlas Barnabus like it wasn’t the best name in the world, and I was in awe. Definitely named after the Greek Titan, was not aware of that at all, very much likes their name. 

Collateral - hhhh okay listen. Listen Collateral and names give way to one of my dumbest Collateral stories, you’re gonna have to hear this out. 

So when I was first writing Collateral, I’d already found both Cain and Theo their names that fit - Theo cause it sounded nice, Cain named after the Caine in the Gone series. But they didn’t have last names, which was an issue, so I was looking for a last name for them. I knew I wanted Cain to have a last name starting with either C or K, cause alliteration, and pulled Kavon out of thin air. I liked it, so it stayed. 

A few weeks later, in film studies, we were learning about Kim Novak, and I liked the name Novak, so stole it and gave it to Theo. 

I did not notice their names were the same forward and backwards for a year and a half, until a friend pointed it out to me. This was not deliberate at all. It Just Happened and I plead ignorance to that tomfuckery. 

Anyway, they both are alright about their names. Theo prefers Theo to Theodore cause no-one got any time for all those syllables. Cain once found out about Biblical Cain and spent about three hours going down that rabbit hole before going ‘alright whatever’ and moving on.

Speaking of moving on - DIAS. I can talk a bit more about that cause that was recent. 

Ant comes from the word ‘antagonist’ actually - I wanted to write about someone who saw themselves as The Bad Guy, which Ant definitely does a lot of the time. It’s a nickname, and I have no idea what their real name is, nor where the nickname comes from, but they like Ant. Their last name - Carnell - is a family name. Not my surname, but someone in my family somewhere had that, and I liked it so yoinked it and gave it to Ant. 

Leon! Leon went through a lot of changes in his name - originally he was Tag, which also comes from ‘antagonist’ but I hated that, so changed it to Tad, which I also hated. So he was without a name and it was getting closer and closer to Nano and the time I’d write his story and I was like ????? what do. 

What I did was drew him a bit. A friend in film class (man, film class really helped to name my characters huh) saw the doodle and was like ‘ooo who’s that’. I told her it was a character in my book, and no, he doesn’t have a name, you should give him one, and she spat out Leon. And hey it actually really works, he can keep that, except wait, he’s Jewish, needs a Hebrew name and I’d like to give him a specifically Jewish surname. Some looking on Jewish name websites gave me Tzalka, and some more looking gave me Cohen, cool, done. 

In-universe, Leon’s name came from his grandfather - it was DIAS Leon’s middle name, and when he left home, he wanted to leave That Part Of His Life behind as well, so swapped from Tzalka to Leon, which he definitely prefers. 

Uhhh other characters - Vincent came from a fandom (which I’m about 90% sure is FNAF ngl) and I went ‘okay well I like the name so shall associate it elsewhere’ and gave it to Vinnie. Last name had the same deal - Scullary came from... 

Phew, okay, side tangent. One of my first characters I made was named Skullary, which came from the play ‘The Road’ which I watched when I was younger. The person playing that character had a really bad cold, so had to use a microphone to make her voice heard, and she fucking killed it, and the voice was so interesting I wanted a character who used it, so stole the name, except I misspelt it as Skullary instead of Scullary oops. Anyway, I wanted to re-use that name, so gave it to Vincent. He likes his name well enough but Definitely Does Not Like Going By Vinnie, so definitely don’t call him that. 

Simon came from the game Simon Says, because it is The Most Silvertongue Game and it made me laugh that his name is such an obvious pun. 

Bonus: wip4 obviously mostly came from filmmakers, because the obsession of that book is filmmaking, as you know. Buster Keaton and... Just Mika the musician, he’s the odd one out. Lynne Ramsay and George Lucas gave a lot of characters a portion of their names. 

I am, however, gonna go on a tiny tangent about Keaton’s last name because it delights me, and then also probably Percival’s name because that amuses me. 

So! Keaton is Spanish - his family comes from Spain and he speaks Spanish as well as English. I’m sure his deadname is probably something very Spanish, but it’s a deadname so we don’t talk about it. I wanted to find a Spanish surname for him, cause like... obviously it doesn’t have to be Spanish, but I wanted it to be, so I was scrolling through Spanish surnames for a while. 

Palomo is a legit Spanish surname in use, and it means pigeon. Keaton likes pigeons. So I was delighted and I always forget it but that’s his last name.

Percival! Percival’s name is actually a fill-in. In a Discord chat I’m in with my friends, I sometimes join the voice chats but cannot talk cause Anti Microphone. So I type instead, and sometimes get bored and just spam words. And the name Percival was very funny to me so I spammed that. 

So, when I needed to name the Bad Guy of wip4, I gave him the name Percival as a joke, and it. Seemed to work. I no longer spam Percival in the chat. 

Anyway there you go, the entire history of where names in my WIPs come from. Spoilers; not the most interesting, but it is long and I hope you found some bits funny or enjoyable. 

[multisfabulis]

Clairvoyant Rain

Word Count: 3038

TW: Implied self-harm, implied/referenced past child abuse

Can you believe it's been about a year since I last wrote these two? It's not that I don't have much to write about, I just haven't had the time to do so! Between working on Corona's Shadow, working on the backburner project you'll get to see after I post chapter 2 of "Love's Descent into Madness", and dealing with IRL stuff, RLD has kinda fallen to the wayside. I can't guarantee I'll work more on it but I'll try my best to!

By the way, the reason this fic exists is because I wanted to write soft Luce/Ravi and this song was my inspiration for it!

Read on AO3 | Read on DA | Support me on Ko-fi!

     Ravi tiredly opened his eyes and immediately regretted it. He hoped it would be morning so this wouldn’t happen but alas… It was still dark, the neon lights outside pouring in from the window. He could hear rain pattering on the glass as he looked at the digital clock for the time. In bright red numbers read 2:52 AM. Yep, way too early to be up and he fucking hated it.

     All waking up in the middle in the night ever did was ruin his good night’s sleep and make the alarm he set even more unbearable than it already was. If only he could go back to the days before Eli came and fucked everything up. That’d be really nice but because he’s wishing for it, he’ll never get those days back. He turned over onto his side and closed his eyes, wanting to drift back asleep.

     It was a moment later he heard a thunderous roar. His heart hammered against his chest as he shot up in bed. It took him some time to realize it wasn’t stuff being thrown around but something falling on piano keys from a great height. Luce knew better than to be loud when people were sleeping. Something must be happening if he was banging on the piano with no consideration for others.

     Tossing the covers aside, he hurried over to the door and opened it. He found himself face to face with a sleepy Amelia. She had a minor case of bedhead going on as dark pinkish eyes widened upon seeing him. No doubt on why she was up.

     “You heard that, too, right?” he asked quietly.

     Giving him a nod for her answer, he stepped in front and whispered, “All right, I’m gonna go see what’s going on. Stay behind me and don’t make a single peep.”

     They tiptoed down the hallway and he peeked around the corner. He saw Luce hunched over his piano, running his hands through his hair while muttering nonsense under his breath. He seemed to be frustrated, which was a rare state to see him in. His exclamation of “Damn it!” before slamming his hands down on the keys was further proof of it. Hearing the sudden discordant boom from up close startled Amelia as she nearly blew her cover with a stifled gasp.

     Turning around, he crouched down and put a finger to his lips, whispering, “Go back to bed, I’ll talk to Luce and everything will be fine, all right?”

     She nodded and walked back to her room. He watched her go inside and shut the door before deciding on his next course of action. He had an idea as to what was going on and he didn’t want her listening in on them. A girl her age shouldn’t be exposed to such dark things.

     He carefully made his way across the living room, being as quiet as the wind. He glanced over to where Luce’s knife was and grew worried when he saw it. It was laying on top of its sheath, meaning he took it out for a reason. He hoped it wasn’t the reason he was thinking of but he had his doubts. He sat beside the other man on the piano seat, concerned.

     “Luce?” he called out quietly, searching for his eyes. “Is everything all right?”

     Ruby red eyes met his as he replied in a guilty voice, “Snowbird, I, I’m sorry if I woke you up, I just---”

     “No, it’s fine, I’m just--” he tentatively put a hand on his back in an attempt to comfort him-- “I’m just wondering if you’re okay.”

     “Well,” he began, letting out a scoff, “I thought that if I played music for a little bit, I would stop thinking about the bad memories that just popped up out of nowhere but because my hands are shaking so damn bad, I’m not hitting the right keys and that’s pissing me the fuck off.

     “If my hands could just stop shaking, I’d be able to play, because if I don’t play soon, I’m gonna do something I’ll end up regretting and I don’t wanna do that so…” he trailed off, his voice going from a fever pitch to sounding broken.

     He rubbed his hand over his back, hoping to soothe him. It was then he looked down and his worry deepened into alarm. Luce was vigorously scratching at his arm, which was a canvas full of faded scars over pale white skin. Oh, that was definitely not good.

     He couldn’t let his panic get the best of him. It’d only worsen Luce’s already bad state and it was the last thing the both of them needed. He had to stay calm and try to curb his urge to hurt himself. In a way, this was good, because it meant he hadn’t done it yet, if the lack of blood wasn’t an indicator. He could try and talk him out of it so, if it worked, it’d encourage him to resist the temptation in the future.

     Placing a hand atop his to stop his scratching, Ravi asked, “Why don’t we go back to my room and get your mind off this for a little bit, hmm? Would that be okay?”

     “Yeah, that…might be good,” Luce replied, his breathing shaky.

     He helped him up off the seat and led him through the hallway. He held on to his hand the whole time as a means of keeping him grounded. Even so, he kept a close eye on him to make sure Luce was still in the present. It was after he brought him inside his room he saw some improvement in his condition.

     A quiet calm had replaced whatever anger was left in him. His eyes were no longer glassy and his breathing had steadied some. He was still there, he could reach him and not be met with silence.

     Setting him down on the bed, Ravi knelt in front of him and asked, “Are you feeling better?”

     “A little bit,” he replied, letting out a sigh afterwards. “Snowbird, listen, I’m sorry for making you have to take care of me and---”

     “Hey, hey, hey, none of that, all right?” He reached up to cup his cheek. “You’re not a burden to me, Luce. I know this is a new thing for both of us but I’ll be there for you, okay? Whatever it is, I’ll be there so…remember that.”

     With the ghost of a smile, Luce took hold of his hand and kissed the back of his fingers. His lips curled into a small smile of his own at the display. At least it showed he meant what he said by feeling a bit better. He retracted his hand and stood up with a huff, sitting beside him on the bed.

     “So, do you wanna talk about it?” he asked, leaning forward to see his face.

     Watching the small trace of relief fade away, he quickly added, “It doesn’t have to be about that! It could be about anything you want! Anything that’ll get your mind off that…”

     A huge clap of thunder sounded off in that instant, rattling the whole apartment. The loud boom caused his heart to stop for a split second before resuming. He turned to face the window to see if the power had gone out from that. Nope, the stupid neon signs from across the street were still on so that’s that.

     “Jesus Christ, that was loud. You okay after hearing that, Lu---”

     He turned around to check on him and fell silent. Luce was leaning back on the bed, his eyes closed as if he were listening to the downpour outside. What really stunned him was the expression on his face. He looked…content, no signs of stress or detachment present. Just peace and serenity, things he never thought he’d ever see on him, at least not for a long time.

     “Luce?”

     As if he just remembered he wasn’t alone, Luce straightened up and said, “Sorry, I just got…entranced listening to the rain.”

     “You actually like this shitty weather?” he asked incredulously. No normal person would like this kind of weather. Then again, he’s forgetting that Luce isn’t normal by any stretch of the imagination.

     “I love it, it’s very special to me,” he replied. “Have I not told you this?”

     “No, and we’ve been going out for how long?”

     “Do you wanna know why, then? I think you’ll have somewhat of an idea when I tell you I began to love the rain on that night.”

     It took him longer than it should’ve to realize what he meant. The night he became truly free from his shackles, the night he… That already told him just a hint of the significance rain carried for Luce. He may not have understood why it was so special but it was cruel of him to mock that which he clearly loved so…

     “That night, after I did what I did,” Luce began, a tone of reminiscence held in his voice, “I went outside. I looked up and there were dark storm clouds coming in and before I knew it, it started pouring down rain. The moment I felt those raindrops hit me, I knew…I’d be okay.

     “I had been so numb, numb to everything that touched me. The beatings my father would give me, the kisses my mother would give me, I felt none of it for so long. That rain was the first thing I felt in such a long time and…I cried. I could finally feel something and I was happy, I was…alive. I think, in that moment, the rain washed away not only the blood but my ‘self’. That was when I became Luce.”

     “When you say that, do you mean you weren’t called Luce before?” Ravi asked, confused by his wording.

     “You really think my parents gave enough of a shit about me to give me a name?” he replied with a sardonic smile. “I was called either some of the worst things you’d ever say to a kid or fake pet names. I found the name Lucian when I was 11 or 12 but I only really embraced it when I was 15.

     “Anyway, ever since then, I’ve always taken rain as a sign of good luck.” He laid back on the bed, his arms folded under his head. “If it rains, that means something good will happen.”

     No wonder why Luce liked rain so much. It represented freedom, it made him feel alive when death wanted to take him, it gave him a life. It was hard to say whether it played a role in the two of them crossing paths but the universe was funny like that. Whatever it may be, Luce was here now and maybe it was fate that he woke up to help him through a bad time.

     “So what’s the best thing the rain’s ever brought you?” he asked, curious to know his answer.

     “Hmm…” Luce looked as if he was deep in thought before replying, “I’d say it was meeting you. It was raining the day we met.”

     Feeling heat rush to his cheeks, he attempted to deflect that by saying, “Maybe you should go up to the roof and soak in the rain for a little while because I highly doubt that I’m the best thing rain’s brought you.”

     Without missing a beat, he countered that with, “It was raining the day I realized I loved you, too.”

     “Oh, come on, that’s not even fucking fair!” he exclaimed, his whole face now warm to the touch. “What the hell do I say to argue against that?!”

     Luce’s laughter at his expense made him turn away from him. He really should’ve known better than to degrade himself around Luce. He refused to allow him to believe there was nothing good about him and it annoyed the fuck out of him. He knew it was because he loved him and wanted to prove him wrong but still. It was rather touching to know how far he’d go but he’d never admit that out loud.

     After catching his breath, Luce took hold of Ravi’s wrist and, in a tender voice, said, “I love you.”

     “...I love you too,” he answered back, defeated. Luce knew exactly what to say to put an end to his self-loathing. It was so rare of him to say “I love you” first so of course he’d say it. “Can I kiss you?”

     He sat up, leaned in close, and replied, “Yes.”

     Ravi closed his eyes and bridged the gap between them. Luce parted his lips just a fraction, kissing him back with chasteness. It was a simple kiss that only lasted a few seconds before they pulled away, Ravi exhaling out a breath. He quickly stood up as he shoved down the urge to go in for a second kiss.

     “All right, get the fuck off the bed, I gotta sleep,” he said, stretching his arms up above him. Then he remembered what happened earlier. “You gonna be okay?”

     “Yeah, I’ll be fine,” he replied, standing up as well.

     “You sure? If you want, I can---”

     Luce cut him off with a kiss to the forehead. He pulled away with a fond smile on his face and whispered, “I’ll be okay. Go to bed, Snowbird.”

     Guess that was as good an answer as any. He reluctantly crawled under the covers and looked at the clock for the time. 3:43 AM in dull red numbers. God, did they really spend almost an hour just talking about the rain? There went his full night’s sleep but he’d learn to deal with it.

     His eyes wandered over to Luce. He wasn’t sure if it’d really be okay for him to sleep while he might still be in need of help. He seemed to be getting on now but it had only been an hour since everything and there was no telling of the future. In the end, he had to trust Luce to come to him if he needed him. Exhaustion swept over him like a wave and he struggled to stay awake.

     “Goodnight, Luce.”

     “Goodnight, Snowbird.”

     And he was out like a light.

     It was morning when he woke up next. He must’ve overslept because he could hear the sounds of rush hour outside his apartment. His alarm didn’t go off so it must’ve been switched off at some point last night. Good thing Luce did it on the weekend; otherwise, he’d be in a panic, trying to make up for lost time. He attempted to turn over but was stopped by an arm around his waist.

     It was then he found Luce curled up next to him, soundly asleep. He was taken aback by this display. Him being asleep was a rare enough sight on its own but him sleeping beside him on the bed was virtually unheard of. The only other time they were like this was the first night they slept together. He wasn’t able to do it before, due to the circumstances, but he could do it now.

     He brushed strands of hair away from Luce’s face, admiring his beauty. He looked so peaceful, so…vulnerable, an impossibility made real. It’s not like he hadn’t seen other sides of Luce. There was the crooked smile and glint in his eyes when he was playful and the furrowed brow and emotionless voice when he was serious. Yet the tranquil and unguarded Luce before him was like a secret he was finally let in on.

     Was his trust in him so deep, he felt like he could do this with him? It had to be if this was happening and Ravi was…happy. Knowing the kind of life Luce had before meeting him, before he knew what freedom was, he was so glad that Luce was letting himself be like this around him. He wondered if maybe, just maybe, he felt safe while in his presence. If so, then…

     He carded his fingers through dark locks, bringing him in close. He decided to bask in the morning sun with him in the little time he had before needing to get up. He softly kissed Luce’s temple and brought him even closer. Their faces were mere inches apart as he shut his eyes. The last thing he could’ve swore he saw was the corner of his mouth curve up into a small smile.

[peggydoodles]

Pain Day - Ducktales Drabble

Where Scrooge McDuck has the first bad pain day he’s had since Della’s returned home. 

Scrooge has gotten hurt A LOT over the years and I can only imagine all that pain and scars and bad memories getting piled up and hurting from time to time. I wanted to write a little thing with him and chronic pain since I talk abt that headcanon a lot w/ my discord friends. My first time trying to describe chronic pain, hope I did a good job! 

So I thought who’d be better to handle it than Della? She’s known him the longest after all. So I tossed her in there, plus a lil pain from when Scrooge was separated from everyone. Place this within the first week or so that Della’s back.

words :1325 triggers: chronic pain grammar errors: probably a whole bunch

As Saturday mornings go in McDuck Manor, this Saturday morning was a pretty calm one. No explosions, no zombies raising from the dead, no evil forces trying to take over and kill the entire McDuck family. It was just a calm morning. And Della sat down at the breakfast table with her three children (plus Webby) as they all ate a meal of scrambled eggs and bacon.

The only thing missing from his perfect, calm morning was her Uncle Scrooge. It wasn’t like him to miss breakfast. He usually woke up with the sun.

“Hey, Mrs. B?” Della said, mouth still full as she spoke. “Where’s the old man? He’s not dead, is he?”

Mrs. Beakley, who was pouring a cup of tea for herself, shook her head. “No, he’s quite alright. Well, as alright as he can be right now.”

“What’s that mean?” asked Dewey.

“It’s nothing to worry about, dear. It’s just a few old injuries from his more reckless days coming back to bite him in the tail feathers.” The old woman answered.

“What?”

“He’s having a pain day, Dewey.” Whispered Huey, followed by an ‘Ooooh’ from his brother.

Della paused for a moment. She remembered a lot of times from her youth when Scrooge would get hurt protecting her and her brother (mostly her brother) from dangers when they went on adventures. Scrooge always put his family first, not caring if he got hurt in the process, but she knew that even before he took care of her and Donald that he got hurt a lot.

“It’s cool, kiddos! I’ll go check up on him!” She said valiantly, standing up from her chair.

“Oh boy, um, Mom?” Louie spoke up. “You haven’t been her for a while, so I don’t blame you for not knowing, but uh … Scrooge gets really grumpy when he’s like this. He doesn’t like us going in his room.”

The mother simply smiled and ruffled his head feathers. “Sweetie, I’ve been dealing with McGrouchie even before you were born. Ten years has got nothing to do with the fact that I know the best way to deal with it. Huey, how about you go get some heating pads for me and meet me upstairs?” And with that, Della Duck set her path for her uncle’s bedroom.

Once there, Della’s determined smile faded just a bit. She wondered how much worse her uncle’s pain had gotten over ten years. She recalls a time when she was younger and asked about what chronic pain meant and her uncle had described it as his body remembering all the times it got hurt. It was a good explanation for a child, but now Della realized how much it really sucked.

Della quietly cracked open the door to her uncle’s room, a stream of light from the hallway entering the darkened chambers. There she saw her uncle in the position she remembers when she was a child. He was still in his pajamas, his blankets in a ruffled mess, he laid flat on his stomach with his pillow pulled over the top of his head, where he held onto it tightly. It was a tough sight, seeing the man who conquered half the world be bed ridden by a couple of nasty joints.

“Hey, Uncle Scrooge?” Della walked in, closing the door behind her. She was greeted with a muffled ‘mmmggghhh’ from the bed. She quickly made her way over, hoping her leg didn’t make too much noise and knelt down beside his bed.

“You doing okay?” “mmmghh.” “Yeah, I hear ya. How’s it on the scale?” She waited for a moment before Scrooge responded. “Eight.” “Yikes. That bad, huh?” Della stood up and took a quick look around his room. Everything looked the way she left it, but she couldn’t be too sure.

“Hey, Donald didn’t move your medicine at all while I was gone, did he?” She asked. Donald always carried around their uncle’s medicine, he was practically a walking pharmacy. He used to remind her where Scrooge’s pain meds were whenever he would go out of town on a college trip. She was lost in thought that she didn’t realize Scrooge hadn’t answered her. “Scrooge?”

It took a moment before the old man squeezed his pillow to the back of his head, and let out a more pained grumble than before.

He must’ve been more hurt than she thought. Della quickly went over to a drawer beside the bed and pulled out a small orange container. “You’re due for a refill, Unc. I’ll go out and get some later. Don’t worry, I’ll pay for it.” She reassured him with a bit of humor in her voice. She took the amount Scrooge was supposed to take and set it down on the end table next to him. “Take those when you’re cool.” And she then sat down on the bed next to him, careful not to move it too much.

“Man,” She started, trying to take her uncle’s mind away. “How Donald managed to take care of you and the boys, I’ll never know.” She laughed. “Must’ve felt like he was taking care of four kids. Well, five if we count Webby.”

There was silence for a while, then her uncle’s body began to shake. He pulled the pillow harder and gripped the case so hard Della was afraid it might rip. It wasn’t until he made a sound that she realized he was crying.

“Oh! Oh, Scrooge no! I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it, I swear!” Della quickly moved over so she was next to him and grabbed one of his hands. “I know how much you helped. I’m sorry if I made it sound like you didn’t. You’re not a burden, you know that right?” She told him. “You have no idea how happy I am that my boys got to know you.”

“Della?” With his one hand off the pillow, Della could see her uncle’s face as he turned to her.

“Hey there. I’m right here. I’m not gonna go anywhere, I promise. I’m gonna stay right here until you feel all better.” She waits until her uncle regains a normal breathing pace, then she gave him a great big smile. “See? A little better already.”

Scrooge looked like he was going to say something else. And by the look on his face it would’ve been important. 

“Mom?” A little voice peeped from Scrooge’s door. Huey stood nervously with a few heating pads tucked in his arms.

“Hey, honey. Come on over. He won’t bite. Not while he’s like this.” She joked and waved Huey over with her free hand. Whatever it was, it could wait for now.

Once her son had made his way to them, Della took the heating pads and put them over her uncle’s right foot, his back, and under the pillow on the back of his head.

“You know, when I was your age, I used to give Scrooge chocolate when he was like this. Duckworth hated it; said I shouldn’t be giving him any sweets.” Della said, kneeling back down so she could be her son’s height.

“Really?”

“I know, right? The Junior Woodchuck Guidebook says it’s good for reducing inflammation, but the old dog wouldn’t take my word for it.” Della shrugged.

“I have chocolate on me.” Huey stated, reaching into his shirt pocket and pulling out a wrapped, one bite piece. “I have them for whenever Louie gets upset.”

“Ooohh!! Look at you, my little responsible man!” Della wrapped him up in a hug before turning to her uncle. “Scrooge? I’m gonna leave this next to your medicine. Try to eat it okay? Huey and I will be right outside if you need us.”

“We will?”

“Sure! You’re definitely someone I should to talk to. I need you to fill me in on everything about your brothers.” She ushered Huey out the door before turning back to Scrooge. She lifted up the pillow so she could give his head a small kiss.

Scrooge cracked one eye open to see her.

“I’m right here.” Della told him. “I’m gonna be here from now on, I promise.”

[moiraineswife]

Knocking On Heaven’s Door - An Ineffable Husbands Fic

*blows dust off my ao3 account* I am Returned. This time ineffable flavoured. Thanks to the ineffable discord peeps for coaching me through this. U all know who u are <3 

Title: Knocking On Heaven’s Door 

Summary: The apocalypse is averted, but neither Crowley nor Aziraphale counted on one thing not even Agnes Nutter saw coming: Me. And my veritable mountain of angst. Crowley is hurt and sad. Aziraphale is indignant and comforting. H/C ensues. Tw: Eye horror. 

Teaser: “You are many, many things, Crowley,” he said, quietly, “But you have never, not even for a moment, in all the thousands of years I have known you, been cruel.”“

’S far as you know,” Crowley muttered, petulantly.

“I know,” Aziraphale said, calmly, refusing to rise to the obvious bait, “As surely as I know every inch, and every crinkled corner, of every page of my favourite book...I know.”  

Link: AO3 

“I hope that’s booze.”  

Logically, Aziraphale knew he couldn’t have a heart attack. Emotionally, he seemed to be experiencing one anyway.

It was almost quarter past nine on Tuesday, and it had been a pleasantly mild, affable night. Aziraphale, pouring over some of the new books Adam had left in the shop for him to uncover, had found the craving for hot chocolate becoming unbearable enough that it had torn him from his work.

He had then discovered he had no milk in the fridge. He could, of course, have made it with water but...He had standards, thank you very much.

So he had taken a short trot to the little corner shop in the next street, the opening hours of which were almost as unusual as his own, but by some little miracle not caused by him, always seemed to coincide with his schedule.

It had been, perhaps, fifteen minutes, all told, between his leaving and returning, and in that time, something had decided to take up residence on the low couch in the back room. Something that was shaped, and slouched, and sounded very much like-

“Crowley?” he ventured, taking a tentative step deeper into the shop and lowering the milk bottle, along with any delusion of it being an effective weapon against an intruder.

“Were you expecting someone else?” the lazy, achingly familiar, voice drawled from the shadows.

Aziraphale moved closer still and lit a lamp, one of the dimmer ones, out of consideration for the demonic nature and sensitive eyes of his guest, out of habit. And there he was. Crowley, in the flesh, sprawled on the couch in all his lanky glory, looking as though he’d been there all the time.

There was such a familiar rightness about the scene that it took Aziraphale a moment to recall his indignation.

It slammed into him, full force, like a very large freight train, as he remembered how wrong it had felt for so long without him.

“I was expecting you quite some time ago!” he blustered, his emotions a terribly complex cocktail of the type Crowley favoured, driving his voice several octaves higher than usual.

A part of him wanted to embrace the stupid, demonic fool out of sheer relief. He would be lying, which, as an angel, he tried not to do, if he said he hadn’t been concerned about him during his absence.  

But for all that, another part wanted to throw the milk bottle over him to make him react instead of sitting slouching there without an apparent care in the world.

Still another part was still quite tempted to drop the milk bottle all over the floor out of sheer shock.

And another part just wanted to collapse into the nearest chair and massage his temples while miracling up some very strong tea because it was all, frankly, just a little too much to take in.

He did none of that.

Instead he glared at Crowley, as much as he was able, he never felt his corporation quite had the face for glaring. No more than he had had the substance for it, if it came down to it. But for special occasions, he would make the effort.

Then he said, with as much indignation as he could muster, which he was actually quite impressed with, “It’s been nearly-“

“Yeah,” Crowley interrupted with that usual languid cool that Aziraphale normally found a soothing counterpoint to his own rather manic way of dealing with the world, but that right now as just downright infuriating. “Sorry about that. Had some stuff to do,” he said, vaguely.  

As far as apologies went, it was definitely bottom five. And there had been quite a lot of competition for those spots over the centuries.

Aziraphale swelled indignantly, like a very indignant bullfrog. 

“Stuff?” he repeated, with all the infuriated incredulity the angel Gabriel had directed at him once after learning he had used a, not entirely small, miracle to ensure that his favourite sushi restaurant didn’t close down.

“Crowley, I thought-“

“So, is it?” the demon interrupted, apparently not listening to a word Aziraphale was saying, or rather spluttering, at him.

“Is what- what?” Aziraphale said, thoroughly confused.

“That,” Crowley supplied, helpfully.

“Crowley-“ Aziraphale began in his best ‘you’re testing my patience, you stupid demon, just spit out what you’ve got to say so we can return to the little matter of your terrifying vanishing act’ voice.

“What you’re holding in your hand, angel,” he said, impatiently, as though he, Aziraphale, were the one being difficult in this scenario, “What you just went out and bought. Is it booze or what?”

“Actually, it’s milk,” Aziraphale replied, with dignity.

“Milk?” Crowley echoed flatly.

“Yes. I ran out, you see. And I was working, and I usually don’t want for much of anything when I’m working, especially if it’s a particularly good book, which this one was. But all of a sudden I had rather a strong craving for a mug of hot chocolate, but then I found I had no milk. And I could have used water but, well, I’m not an animal, so...“ Aziraphale babbled.

He was good at babbling. Probably too good at it, if truth be told. If there was a religious order that specialised in rambling, he felt sure he should join it. Not that there was ever likely to be anything quite as ridiculous as that, but one never knew.

Somewhere in the back of his mind a small voice was screaming at him and demanding to know why he was justifying himself in this moment, but he wasn’t paying it too much attention.

“Right, yeah, ‘course,” Crowley muttered. “Some things don’t change, I guess, no matter what happens to the world.”

“Crowley-“ Aziraphale began, finally taking heed of that little voice and trying to drag the very resistant conversation back to the ground it should be on at present.

“Even after the apocalypse,” Crowley interrupted him.

Though, as interruptions tend to require the intent to speak over another person to silence them, he didn’t feel that was quite the correct word for what Crowley was doing.

Crowley didn’t seem to be very aware that Aziraphale was trying to ask him questions. Or that he was speaking to him. Or that he was speaking at all.

He simply mumbled on, barely aware that he was speaking for that matter.

“Crowley-“ Aziraphale tried again.

“Sort of apocalypse,” Crowley said, head bobbing vaguely.

“Crowley-“

“Not really apocalypse at all, since Adam fixed it, y’know.”

“Crowley, I-“

“Some things changed, I suppose,” he mumbled, “Some things changed a lot. But not you, eh, angel. You’ll always just be you. Ineffable and angelic and-“

“Crowley!” Aziraphale exclaimed, loudly.

Crowley jerked as though he had just branded him with holy lightning. “Yeah?” he said, raising his sunglass covered face to him, “Sorry. Carried away.”

At last he managed to put down his milk bottle on a nearby table, or other convenient hard surface, of which there were many in his bookshop, by design.  He swept over to the couch Crowley was slouching in, and peered down at him.

Here, he consoled himself, definitely, solidly, here. Physically, anyway. Mentally, Crowley seemed to be somewhere else entirely, but that wasn’t altogether unusual for him.

“Crowley I, I-“ he stammered, but apparently, simply because he now had an opening to speak, it didn’t make the words any easier to say, “I thought that you were dead,” he finally managed to say, in a kind of strangled whisper, as though his throat resisted releasing the words until the very last second.

A half-smile twisted Crowley’s lips at that. Usually his smiles, even the wicked ones, were still tinged with enough humanity that they never appeared all that sinister at all.  And, in all their time together, Aziraphale had never seen one that even scratched the surface of what you might describe as demonic.

This, though...This was not a smile that he recognised. There was something dark in it, something hollow, and ancient, and twisted. He felt some part of himself turn cold in return.

Crowley cocked his head to one side and said, with an admirable attempt at his usual languid ease, which was undercut by the way he had smiled just now,“We can’t die, angel. Remember?”

“I- don’t you be flippant with me!” Aziraphale blustered in response, feeling this reprimand was not at all going the way it had in his head. There wasn’t an awful lot of reprimanding for a one thing. And for another, Crowley clearly wasn’t understanding just how serious this had been for him.

They had passed quite some time, long, dusty centuries even, in the past, where they hadn’t seen hide nor hair of each other but this...This was different. They were different now. Before they had always, ultimately, been working for their respective head offices, and the Arrangement they’d had had always been secondary to that.

Now...Well, now, they had foiled an apocalypse together. They were on their side, now. Wasn’t that what Crowley had insisted to him? Things had felt different, they had been different. He was sure of that.

And he had worried. Being worried was something of a natural state of being for Aziraphale. Even when there was nothing to conceivably be worried about at all, his mind found something, latched on, and made mountains out of molehills until he had something suitably distressing to fret over.

This had begun as a mountain and twisted into a veritable Everest after only a few days. By this point, it had turned itself into an earth-consuming, Satanic sized, world-ending volcano of a thing, and it had nearly been enough to discorporate him all over again.

So, with one thing and another, Crowley’s current lackadaisical attitude, while in many ways expected, wasn’t really cutting it at present.

“I thought something terrible had happened!” He burst out, no longer able to keep his emotions in check, “I thought they had done something dreadful to you, and that’s why you hadn’t come back. I thought you’d been discorporated into a thousand tiny pieces, which had then been scattered to all the worst, most terrible, most twisted, and God-forsaken, isolated places in heaven, hell, and the known universe, to force you to exist forever in perpetual torment and agony!”

“With an imagination like that, you could be a demon, Aziraphale. Sure you haven’t Fallen after our little adventure with the antichrist?” Crowley said, sardonically.

Aziraphale opened his mouth to snap back the reply that this deserved. But then he shut it. And shook his head. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and composed himself as much as he could.

Then he whispered out the final thought, which had been the worst of all, “I thought that I would never see you again, Crowley.”

A little desperation tinged his words, desperation to make the damned demon do something, say something, feel something. So Aziraphale didn’t feel like the greatest fool anyone had ever seen in six thousand years for caring about him.

He didn’t understand how Crowley could be so...So unconcerned, so unbothered by any of this. He knew that the demon liked to put on a front, to pretend ignorance, or obliviousness, or simply that he didn’t care about anything.

But Aziraphale knew him better than that. He knew that that was a front. He knew that the demon did care. He knew that, behind those serpent’s eyes, there was a good heart, and a good person. He knew Crowley...Didn’t he?

“Well,” Crowley said, at last, “Now you can.” He gestured vaguely at his form, slumped on the couch as he had been slumping in it since Aziraphale had first purchased it, “Sorry to disappoint and all that.”

Aziraphale pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a long, slow breath, which was all that stood between Crowley and a bottle of now lukewarm milk being smashed over his head.

“Really, Crowley,” he said in exasperation, “Sometimes you can just be so, so, so-“

“Demonic?” Crowley supplied, helpfully.

“Stupid,” Aziraphale concluded, with an affected little shudder to appropriately punctuate the point.

There was a long pause, in which Aziraphale duly hoped that Crowley was considering his recent actions, feeling serious remorse for them, and that any moment now, an apology would be forthcoming. A proper apology, this time.

“Have you got anything to drink?” Crowley slurred, in a way that told him he’d already helped himself to a number of alcoholic beverages on his way over here.

“Have I-“ Aziraphale repeated faintly.

Sometimes, sometimes, Crowley really did test him, really did tempt him to commit all manner of unnameable, unthinkable sins. There many little dinners, for a start. The Arrangement, for another. Preventing the apocalypse. And, in this moment, putting his hands around his throat and throttling some sense into him.

But no. That wouldn’t do. It would not be very angelic of him. So he resisted. With difficulty, it should be noted.

Instead, Aziraphale took a deep breath, stalked purposefully back over to his milk and said, “I shall make us both a cup of tea, and then we will talk about this,” he said, in a tone that strongly implied, you see if we don’t.

“Not gonna lie,” Crowley called after him as he headed towards the kitchen, “I was kinda hoping for something a little stronger.”

“I think you’ve had more than enough already, to be frank,” Aziraphale replied, a little tartly.

“Glad to see the near end of the world hasn’t changed you at all, angel,” Crowley half-shouted bitterly as he retreated into the sanctity of the kitchen.

If only you knew, Crowley....If only you knew.

Aziraphale could, naturally, have used a fairly minor miracle to create them tea but...There was something so familiar, so oddly routine, and comforting, and human about the process of making tea, that he leaned into it, and allowed it to calm him.

When he returned to the living room with the two cups of tea on a tray with a small plate of biscuits to go with it – because he might be angry with Crowley at the moment, but he wasn’t a barbarian – the demon hadn’t seemed to have moved from his spot sprawled on the couch.

With the light flickering on his face as it was now, hollowing out his already gaunt cheeks, and casting deep, dark shadows across him, he almost seemed a corpse.

Aziraphale stuttered in the doorway for a moment, before he managed to step forwards and set the tea tray down feeling a little troubled, all the same.

In all the years he had known him Crowley had always been a being of intense, continual, restless energy. He had to be doing something. Mostly he had to be doing at least two things at once to be in any way satisfied.

Whenever Aziraphale had left him alone for longer than it took to, well, blink, he had usually found him pulling books from their proper places and rifling through them, simply because he could, or was bored, or couldn’t think of a reason not to. Typically a combination of all three.

He opened his mouth to remark on the strangeness of this, but was distracted by a dark smudge on one of the demon’s high cheekbones, and changed tact mid-breath.

“Oh, you have something on your face. Here, let me-“

He reached forwards without thinking, but Crowley raised a hand and brushed it away before he could get near enough to even consider touching him.

“Oil”, he muttered, as Aziraphale drew away, and tried not to let the strangely keen pang of hurt show on his face, “From the car. It’s acting up a little, since Adam fixed it, y’know.”

“I’m sorry,” Aziraphale said, automatically, internally cursing himself for not sticking to what he had practiced in the kitchen – firm, stern, committed to his indignation.

“What for?” Crowley asked, frowning.

“The car. I know Adam sorted it out for you, just as he sorted out my bookshop,” he looked fondly around at the place, “But I know how much you loved it just as it was.”

“Demons don’t love things, angel,” Crowley replied, harshly, “Kinda the point.”

“All the same,” Aziraphale said, gently, refusing to be baited into an argument of this sort again.  

He had long ago learned not to try and correct Crowley when he spoke like this. It did neither of them any good.

Aziraphale had long since suspected that Crowley’s Fall still caused him pain, even to this day. He had never fully embraced his new role as a demon. There just wasn’t enough difference for him between angels and demons to ever accepted that he was completely one, or completely the other.

But sometimes he snarled, viciously, the truth of his being, as if to remind himself what he was supposed to be, and to reprimand himself for not doing it properly.

Aziraphale had always considered that conflict, tragic as it was, one of Crowley’s greatest qualities. For at the centre of that conflict lay his heart, always at war with his nature.

“You heard from your side recently?” Crowley asked unexpectedly after some time, during which he hadn’t so much as looked at his tea, which had caused Aziraphale to purse his lips at the distinct lack of manners on show, even for a demon.  

“No, I haven’t,” Aziraphale replied primly, sipping his tea pointedly and frowning slightly.

When last they had spoken, Crowley had insisted that neither of them had sides any more. They were simply on their own side.

He shifted into a more comfortable position and then said, “Have you?”

“Nah,” Crowley shrugged with characteristic nonchalance.

Aziraphale relaxed again, though with a slight nagging continuing to badger him all the same.

“Out of sight out of mind, I suppose,” Crowley mumbled, more to himself than to Aziraphale.

He still hadn’t touched his tea.

Aziraphale frowned slightly, and set his down on its saucer with a little more force than was strictly necessary, so it made an audible and insistent little tinkling sound to remind Crowley of his own.

“So,” he said, when it seemed blindingly obvious Crowley was content to sit in languid silence, staring vaguely into space, not addressing the planet-sized elephant in the room between them. “Are you going to tell me where you’ve been?”

Crowley sneered with such unexpected venom that Aziraphale started in surprise, “Since when we do we do that?” he demanded.

Since, but for us, the entire world almost ended. Since we cut ourselves off from our people, and everything we’ve known for six thousand years to do what we both felt was right, leaving us alone in this world, devoid of understanding, compassion, or aid, save for each other.

That was what Aziraphale thought.

What he actually said, rather lamely, was, “Well, you haven’t been around for some time, you know.”

He forced the words to be slow, and measured, forcing a control he certainly didn’t feel in this moment.

He had also tried to inject them with Crowley’s casual coolness, too, but he felt that was stretching the bounds of reality to a point even Adam couldn’t have managed, and gave up half-way through.

“Is it that unusual I might be curious, or even, dare I say it, a trifle worried about your whereabouts?” he demanded. Crowley said nothing, and now feeling rather foolish, he added, “Particularly after recent events I should add!”

Sarcasm was now starting to do rather more than tinge his words. It was oozing into them, filling up the gaps between the words, dripping between the contours of the letters. He did try not to lower himself to such things too often but, well, sometimes one just didn’t have a choice in present company.

Then there were the words themselves, which were definitely starting to run away with him. And he wanted to stop them, he did, he didn’t want to accost Crowley like this, that had never been his intention.

Only, well, now it was happening, and his voice was rising, and he was getting to his feet without ever telling his feet to get him, and he was ranting, yes, definitely ranting now, and a part of him didn’t care because, blast it all, it felt good after all this time.

“I had no idea where you were! You could have been anywhere! Anywhere! Heaven, or Hell, or some other forsaken place in between! I didn’t know when I would see you again. I didn’t know if I ever would see you again!”

He was breathing hard now, as though he had just run a race, but Crowley just continued to sit there, face perhaps a little tighter than it had been before, a muscle twitching in his jaw. But still, resolutely, saying nothing.

When he spoke at last, there was a cold, empty bitterness in his voice Aziraphale had never heard there before, “Thought you’d finally gotten rid of me, did you?” he asked.

This was so unexpected, so utterly, completely impossible to have foreseen that Aziraphale simply stared at him, mouth slightly open, eyes popping, as he continued, “Or maybe hoped-“

“Crowley!” Aziraphale exclaimed, the bite in Crowley’s voice more than sharp enough to pull him unceremoniously from his state of temporary dumbfounded shock, “Crowley, I would never, I-“

“That’s the trouble with me, see,” Crowley said, thickly, his head lolling rather alarmingly on his neck as he fixed Aziraphale with a terrible grin, “I’m like a bad penny. I just keep turning up.”

“You, you shouldn’t say things like that,” Aziraphale said quietly, utterly thrown by the way this conversation was going, which was not at all what he’d anticipated or prepared himself for in the kitchen.

“What?” Crowley demanded harshly, “The truth, you mean? Thought that’s what your lot were all supposed to be about- The truth.”

“The truth can be....brutal, sometimes,” Aziraphale said carefully, “And cruel.”

“Right, well, that’s my department covered then, isn’t it? Is that what you mean?”

“No! Don’t twist my words in a way you know I would never use them,” Aziraphale said sharply, frown deepening.

Something was wrong. He had known it from the moment he spotted Crowley sprawled there on his couch but...Now he knew it.

“You are many, many things, Crowley,” he said, quietly, “But you have never, not even for a moment, in all the thousands of years I have known you, been cruel.”

“’S far as you know,” Crowley muttered, petulantly.

“I know,” Aziraphale said, calmly, refusing to rise to the obvious bait, “As surely as I know every inch, and every crinkled corner, of every page of my favourite book...I know.”  

Crowley said nothing to that, he just swayed slightly in his corner, expression curiously blank.

Aziraphale folded his hands neatly in his lap then examined them as he added, quiet but audible, “And, just for the avoidance of any and all doubt, you are, you know.”

“Am what? A demon? I’d spotted that for myself, thanks.”

“Wanted,” Aziraphale murmured softly. “You will always be wanted by me. And you will always be welcome here,” he said, firmly. “No matter what you may have done, or what may have happened. Always. Unconditionally. Eternally.”

Crowley was silent for a long moment, then he frowned slightly and hissed, “What are you getting at, angel?”

“Something is wrong,” Aziraphale said, simply.

He hadn’t wanted to address things quite so directly, but it seemed he now had no choice.

“Nothing is wrong,” Crowley jeered, in mocking mimicry of Aziraphale, waving his hand.

Aziraphale couldn’t help but notice that it trembled slightly.

“Something is wrong with you,” he pressed, firmly.

Crowley snorted, “There’ve been a lot of things wrong with me for about six thousand years,” he said, sardonically, “Have you just noticed?”

“You are out of sorts, you have been all night,” Aziraphale continued doggedly, refusing to be derailed now that he had started. “This is not- This is not like you, Crowley. Not at all.”

“Maybe it is,” the demon ventured, a cruel twist to his lips as he said it.

“It isn’t,” Aziraphale said, firmly.

If he knew anything in this strange new world of theirs, he knew that.

“Well maybe you just don’t know me as well as your precious old books!” Crowley hissed, baring his teeth at Aziraphale.

“You see!” Aziraphale erupted in frustration, “This is precisely what I’m talking about!”

Crowley suddenly surged to his feet and Aziraphale, startled, took a little step backwards.

He swayed a little unsteadily then said, thickly, “Aizraphale?”

“Yes, Crowley?” he replied, a little uncertainly.

“Go fuck yourself,” the demon spat.

He flicked his fingers in a vicious little movement, and the cup of still undrunk tea shot from the table like a bullet and smashed against the wall.

Aziraphale gave a little gasp as Crowley pushed past him, heading for the door, his shoulders hunched. Too stunned to do anything, Aziraphale simply stood, staring at the shattered remnants of his favourite tea cup lying amidst the slowly spreading pool of overly milky-tea he’d teased Crowley gently about for centuries.

He looked up at the sudden banging sound, which was all the warning he had to realise that Crowley had collapsed to the floor and was now shaking.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale cried, dropping down beside him and reaching out a trembling hand, “Crowley, what-“

He broke off, breath catching in his chest like a fly in a cobweb.

Something dark was trickling from beneath the lenses of Crowley’s glasses. It was black. Black like the ink that gave life to his beloved books and black like, like-

“Crowley-“ he whispered hoarsely.

The tips of his fingers brushed Crowley’s cheek, so gentle, so tentative, as though he were the one that was holy, and Aziraphale feared to sully him with a touch, feared it may crumble him into nothing. And just like that he would be gone again. And Aziraphale would be alone again. And that was a terror worth Falling a hundred times to avoid, but-

“We can’t die,” Crowley breathed softly, panting, as the ribbon of black wound its way down his cheek like a tear. “But we can wish we could.” Something in Aziraphale’s chest stuttered, and died. “We can still hope for it, angel,” Crowley continued, his words slurred, not with drink, he realised, belatedly, but with pain. “We can beg for it. We can pray for it.”

Aziraphale closed his eyes, shaking his head weakly, the last efforts of a dying man trying to rid himself of the flies that called for his end.

Crowley shuddered, “But we can’t die, angel. For all our miracles, and all our power, all our divine origins...It’s the only thing we can never have.”

He didn’t want to hear this. He couldn’t stand to hear it. He had wanted explanation from Crowley, but he had wanted to tell him he’d gotten drunk in Paris a month ago and lost track of time until he sobered up. He didn’t want this. It couldn’t be this.

But he couldn’t stop him. He had never been able to stop him. For six thousand years he had drunk in the words of this demon when he knew he shouldn’t, when he knew that it could corrupt his angelic soul and damn him for all eternity.

But it had never felt like damning. It had never felt like corruption. It had felt as though his soul had been the blank pages, and Crowley’s words had inscribed themselves, each one, upon it. He was a part of him, now. He had woven himself into the fabric of his being from the moment he had slithered up beside him in Eden.

After all, a book without words was as pointless as a pen with no paper, as pointless as a teapot without tea, as pointless as good without the balance of evil...As pointless, in fact, as an angel without his demon.

So he asked. Though it broke him. Though it shattered him in a way no discorporation ever had. He asked him.

“Crowley, my dear boy, what did they do to you?”

Crowley couldn’t speak. He tried. He opened his mouth, but for once, no words dripped like honey from that easy serpent’s tongue of his.

Aziraphale didn’t need them to. He never really had. When you knew someone as long as they had, there were some things that didn’t need to be put into words to be known.

His hands curiously steady, for they needed to be, he needed to be, in this moment, Aziraphale reached up and placed his hands gently on Crowley’s glasses.

They were his shield, he knew. The great lie he told the world. There was a vulnerability to him without them. He seemed more naked, fully clothed, without them, than he ever could have standing in nothing but his skin with them.

He paused, trembling, and waited until he got the jerky nod of approval from Crowley before he gently slid them free, folded them up, and laid them down as tenderly as he would a baby bird.

“Look at me,” he whispered softly, sliding a finger beneath Crowley’s chin and encouraging him, gently, oh so gently. “Please, Crowley.”

Crowley, breathing heavily, did as he was bid, raised his head from the pool of shadow that had been his last protection against the horror of reality.

Aziraphale felt his stomach clench, and then turn.

He had known it. He had known it from the first moment he saw Crowley sitting there, somehow, he had known it. But that didn’t make it any easier to witness.

Where once his eyes, his beautiful, bright eyes, like glowing stars in a world of darkness had been, now there was nothing. Nothing at all. Two gaping black holes that silently wept black blood and mourned their own passing.

“Oh, Crowley,” Aziraphale whispered as he collapsed down onto the floor beside him, trying desperately to control himself for Crowley’s sake.

Even though all he wanted to do was cry, and fold him into his arms, and sob until there was nothing left of either of them.

Even though all he wanted was to rage, and storm the gates of Hell and rain holy water down upon them like a hurricane the likes of which had never been known before, until there was nothing left of them. Until he had obliterated it all so thoroughly that the mere memory of Hell was erased from the minds of anyone who had heard of it, and was wiped out from the pages of books that had once held its foul name.

But he didn’t. He couldn’t. He had to be strong, and he had to be here. Crowley needed him.

“Crowley,” he whispered, pain stretching every syllable of the word.

“Don’t,” Crowley mumbled, shrugging away from him, hunching in on himself, “If I wanted your pity, I’d ask for it.”

Aziraphale opened his mouth to deny that he’d been feeling any such thing. Then he closed it again. Angels weren’t supposed to lie, after all...

“Crowley,” he whispered, voice suddenly hoarse, throat tight from his attempts to restrain his emotions, his body shaking for the same reason,“Crowley, you must let me put this right.”

The demon made a small noise of disbelief in the back of his throat, and Aziraphale couldn’t blame him.

He had failed him. He had not been there when this had happened, when he had been taken. If he had, perhaps he might have stopped it, perhaps he might have stopped them when they’d come for him, kept him safe, and-

No.

No had he been there he would have stopped it.

He would have stopped it, and reminded the filthy demons that would do this to him why they should never have so much as looked at his Crowley in a way that might even consider harm to him.

He would have reminded them why he had been given charge of the Eastern Gate of Eden. He would have reminded them why he had been entrusted with that flaming sword. He would have reminded them why Heaven had won the first war and that, just because he was an angel, that most certainly didn’t mean he didn’t know how to hurt. He did. And he would.

The only pity would have been that there would have been nothing left of them afterwards to remind the others.

“You can’t, angel,” he muttered bitterly, shaking his head.

“I can try,” Aziraphale replied firmly.

“I have,” Crowley spat out, hunching in on himself again with a look of pure self-disgust at, what he perceived, as the weakness that confession implied. “I have tried. I’ve tried everything, I- It- It’s hopeless,” he finished, shaking his head, still trembling uncontrollably. “They told me,” he choked, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, “They told me I could try everything, could try it for another six thousand years, and it wouldn’t make any difference.”

“You haven’t tried what I can do,” Aziraphale said, as gently as he could, holding his tongue with difficulty on the fact that of course the demons would lie to him about something like this, just to further hurt him. “You couldn’t have. Perhaps- They could make insurances against your power, as it mirrors their own, but not against mine.”

Crowley shook his head again, but he didn’t speak, and there was, perhaps, a faint glimmer of hope in him now, that had not been there a moment ago.

“Please, Crowley,” Aziraphale said trying, and failing, to stop his voice from cracking, “You must let me try. You must.”

It was selfish, a part of him knew, and the other part hated him for it.  

Oh he wanted to help Crowley, of course he did. But he also wanted to do something about the abyss of guilt that was opening up within his heart and burrowing straight down into the depths of his soul.

He had let this happen. He had not been careful enough, not watchful enough. He had not been there for him when this happened. Crowley had been forced to go through it alone. And now, in the aftermath, Aziraphale felt a compulsion so powerful it might destroy him if not relieved, to help, to do something, to fix him.

He always had.

Aziraphale stared at Crowley, watched the hope, the faint, terrible glimmer of it, flicker to life in him, like the embers of a fire that still glowed even after it had been doused.

Then, just as suddenly, he watched them die.

“You can’t angel,” he said again, shaking his head more firmly this time, fists clenched tight as if to stop himself begging for it.  

“You can’t possibly know that!” Aziraphale burst out with desperate impatience.

“I dunno if it’ll fix me,” Crowley bit out, his own temper flaring, “But I know your lot aren’t going to like you using a miracle this big on a demon,” he spat out the word as though it were poison. Then he continued, more flatly, “They’ll come for you, angel. And I’ve got enough to deal with it without adding that to the list.”

It would have hurt less if he’d stabbed him.

Crowley turned away, shaking his head, defeated, certain he knew precisely how Aziraphale would respond.

And for six thousand years before this very moment, he would have been right.

Even after everything that had happened, everything they had gone through, everything they had done, he had still not fully chosen a side. Not truly. Not in his heart.

He would have agreed with him.

He would have hurt, and he would have hated himself, and he would have been wracked with guilt about it for several centuries. But he would have remained on the fence. Trying to have his cake and eat it as it were. Not committing. Not choosing.

He chose now.

“Let them,” he said, very quietly.

Crowley started, “What?” he said, sounding a little dazed.

“Let them come,” Aziraphale said, more firmly, “Let them come, and let them try to stop me.”

Crowley was staring at him, mouth slightly open as Aziraphale swallowed and averted his eyes, sitting up a little straighter.

That had been frighteningly easy. He meant it. They both knew that he meant every breath of it. And it should have scared him, it should have terrified him but...But it didn’t.

In the moment, it seemed as though he had only just chosen, and the moment was suitably momentous for that.

But in truth, he had chosen years ago. Centuries, if truth be told.

“So,” he said, firmly, clasping his hands neatly together in his lap, trying to pretend his heart wasn’t beating so hard and fast it felt as though it might explode at any moment,“What do you say?”

At last, Crowley gave a shaky nod of consent, “Can’t do any harm, I guess,” he said, with an awful attempt at nonchalance, as though it didn’t really matter to him whether Azirphale tried or not, outlined by a poignant, desperate hope that Aziraphale felt radiating through the shattered remnants of the thing that had once been his heart.

“Just, just as long as you’re sure, angel,” he added softly, “There might not be any going back after this.”

“I’m sure,” Aziraphale said, softly, “I am surer on this than I have ever been of anything in my life, I promise you.”

Crowley reached out clumsily, found Aziraphale’s hand, and squeezed it once.

“Right,” Aziraphale said, briskly, pushing himself to his feet and trying to push away his mounting emotions with action.

He knelt down, lifted Crowley carefully to his feet, apologising softly as he winced. The he guided him back to the couch he had recently vacated.

Crowley collapsed down with his usual inelegance, leaving Aziraphale to kneel down primly in front of him.

“I’m going to put my hands on your temples now,” he said, quietly, and caught Crowley’s sharp nod of confirmation that he had heard and consented.

Aziraphale gently laid the tips of his fingers on either side of Crowley’s ravaged eyes, took a deep breath, and prepared himself. It had been quite a while since he had done this. Or at least, since he had done anything quite as, quite as bad as this.

“I, I’m going to begin now,” he warned him, “This may sting a little.”

Crowley let out a soft snort of derisive laughter at that.

Taking a deep breath, Aziraphale began softly chanting, his eyes half-closed, focusing, channelling every bit of power at his disposal into the healing, chanting softly under his breath as he did so.

Once or twice he felt Crowley twitch beneath him, but the demon did not pull away, and as he finished, letting his eyes flutter open properly, he could see a bright light flickering within the empty holes where Crowley’s eyes had once been.

 He could see it shaping into eyes, taking cues from Crowley’s body, and mind, and memory, as to what had once been there, putting right what had been lost. He could see them becoming clearer, sharpening, focusing, solidifying-

Then Crowley screamed.

He screamed as though Aziraphale had just shot holy water directly into his veins.

As Aziraphale watched, petrified, he slid from the couch, trembling and clutching his head, still screaming, and screaming, and screaming.

It was the worst sound Aziraphale had ever heard in six thousand years. Worse than the first war between Heaven and Hell, worse than any atrocity he’d ever experienced on Earth, worse than anything he could ever have imagined.

Until it stopped.

The silence that followed was more devastating than the end of the world could ever have been, and every part of him became cold as death in answer.

Crowley’s body trembled. Aziraphale felt his very existence shiver, and he knew that he had made a terrible, terrible mistake.

Crowley had come to him after, after what they had done to him. Because of course he had. Because that was what he did. It was what they both did. They came to each other when they needed someone most.

And they would have known that. Those demons that had done this to him. Of course they would have known that. And of course they would have set things up so that when he inevitably tried to heal him, instead he would, he would-

Oh God. Oh God. Oh-

“Aziraphale-“ Crowley rasped, one hand reaching out blindly, desperately, seeking for him, an anchor amidst the storm tossed seas of his fear, which was palpable.

The angel dropped down beside him and took his hand. Then decided, to Hell with it, and he simply drew the demon into his lap, cradling his body, not sure which of them was shaking more in this moment.

“I feel strange, angel,” Crowley whispered, gazing blindly upwards as though he could suddenly see more than he ever could before. “I feel...I feel...cold,” he frowned slightly, as though he’d just realised the absurdity of what he’d said. Demons were creatures fuelled by hellfire, they did not get cold. Not unless-

“I don’t think I’ve been cold since I, since I-“

He broke off and convulsed in Aziraphale’s arms and in that moment he felt sure – with the kind of burst of blinding certainty that comes with the kind of horrific revelations that leave permanent scars upon the soul – that this would not be a mere discorporation. This had been designed for Crowley to-

“No!” he burst out, giving him a little shake, which was decidedly not something he had ever been taught when he learned healing rituals, but seemed to have the desired effect on Crowley all the same. “No, Crowley I, I forbid this, I absolutely forbid it,” he choked, because if he forbade it absolutely there was no way it could happen.  

“Do you- Do you hear me, Crowley?” he demanded sharply, the effect somewhat ruined by the way his voice broke on his name. “I forbid you, I forbid you to die on me.” He carded his fingers through the demon’s thick red hair, barely knowing what he was doing or saying, “Not now,” he breathed, tears dampening his eyes, “Not after everything.”

“Angel,” Crowley interrupted hoarsely, stirring slightly, “We can’t die, ‘member?”

“Then I forbid you to leave me!” Aziraphale snapped, half-terrified, half-frustrated that, even on the edge of discorporation, the demon was the most vexing creature he’d ever come across in over six thousand years, and entirely overwhelmed. “In any way. At any time. For any reason! Because I can’t- I won’t- I, I refuse to do this without you, Crowley!”

Crowley stilled, and Aziraphale felt the shadow of death whisper on the back of his neck like a cold breeze.

“Crowley!” he cried in desperation.

Aziraphale’s wings burst from his back in his panic, sending books and papers scattering over the floor. In some distant, inconsequential place, he had the shattering of his own teacup.

“Crowley, no! Stay with me now, come on, stay with me. Oh God. Oh God please. Please don’t take him from me. Crowley, Crowley please don’t leave me. Please. Oh what have I done?” he rasped, tears flooding from his eyes as he gripped the demon close to him, as though he thought to fuse them together and keep him safe within his soul. “What have I done? Oh Crowley, Crowley, Crowley-“

Crowley made a soft, muffled sound against Aziraphale’s waist coat, and Aziraphale started, drawing back slightly and peering down at him with streaming eyes.

“Crowley?” he whispered in disbelief.

“Untwist your knickers, angel,” Crowley ground out with characteristic tact, “’M alright.” He patted Aziraphale vaguely on the back and repeated, a little more firmly, as though he knew Aziraphale hadn’t quite taken it in, “’M alright, angel.”

Oh.

Now that he looked at him properly he realised that, by some miracle or other, he rather did seem to be alright. He felt heat and colour flood his cheeks

Aziraphale felt as though he had just aged another six thousand years within the span of around six seconds.

He closed his eyes and deflated dramatically, “Oh thank-“

“Language,” Crowley intoned.

“Sorry,” Aziraphale replied, automatically.

“Fuck” Crowley groaned, shifting uncomfortably in Aziraphale’s arms, “Promise you’ll never do this to me again, angel. It’s more painful than watching you do your magic act.”

Aziraphale snorted, rather inelegantly, through his tears, and hastily wiped his nose.

Crowley frowned up at him, face scrunching, “Angel, are you crying?” he demanded.

“No!” Aziraphale cried, indignantly, “I most certainly am not.”

“You are,” Crowley crowed, with rather indecent delight, given the circumstances.

“I, I-“ Aziraphale blustered, “For God’s sake, Crowley! I thought I had just killed you! I’m sure that in my position you might be a little, well, distressed, too!”

Crowley seemed to seriously consider this for a moment. Then he said, easily, “Nah, wouldn’t be that bothered to be honest.”

“Oh shut up!” Aziraphale snapped, but with a certain level of affection.

Crowley wheezed with laughter. Then just wheezed and began hacking and spluttering in Aziraphale’s arms. Aziraphale, because he was an angel after all, patted him on the back and miracled him up a glass of water.

Aziraphale pulled him a little closer, running his fingers absently through his hair, thinking a number of decidedly unangelic thoughts about what he would like to do to the demons responsible for this whole affair.

Finally, Aziraphale decided that the universe had reached a balance between Crowley’s general well-being, and his shredded nerves. So he scooped the demon up, steered him back to his couch, deposited him there (gently), then moved towards the kitchen.

“Where are you going?” Crowley demanded, something that almost sounded like fear bleeding into his words, one hand half-raised, fingers brushing at the hem of his sleeve.

“Don’t let this go to your head now, dear,” he said, “But I’ve decided you were right. We need something decidedly stronger than tea.”

He returned some time later, rather longer than it should have taken to fetch two glasses and fill them with wine, during which he composed himself as much as he could.

Crowley was still sitting where he had left him, looking only mostly dead now, as opposed to utterly.

Aziraphale gently tapped him on the shoulder with his glass, and waited patiently as he fumbled a little before taking it from him.

He took a long gulp, then considered, as Aziraphale sat primly down on the chair opposite him, and sipped his wine a little more slowly.

Aziraphale opened his mouth to comment on the vintage and the unusual flavours of this bottle of wine in particular that had been lurking in the back of his shop for quite some time now.

But Crowley said, a little thickly, “Six thousand years. Figure I’ve seen pretty much everything there is to see. ‘S no great loss really, is it?”

Aziraphale closed his eyes and bit his lip until it was painful to force himself to control his emotions.

“Crowley, I am so-“ he began, shakily.

“Don’t,” Crowley interrupted him, a bite of impatience in his voice.

“What?”

“Apologise.”

“But my dear,” Aziraphale murmurs softly, unable to stop himself, “What they’ve done to you, I-“

“Wasn’t your fault,” Crowley said, gently.

Somehow, the words didn’t sound mechanical, or knee-jerk, or forced, or even bitter. Instead, there was an aching softness to them, a warmth there has no right to be a...A deep sincerity.

Aziraphale knew, in that moment, that he had heard more truth spilled from his demon’s lips than all the angels of Heaven had ever spoken in their holy immortal lives. Or likely ever would.

And so he spoke his truth. Because fair was fair. And because he couldn’t stop the words from coming.

“It should have been me,” he whispered, hoarsely, trembling, “I should have been there. I should have been punished, too.”

Crowley frowned, frowned the same way he had that time they had both gotten extremely drunk together, around 1932, and he had asked Crowley, jokingly, how long they’d been on Earth together in seconds.

The poor dear had looked so thoroughly confused, and in the end, had broken down sobbing, saying he couldn’t do maths quickly enough because there were always more seconds adding on all the time and he could never count them all.

His face was a perfect mirror of that confusion in this moment, too.

“Good would that have done?” he demanded, finally.

Then he shook his head and taking another swig of wine, as though that would be the end of that conversation.

“I was responsible too,” Aziraphale croaked, unable to find any levity in the matter whatsoever. “Any punishment should have been shared equally between us. The burden should not have been placed entirely upon your shoulders.”

“It’s not as though you asked them to just punish me and leave you out of it. And-“ he added forcibly, voice rising along with a stern finger to silence Aziraphale. Even though he could no longer see him, he seemed to have been able to sense the impending interruption all the same. “Pretty sure I tempted you into it, technically, so you know...”

Aziraphale laughed at that. It was a hollow, bitter thing, and it echoed off all the harsh truths Heaven had carved into him over the years.

“What a mockery they have made of us,” he said, darkly, “When a demon has to tempt an angel into doing the right thing.”

He shook his head, and downed the rest of his wine. He was going to need to open another bottle soon, they were getting through it rather quickly. And with good reason.

“’M glad you’re okay,” Crowley said, so quietly, Aziraphale almost missed it.

“Pardon?” Aziraphale said, with impulsive politeness, quite sure he’d misheard.

“I’m glad that they didn’t hurt you,” Crowley repeated, more loudly this time.

Aziraphale didn’t know what to say to that, so he simply mouthed at Crowley like a stunned goldfish.

Then Crowley suddenly let out an almost hysterical little laugh, that just as quickly choked and died, rising as what he might have sworn was a muffled sob. He took another long swig of wine, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, then turned a tortured face to Aziraphale. It took everything in him not to rush forwards and embrace him.

“When my lot took me, I figured your lot had come for you, too,” Crowley said, suddenly, with the inexorable forward motion of a train that has come off the rails, doesn’t know how to get back on them, and cannot stop, so must plough resolutely on and hope for the best.

“I thought that was it. We were both done. No more tricks, no more games, no more chances just- Over.”

Aziraphale stared at him, quiet, gripping his now empty wine glass so tightly he feared it might shatter. But he didn’t really care.

He didn’t want to hear this. He didn’t think he could stand to hear it. But he couldn’t not. Crowley needed to say it, and he needed someone to listen, needed someone to share this burden with. And Aziraphale would not, could not turn him away when he needed him.

“All those films humans make, they always say in them that when you’re about to die, you think of all the things you should have done. All the things in your life you would have done you never did, or all the things you would have changed, but I never did.”

“What-“ Aziraphale cleared his throat and tried again, “What, what did you think of?”

Crowley raised his hollowed, empty eyes to him and said, simply, “You.”

Aziraphale nearly dropped the wine glass he was holding. Something, luck, demonic miracle, divine intervention, stopped him.

“I thought of, of all the stupid stuff. Stuff I didn’t even think would matter all that much at the time. But stuff that made me...made me happy. Made me feel like me. D’you know what I mean?”

Aziraphale nodded, then he, he remembered, and managed to rasp out, “I, I think I do.”

“Rain storms in Eden,” Crowley said, a faint smile daring to tug at the corner of his mouth, “Shakespeare in the globe. Jail cells in Paris. Ducks in St James’ park.” He swallowed, throat bobbing, and went on, more softly, “I dunno why that’s what I thought of. I dunno what good it did but...I think it was right. That at the end, it was you and me, the way it was at the start. And I guess, if the humans are right...It just shows that...I did the right thing. That, demon or not...We did the right thing.”

Aziraphale couldn’t speak. He couldn’t breathe, either. The fact that he didn’t, technically speaking, need to, shouldn’t be considered when determining his emotional state.

“And I figured, one way or another, however it happened, I’d never see you again,” Crowley said, his voice something that resembled more half-whisper than speech, now. “Guess I was right. Even if it didn’t happen the way I thought it would,” he said, gesturing towards his ruined eyes with a stab at black humour.

Aziraphale closed his own with despair.

“That’s the hardest part, y’know,” he mumbled, “It’s not the car, or the driving, or the humans and whatever weird shit they’ll come up with next. It’s not even my plants.. It’s you.”

“My dear,” Aziraphale said, with a near-hysterical little laugh of incredulity, “You’ve seen me for six thousand years. I don’t think you’ll forget what I look like it- It’s not so bad as all that, surely?” he said, with a false optimism that sounded hollow even to his ears.

“But that’s what I was most afraid of. In that moment. When it was-“ he swallowed, “When it was happening.” Aziraphale resisted the urge to leap from his chair and seize Crowley’s hand and hold it tight, as if that would stop the hurting, with great difficulty. “And I realised...I realised afterwards that I was right.”

Aziraphale stared at him. He could breathe now. But he didn’t dare to. This moment felt holy, sacred, to interrupt it with anything, even the faintest breath, would have been sacrilege.

“They were right, too,” he continued, “They knew just how to torture me. Now I’ll never get to see you again, all big eyes and flapping hands ‘cause I drive too fast. Or how pleased you look when they remember at that little cafe down the street that you don’t like your beans touching your toast, ‘cause you’ll never ask. Or that little smile on your face when you read your favourite part of your favourite book for the hundredth time or-“ he took a deep breath, as though his brain had caught up with what his mouth was saying, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to continue.

But then he did.

Almighty be praised. He did.

“Or the way,” he said, so softly, “The way you look whenever you look at me.”

“Crowley-“ Aziraphale began, voice strangled.

“Don’t,” Crowley interrupted him, and he sounded so broken, and so divine, all at once, that he found he couldn’t speak. “Even if I can’t ever see it again, I know, I know what I’ve seen before.” He raised his head, and somehow found Aziraphale, pinned him with that empty stare and said, “I know you, too, angel. And I know...I know how you’ve looked at me when you thought I couldn’t see. I know...Don’t I?” he breathed.

Those last words sounded like a prayer.

Crowley hadn’t prayed for six thousand years. Since before his Fall. And now here he was, metaphorically on his knees, praying for him.

And just like that, Aziraphale felt himself fall.

It didn’t hurt. It didn’t feel like damnation. It didn’t feel as though his soul was burning in the unearthly fires of Hell. It didn’t feel wrong, or traumatising, or like the death he never thought he could know as an immortal but for that.

It felt like coming home.

And so he said, soft, and gentle, and right, “Yes, my dear. You do.”

Crowley sat and stared at him with pure awe on his face. In all the years he’d known him, Aziraphale had never seen that expression before, and had never thought to see it either.

But in this moment, with adoration carved into his features as if by God herself, the candlelight gilding him with a radiant warmth, Aziraphale knew, somehow, that this was how Crowley had looked when he’d painted the stars onto the empty canvas of the night sky.

And he knew, with just as much inexplicable certainty, that that was where he belonged.

Aziraphale was never conscious of moving. He never gave his body instructions to go to Crowley. Yet suddenly, he was there, right beside him, Crowley’s face cradled gently, so gently, in his hands.

And he knew, with a deep, absolute certainty that radiated from his soul, that this was where he belonged.

How absurd, for an angel to belong with a demon. But it wasn’t absurd at all. It was right. Neither could exist without the other. That was the fundamental truth of good and evil. You couldn’t have one without the other. Two sides of the same coin, so to speak. They were both wholly necessary to the other’s existence. They had been for six thousand years and, Aziraphale felt quite certain, would continue to be for another six thousand.

The ball of his thumb traced lightly over the smooth angle of Crowley’s cheekbone, like a sculptor marvelling at his life’s greatest achievement.

And it was.

Six thousand years this moment had been in the making. For six thousand years, every breath they had drawn, every step they had taken, every word that had slipped past their lips had done so to bring them here.

They had carved this moment out from a universe that had never wanted it. With blood, and sweat, and tears, they had made it happen anyway.

Six thousand years.

Six thousand years for a single touch.

It was worth it.

Every single, interminable, ineffable second was worth it for this moment. To be able to touch him like this, skin against skin, their truths laid bare at last, their hearts held out in their hands. It felt rather as though his soul had just brushed against Crowley’s soul, in the most perfect collision since the Creation.

Aziraphale was an angel. He had been made from Heaven, made by God’s own hands, an instrument of Her will, a sliver of her own self.

But not until this moment had he truly understood the meaning of divinity.

“Angel,” Crowley murmured, sounding quite drunk, though he’d barely had a single glass of wine, “I can taste what you had for lunch right now. That better mean you’re about to kiss me.”

Aziraphale huffed out a laugh and shook his head, a smile blossoming across his lips, “You are incorrigible, you know.”

“Demon,” Crowley reminded him in a low hiss, baring his teeth in a terrible grin that immediately made Aziraphale want to kiss it off his stupid handsome face.

“Yes, you are,” Aziraphale agreed, fondly, thumb gently stroking his face. “But I am an angel, and must remember my manners. So, yes, I fully intended to kiss you, my dear, but I had to ask your permission first.”

Crowley let out a soft groan, “You have it,” he breathed, “By everything holy and damned, you have it, angel.”

So Aziraphale kissed him.

Contrary to popular belief, the world did not stand still the moment their lips met. Explosions did not take place within their chests, or their hearts, or their souls. Or anywhere else for that matter. And a choir of heavenly angels did not descend from above to serenade them, which would have been wholly inappropriate, anyway.

What did happen, was two wandering souls that had been lost for a very long time, finally found their way home.

After a long time, or, perhaps, no time at all, Aziraphale was never very sure, they drew apart.

What he was sure of was that Crowley smiled at him when they did, and said, “To us?”

And Aziraphale smiled right back and breathed, reverently, “To us,” before Crowley kissed him again.

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

[thelastarchangelaskblog]

Rhodey & Zira (and Tony)

We have a ton of RPs in the Discord channel. I’m going to do my best in my copious amounts of free time to clean them up and drop them here since this campaign is turning out to be as much of a story as actual in-person gaming!

This one is an older RP that we did that I wasn’t yet able to clean up, but it’s here now.

Tony & Zira’s Chat

Tony & Rhodey’s Chat

Tony & Rhodey Compile a List

The Trouble with Two Tonys

**

(Read more.)

(There is a small, injured bird on the ground. It seems distressed, and its wing is bent strangely, and Zira is slowly creeping towards it)

(Tony has crept along behind Rhodey and is gesturing to him to just go ahead and that he will stay here and do something else that is not listening in)

(Rhodey was approaching Zira, but pauses uncertainly when he sees the bird she's going for)

(He rolls his eyes at Tony)

(Tony shrugs his shoulders and flaps at Rhodey to continue)

(Rhodey hesitantly starts forward, doing his best not to be quiet, but not startling either)

Rhodey: Hey, Zira, what you doing?

(Her head whips around and she relaxes slightly, realizing it’s just Rhodey)

Zira: I don’t know what to do!

(Tony settles against a tree and pulls out his bag of tools, pretending to do something with them.)

Rhodey: Is the bird hurt? Do you want to help it?

Zira: Yes! I know so little about birds though, and I don’t want to hurt it more.

Rhodey: Would you like help? I don't know much about birds, but I'm okay when it comes to patching injuries.

Zira: I’m certified in fixing people, not birds. I’m assuming we'd need to set the wing, and make sure this bird is somewhere safe and warm while it recovers, but I’m worried that that might scare it to death. I saw a bird die after someone picked I up. I don’t know what killed it, the fear or the fact that she snapped its neck. I don’t wanna be like her.

(Rhodey moves over to Zira and kneels next to her and the bird) 

Rhodey: Whoa, easy, Zira, take a deep breath; it's alright. We can help it.

(Zira hunches over and shifts a bit away, but still near the bird)

Zira: We can?

Rhodey: Yeah, here: let me try something.

Zira: :o?

(Rhodey reaches out slowly to the distressed bird and, upon brushing its wing, uses Lay on Hands to heal it)

(The bird peeps in surprise as its wing pops back into shape. It lies there for a few moments, then shakes itself and flaps the wing to test it. It hops a few steps forward, then flies off)

Zira: :O!! You’re a healer!

Rhodey: I can do a little, yeah.

Zira: That’s amazing! What spell was that? Is there a specific source you draw your power from or is it innate? And you could assist me in caring for fake Tony! He’s a bird, too, and I would hate to hurt him.

(Tony is still messing around with his tools, listening in on the conversation while pretending not to. He smiles at hearing Zira call Bob "Fake Tony")

Rhodey: That was called Lay on Hands. I don't think it's a spell exactly-- It comes from being a paladin. I draw power from my goddess, the Lawbearer. And I'm always happy to help people. It's what I like best.

Zira: The lawbearer, that’s amazing. Is she like the archetypal lawful good enforcer of the pantheon? I’m guessing she’s probably one of the more major players. And I think I like helping, too. (she smiles kind of uncertainly)

Rhodey: Yeah, Erathis-- sorry, that's her name-- is about the good of civilization and community. She... well. (he rubs his neck nervously) She, and the friend who introduced me to her... they saved me.

Rhodey: And that's great, Zira, helping can be really rewarding.

Zira: They were right to save you. You seem to have a lot of useful skills. (she pauses, uncertain) ...But that’s not what... matters? Because people derive worth from...something I can’t seem to get a hold of.

Rhodey: (he smiles) Thank you, Zira, I like to think that I can be useful, but I get what you mean. People... Everyone has different things that they value.

Zira: And they deserve presents and kindness even if they aren’t useful or earned it (she pulls out a piece of chocolate and holds it out to Rhodey)

Rhodey: Yes, everyone is worth kindness. (He startles a bit, then smiles at her) Oh, uh, thank you, Zira. (He accepts it)

Zira: And, uh, I’m really glad you didn’t kill that bird. I, uh, I was very weak when Asher snapped the other one’s neck and displayed. Emotions. That simply hinder. Which I should not have done.

Rhodey: (blinks at her, looking up from the present) Oh, that's... I'm sorry Zira, that can't have been pleasant to watch

Rhodey: What? Emotion... Zira… Emotions are beautiful. They can hurt so much, but they're beautiful too

Zira: They don’t seem like it. Theyre weak points and they hurt so much. Even if you feel good for a little while it never lasts. It never lasts.

Rhodey: I know, they can. And it can definitely seem like that... Uh. Would you be willing to sit down with me for a bit?

Zira: I... Sure

(Rhodey leads them over to a log a little ways away)

(Zira follows, a bit wary)

(Once they sit down) Rhodey (slightly nervous): Would it be right to say that you've lost someone you care about?

Zira: I did not lose them. I left them. The fault was entirely mine

Rhodey: (gives her a considering look) Were you in danger?

Zira: Danger is a constant. And at the moment, I should have been fine. There was no great fight or threats at that moment. I just. Couldn't...stay there.

Rhodey: I'm not gonna pry, but It sounds like it wasn't a happy place, and that leaving made you safer, right? At least, you're safer now?

Zira: I don’t know. If my betrayal is discovered, which it doubtlessly has been, I will be hunted and brought in, dead or alive.

Rhodey: (looks very concerned and hiding anger at these unknown people) Well, I can say with great certainty that these people you've found now? Me, Tony, the others? We're gonna help you.

Zira: I’m not sure if you can, but it’s very kind of you to offer, and I apologize for dragging you into this.

Rhodey: (sighs, and runs a hand over his hair) I'm bad at this. Look, I'm just going to share something, if that's all right.

Zira: They won’t hurt you if you don’t interfere. What is it?

Rhodey: Ok. So, DJ and Tony know this bit. I used to be a soldier. And, well, it wasn't the most pleasant, but we managed to help people and I liked that bit of the job

Zira: I could have been considered a soldier as well. But we never helped people.

Rhodey: Well, we certainly did some things I hated and I never want to do again, but we were mostly...seeking out people who hurt others.But, anyway, I had a friend. He, well, he was the one who introduced me to Erathis. A few years before my contract with the army was up, we got in over our heads. I had to duck out with a few others to get reinforcements, and by the time we got back... Well.

Rhodey: What I'm trying to say...is I understand what it's like to lose someone? No. No.. Still not good at this.

Zira: But you came back. You are not a traitor, you are not weak.

Rhodey: Once I was strong enough. I didn't come back right away--- I got help

Zira: I am going to say something very bad. I don’t want to go back. I don’t want to help them. Meri is the only one there with a chance of being good and they broke her. I’m sorry.

Rhodey: Well, to be frank here, I volunteered to be a soldier, to put my life on the line. I get the feeling fighting is the last thing you want to do-- you like helping people, right? Maybe, like with that bird, healing?

Zira: I want to help. I want to help more than anything.

Rhodey: There are so many ways you can help people. So many ways. And every single one is valid. I hope to learn a more powerful healing spell soon. Maybe... we could learn it together?

Zira: I don’t know how I can help anyone like this. I ran and I’m still running. I stitched Meri back together but I couldn’t fix her. I can only provide a hollow imitation of what is meant to be. I feel you would be a great healer. You have been brave, and good.

Rhodey: I think a lot of us in this group are running. That...doesn't make it bad. You can see a lot of interesting things while you're running. And I think you would be a great healer too. Zira, you are very kind. You may not know everything about the way the world works, but you want to help. You wanted to help that bird. That... that kindness is the most important thing for a healer.

Zira: I...guess. They always called it weakness.

Rhodey: Have you found them to be wrong about other things?

Zira: I received a...sign, that many of the things they did were bad, and wrong, but I’m still untangling the depths to which that reaches.

Rhodey: That's fair. Can you believe me if I say kindness is a strength? It takes strength to maintain it despite the world, and it takes strength to give it despite your fears.

Zira: I want to. That seems better than anything I've learned. Except for maybe presents and candy. Those are pretty great

Rhodey: Chocolate is awesome, isn't it?

Zira: It IS! Tony gave me SO MUCH and I LOVE IT!

Rhodey: (smiles, glances back at Tony) Yeah?

(Tony is deliberately not looking at them, but he's listening.)

Rhodey: That's really great.

Zira: It really is.

Rhodey: (holds up piece Zira gave him) Thanks for this, by the way.

Zira: People get presents for being people, not for doing anything, which is kinda weird. Lots of things are weird.

Rhodey: A lot of the best things are weird, just like people.

Zira: Like most bugs. And candy. And the idea the kindness is strength.

Rhodey: I'm not fond of bugs, but I can get behind those other ones.

Zira: But I think I like weird things. They seem a lot nicer than what i learned. Like you! Creda was training to be a paladin, but she wasn’t very nice.

Rhodey: If you ever want to talk about weird stuff, I'd love to listen. I'm not great with the talking but I love listening. I'm glad you like me; I like you, Zira

Zira: :D Everyone is so nice here.

Rhodey: We do our best, I think.

Zira: Creda hated listening so it’s weird that you like it but it makes sense because there is always variety within a group but it’s still new and I think I like you, too. And you’re friends with Tony and he doesn’t seem like he’d be friends with someone bad.

Rhodey: Tony does have pretty good taste.

Zira: Especially in candy :D

Rhodey: Even if the people he likes occasionally blow stuff up on accident or stick their feet in their mouths.

Zira: Oh my gosh.

Rhodey: Yeah-- definitely in candy.

Zira: Guess what he told me??

Rhodey: What?

Zira: DJ’S NAME STANDS FOR DUMMY JR

Rhodey: (chokes on his own breath, and holds in a chuckle) Did he, now? I don't think I knew that.

Zira: He DID and said that dj would deny it but I really want to think it’s true because that is hilarious.

Rhodey: Honestly, anything could be true with those two, and at this point I've given up trying to figure out what's what.

Zira: There are so many secrets waiting to be found out here. That is very exciting.

Rhodey: Do you like puzzles and mysteries?

Zira: Like I know that you’re avoiding talking at length about what you did as a soldier because you’re ashamed and Tony is running from something just like me, and Bob definitely has a reason for the name changes that goes beyond any sort of physical damage. And luna is hiding something but I can’t figure out what. But I will. Thats what I’m good at.

Rhodey: You're pretty astute when it comes to reading people, aren't you?

Zira: I’ve always been good at information gathering. And people are the greatest mystery of them all. So I have to collect a lot of data to crack the secret.

Rhodey: Oh, boy, aren't they. People are messy and complicated

Zira: Yeah. I’m working on it, though. But we should probably go divvy up shifts for tonight.

Rhodey: Good idea. Thank you for talking with me, Zira, and let me know if you decide you want to learn some healing with me. It'd be nice to have a healing buddy

Zira: Healing buddies!

Rhodey: Yeah. (He smiles) Healing buddies

(Zira beams at Rhodey, gets up, and almost skips away)

(And as she passes Tony)

Zira: Hi, Tony!

(Tony drops tools)

Tony: Ah-

Zira: You should work on your subtlety a little more perhaps! It was very easy to tell you were there.

(Rhodey cackles to himself on the log)

Tony: ...ha? Sure.

Zira: It’s okay, though! We all start somewhere!

Zira: :D

Tony: ...That we do. I'm gonna...go over there. (gestures to Rhodey)

(Rhodey is still laughing his ass off)

Tony: You have a good time, though?

Zira: Of course! You, too!

(Tony waves to Zira, picks up his tools, and then goes to Rhodey.)

Tony: Shut up

Rhodey: Never (through laughter) that was great.

Tony: Ha ha, laugh it up.

Rhodey: Oh, I will (eventually settles himself) I will.

(Tony shoves at Rhodey, sits down on log)

Tony: So.

Rhodey: So.

Tony: That happened. You did good.

Rhodey: Ha, I don't know about that. I really put my foot in it a few times.

Tony: I probably did, too. It's not easy.

Rhodey: We haven't known her long, but it still really hurts to see her in pain-- emotional pain in this case, I guess. I wish I could help more.

Tony: Sometimes...waiting's all you can do. Waiting and pointing out the small things. She has to take those steps herself. We can just give her a small map

Rhodey: Yeah. And at least I can listen. I'm quite good at that.

Tony: That you are, that you are, buddy. You are very good at the strong and silent type.

Rhodey: Uh, thanks, Tony.

Tony: :3

Rhodey: Alright, enough of all that. We should go be useful with camp.

Tony: We should. And, uh...any ideas on last names? Or should we just sneak in a list into her pack.

Rhodey: Shoot. I forgot about that. A list might be a good idea.

Tony: Let's both come up with something.

Rhodey: Pool our resources.

Tony: Should we sign it? Because if she just finds a weird list of names in her bag...

Rhodey: I mean, that's a good point, but maybe she'll like the mystery of figuring out who gave her it?

Tony: ...point. Let's just make it super obvious it's from friends

Rhodey: Good plan

Tony: I'll write it down; you give me a list of names. I'll copy someone's handwriting...

Rhodey: (smiles and shakes his head) All right. I'll get to thinking and let you know when I have something.

Tony: You do that.

(Tony stares into forest)

Tony: ...I can't believe how messed up some people are.

(Rhodey claps Tony on the back) 

Rhodey: Well, i don't know. Maybe that's just the way of the world. Maybe everyone's messed up and we just can't see it

Tony: ...It shouldn't be.

Rhodey: Yeah. We can all do our best to make it a better place.

Tony: (turns to Rhodey, grinning brightly) Exactly. All we can do. And maybe one day it'll get better.

Rhodey: Yes, exactly. (stands up and brushes clothes off) Alright now, we really need to go help everyone else.

Tony: Yeah, yeah. Let's go do it, bird whisperer.

(Rhodey punches his shoulder) 

Rhodey: Well, I certainly didn't quibble half of last night with our resident bird.

Tony: Quibble? Quibble? There was no quibbling involved! It was a very serious discussion on names!

Rhodey: (starts walking off and calls over his shoulder) Definitely a quibble!

Tony: Not a quibble!

(Rhodey's totally doing this just to rub Tony wrong)

(Tony knows Rhodey is riling him up.)

(Tony continues muttering under his breath, gathering up his tools.)

Tony: Tony, Tony, Tony.  It was my name first. And I should definitely get better at stealth...

(Rhodey laughs to self and goes to help with the fire and food or whatever.

(Tony goes off with a sheet of paper and his tools.)

[intheyear39]

Fleece Blanket (Joe Mazzello x Reader)

Title: Fleece Blanket (Joe Mazzello x Reader) Genre: Romance / Fluff Rating: PG for a bit of swearing and references to sex (though not really?) Length: 2204 words Summary: Joe invites you to a movie marathon in his house. Yes. A/N: Um, I know this is no excuse, but I haven’t written a proper fic in years so please bear with me. I wrote this thanks to my Queenie Discord peeps <3 I love y’all!

You just got home from work, and it hadn’t been a good day, at all. As you put the keys on their usual place, all you wanted at this moment was to lie down on the bed and never get up.

You didn’t have the mood to do anything else. But as if on cue, your phone rang.

“Hello?” You answered as soon as you saw the name “Joe Mazzello” appear on the phone. You always answered his calls.

“Hey, I’m free tonight, want to come over?”

Joe’s voice sounded tired, but a bit excited for some reason. You always admired that about him – he could be enthusiastic regardless of how exhausted he was. Sometimes you wished you could be just like him, even just the enthused part.

You then looked at your watch. 8:00 PM.

You liked Joe, you really did, but you weren’t about to brave the rush hour traffic on a Thursday night. You’d already had enough bullshit for this week. But before you could answer, he piped in quickly–

“I’m on the way now, don’t worry. See, I’m already suffering on your behalf.” You could hear his little smirk coming on.

“You’re coming here?” You smirked as well, naturally. “I thought you wanted me to come over?”

“Oh, you’re still coming over,” he sounded adamant. “I’m just picking you up.”

“Are you kid—”

“Oh and pack enough things for a night’s stay.”

You were taken aback. What did he mean by ‘a night’s stay’?

“We’re marathoning the Star Wars sequels!” He never waited for you to react. “And by that, I mean the old sequels. So, you know, we’re definitely pulling an all-nighter.”

You didn’t say anything, because you liked Star Wars and had seen the movies, but also, there was the fact that you needed to sleep tonight because you’re tired and you still had to go to work tomorrow. Despite that, he had already made the effort of picking you up. The least you could do was indulge the man.

Then again, you knew you’d always indulged him.

A sigh finally came out. “Fine, but you’ll have to feed me and shit.”

“Feed you shit?” he chuckled.

“You know what I mean.” You rolled your eyes even though he couldn’t see it; you knew he heard it.

“Okay, I’ll order pizza, how about that? Or, better yet, we’ll order as soon as we get back on the road.”

“So long as I don’t have to cook.”

“Alright! I’ll see you in a bit!” And then he started to sing the Star Wars theme a little too loudly, which, you had to admit, was pretty goofy and adorable. A perfect summary of Joe.

You giggled before he said goodbye and hung up. Maybe this night wasn’t as bad as you’d thought it’d be.

---

When he got to your house, he’d brought beer and you asked him, “Why are you bringing alcohol here?” He answered that it was your stash, and that he was going to leave it in your house since he didn’t want any cops asking him if he’s drunk on the way back. He had learned over time that it hadn’t been easy to convince them that he hadn’t been drinking, even if it had been the truth.

---

On the way to his place, in his car, Joe kept blasting Queen songs in an attempt to cheer you up (unsurprisingly, it did help a lot). You could tell that him doing the movie really made him a Queen fanatic. In some weird way he also kept skipping back to Somebody To Love, and you didn’t know if he was being subtle or just really loved the song so damn much. Knowing Joe, you could never actually tell; it could have easily been both.

---

“Home sweet home!” He declared as he opened his front door into his living room. You soon followed, but then you found yourself walking straight past him and to the couch without any hesitation.

“Wow,” he raised his eyebrows. “You’re really excited for this all-nighter, huh.”

You stared daggers at him, as if to say it’s not that, I’m just really tired right now, but you didn’t want him to feel guilty. For all you knew, he was just as tired as you, and in spite of that, he wanted to spend his day with you. That obviously meant a lot.

He chuckled, because probably knew you didn’t mean it in any bad way. He plopped down next to you. Groaning so loudly, he eased his way closer to you and put his left arm behind you on the couch.

“Pizza’s gonna be here any moment.”

You nodded, now smiling. His body felt warm. And before you knew it, you were leaning your head on his shoulder. He scoffed, rather pleased, but didn’t say anything else.

You two stayed like this for a while, in complete silence. Funny thing was, it didn’t feel awkward at all. It was not only comfortable, but it was also comforting. You felt like you could be here forever, and you wouldn’t need anything else. You wouldn’t need anyone else.

The doorbell suddenly rang. Joe jumped up from the couch to get the door. You didn’t know whether to be happy or sad; the sweet moment had to end, and yet, you were also getting so hungry. What a weird dilemma to have, you thought.

You tried to linger in the leftover warmth. It was so intoxicating that at one point you couldn’t hear Joe clearly as he talked to the pizza guy – it was as if the world had gone blurry because you were drowning in it.

“You alright?”

He woke you up from the trance, his face showing a smile but his voice sounding concerned.

“Y-Yeah,” you felt your cheeks become flushed and you tried to hide it, but you were failing. You had to make an excuse. “Sorry, this week’s just been terrible and—”

“I know,” he assured. “We both could use a break.”

“Tell me about it,” you scoffed. He chuckled again, this time a little more encouraging than joking.

“Hey, Joe?”

“Yeah?” He put down the pizza on the coffee table without looking at you.

“Is your place usually this cold?”

He laughed, “It is, sorry. That’s why I keep fleece blankets everywhere. Speaking of, where is the one for the living room? I just washed it this morning...”

His voice trailed off as he walked out of the room. You heard things being scrambled around, and then—

“Shit!”

Alarmed, you called out to him, “Joe, are you okay?!”

“Yeah, yeah – I just... fuck, my dryer’s broken.” You couldn’t see him, but you could hear how disappointed he was. “I’ll find you another one.”

“No, it’s fine,” you said, embarrassed. He’s doing an awful lot of things for you today, and you couldn’t help but feel happy. Funny, right?

“No, no,” he emerged back from the laundry area. He sighed, “Unfortunately I don’t have any more extras, so I’ll just get you the one from my bedroom.”

You just nodded. Joe spoiling you wasn’t surprising, but somehow, it always felt special.

“Here,” he handed you a red and green plaid fleece blanket. “It smells like me, so I apologize in advance. I’ve only used it once though. And I shower every night before I go to bed, so technically it smells like newly-showered me.”

You smiled at him, “Thank you, Joe.”

“You’re welcome. You want anything to drink? I have leftover beer, well, not leftover opened beer, that’s just gross, but yes, the ones I didn’t give you, I have some here.”

“Sure.” You thought he’s cute when he rambled, and this was no exception. “Stale beer sucks.”

“Right?!” He was clearly worked up about it. “I’ll be right back.”

“Okay.”

In the meantime, you opened the pizza box and took a slice. As you bit a part of it, you could hear him opening two bottles as indicated by the fizzes. He came back a couple of minutes later.

“Man, you weren’t kidding when you said you were hungry.”

“Shutuff,” was all you could mumble with pizza in your mouth.

He laughed heartily, and that made your heart skip a beat. Why is he so goddamn adorable?

“I feel like this is too much of a foreplay—”

What?

“ —for a Star Wars marathon.”

You almost choked.

“Huh, what?” He was confused. And then he realized what he had said, and he suddenly turned red. “I-I mean... It was a joke. Y-You know what I mean.”

You gave him a look along the lines of “I do?” but he was already busy setting up his TV and his Blu-ray player. “Okay, first up, New Hope.”

He came back around to sit down. You were already under the fleece blanket, so he tried to tuck himself beside you. He put his left arm again where he previously had. “Ready?”

“Mmhmm.”

---

It surely wasn’t Joe’s fault, nor was it Star Wars’, but about forty minutes in, your eyes started to close on their own. Maybe it’s the beer? Food coma from the pizza? Or maybe you’re really just tired.

Never in your life had you tried so hard to keep watching, but your eyes just wouldn’t cooperate right now.

The last thing you felt was your head on Joe’s shoulder, and that familiar warmth. If you were to be honest, there’s no better way to fall asleep than this.

---

You woke up. You were still on the couch, but now you were lying down, still covered in that lovely blanket that had Joe’s subtle scent in it. It was still dark outside. The lights were off, except for a faint light coming from behind the couch. You looked at your watch: It’s a little past midnight, so you couldn’t have slept for that long. The TV was still on, but it’s just the New Hope Blu-ray menu screen playing over and over.

You realized at this point that you had slept for more than an hour. A sudden pang of guilt washed over your body, and even more so when you heard the clattering in the kitchen.

You got up and realized that the faint light came from the kitchen. You let out a soft cough to see if he could hear you. Just more clattering.

“Joe?”

“Mm? Oh, sorry! Did I wake you?” He approached you from the kitchen, wiping a glass dry before putting it down on the coffee table.

You shook your head, “No, I just... sorry, I fell asleep.”

An overjoyed smile emerged from his face. “You were tired. That’s why I picked a movie you’ve already watched, so you could sleep through it if you couldn’t help it anymore. Besides, I have evidence.”

Your jaw dropped. “Evidence... of what?”

“Relax,” he chuckled as he put out his phone. “This is just between us, I promise.”

He showed you his phone as a video started playing. In the video, his voice started to narrate over the footage.

“This, this is how you look like when you’re asleep. Wait, it’s a little difficult at this angle... And my arm is starting to fall asleep too...”

The camera stopped moving, and he directed it at his face instead.

“This is a little creepy, huh. I know. But you’re just so cute and I couldn’t help myself. I thought it’d be funny at first, but I guess the joke’s on me. I drag you all the way here, to make you spend the night with me, and while we’re sitting together, all this time, I kept thinking how I should tell you.”

You looked at Joe in real life – he had an embarrassed smile on as he tried to avoid your gaze.

The video went on: He sighed, “It’s really hard, you know. I think... I think I’m in love with you. That’s it. That’s all I have to say.”

The video ended. Joe let out a huge sigh, his head down.

You were speechless yourself. But you had to say something. “I-I don’t know if this is still a joke or not—”

He shook his head, still looking down. “Nope, not a joke.”

You couldn’t believe it. All this time, you’d always thought that he didn’t feel the same. All this time, you thought he’d just been leading you on. All this time, you thought you’d been the only one who was in love.

You couldn’t help but smile. It was too much to bottle up. “I think, I think I’m in love with you too.”

He sighed, smiling – it was probably as much as relief for him as it was for you – and his eyes got teary.

He skipped and plopped down beside you for the third time tonight. It startled you a bit. He finally leaned in for a kiss.

Naturally, you kissed him back.

His warmth – from his arms, to his body, to his lips – it’s all very intoxicating, just like his scent was. You knew it wouldn’t get old anytime soon.

“Come on,” he said as he pulled away. “Let’s go to bed.”

You nodded, because really, who could say no to Joe Mazzello?

END.

---

Comments are always welcome!

@39-volunteers-to-space @bburellina @struwburry @rogerisinlovewithhiscar @sneakydeakyy @m-idnightsky

[criterioncollectionashaiku]

Criterion Collection as Haiku: Paris, Texas

I’ve seen over 250 movies in the Criterion Collection, and one of my all-time favorites has consistently been Wim Wenders’ 1984 film, Paris, Texas. The movie has popped up twice this week in very unexpected ways: once last night at a dinner with friends, and also on Reddit’s Criterion page, where someone linked to an essay by Nicky Smith called “The Emotional Terrorism of Paris, Texas.” Smith HATES Paris, Texas, and I’ll explain why shortly. Her essay has definitely changed the way I’ve thought about the world within the movie, but I’m here today to provide a different read — one that explains why I’ve loved it all these years.

Needless to say, major spoilers ahead. If you’ve never seen Paris, Texas and would like to view it tabula rasa, then stop reading and come back after you’ve had a chance to watch and digest it.

First, let’s start with a quick plot summary: The movie opens with Travis (played by Harry Dean Stanton) walking through a desert. He’s dressed in a dusty suit, a red cap, and an unkempt beard. We come to learn that Travis has been missing for four years. No one has heard from or seen him until, one day, his brother, Walt (Dean Stockwell), gets a call that Travis is at a doctor’s office in a remote part of Texas. Walt and his wife Anne (Aurore Clément) live in California, but upon hearing the news of his brother, Walt immediately drives to Texas. By the time he arrives, Travis has left the medical office and is roaming the desert once again. Walt searches aimlessly for Travis and eventually finds his brother.

Walt is full of questions, but Travis remains mostly silent. The two eventually make it back to Los Angeles, where Travis is reunited with his now seven-year-old son, Hunter (Hunter Carson), who for the past four years was raised by Walt and Anne. Hunter’s mom/Travis’ ex, Jane (Nastassja Kinski), left Hunter in Walt and Anne’s custody shortly after Travis left, and she’s had limited communication with Anne since then.

The first half of the movie is about Travis’ return to humanity — learning to reconnect with his son and brother and sister-in-law. He slowly becomes more communicative, although he’s largely silent on what happened between him and Jane.

The second half of the movie begins when Anne tells Travis that she thinks she knows where Jane is. For a year now, Jane has been making monthly deposits in a bank account under Hunter’s name that she asked Anne to open for her. These deposits always happen on the 5th of the month, and they’re always at a bank in Houston. Travis asks what day it is, and Anne says it’s the 1st of November.

Travis is determined to find Jane. When he tells Hunter this, Hunter says he wants to come along, too. Even though Travis knows Walt and Anne wouldn’t approve, he picks Hunter up from school and the two drive to Houston to find Jane.

They spot her at the bank Anne mentioned and follow her to a peep show club. Travis leaves Hunter in the car, then goes into the club to confirm that Jane does, indeed, work there. The next day he leaves Hunter in a hotel room and goes to the club for the climactic scene between Travis and Jane. Because it’s a peep show, the glass in the room is one-way: Travis, as the customer, can see Jane, but Jane can’t see Travis. All communications is done through a telephone on Travis’ side of the mirror and an intercom on Jane’s side. Travis tells a story in the third-person that’s actually their story: a story of a man and a woman in love, but the guy gets jealous and possessive. One day the woman says she’s pregnant, and things are okay for a while, but then once the baby is born the mother has postpartum depression, and the two start fighting more and more. The guy starts drinking and becoming abusive; the breaking point is one night when he catches the woman trying to escape, and he ties her to the stove. He goes back to sleep and wakes up to their trailer engulfed in flames, the woman and the son gone.

At this point, the conversation flips. Travis shines the light in his face so that Jane can see him, but he can’t see her. She has a monologue about how she couldn’t care for Hunter by herself, that she had an emptiness inside her. And even though she loved Hunter, it hurt to talk to Anne about the boy, so Jane stopped calling. She also played out conversations in her mind between herself and Travis, all the things she’d say, but since Travis disappeared she eventually moved on. Travis tells Jane where Hunter is, and the movie ends with Jane and Hunter embracing while Travis watches them from the top of a parking garage across the street before he drives off into the night.

Whew. Okay, so that summary was a little bit longer than I expected. But I wanted to lay out some of the key points that I’ll get to in a bit. Before that, let me summarize Nicky Smith’s argument about why she hates Paris, Texas. Her critique is with the second half of the movie, when Travis kidnaps Hunter to go to Texas. The crux of the matter is that we don’t ever see Walt and Anne again, and thus we don’t witness the deeply hurtful emotional turmoil they’re going through. Moreover, the climactic scene between Travis and Jane, Smith argues, is problematic. “What’s criminal and irresponsible,” she writes, “is shown as heart-warming and fun.” She views Travis’ monologue as valorization of his actions, completely whitewashing his atrocious behavior.

I have a very different read on these points. Because for me, what I love about Paris, Texas, is the structural reversal of traditional story arcs. This is not a redemption story. We don’t start with a character we dislike whom we grow to like (or at least empathize with). The example I’m thinking of here is Citizen Kane, a movie I absolutely hated when I saw it in high school. I couldn’t get over how much of an asshole Orson Welles’ character, Charles Foster Kane, was. But I rewatched it maybe five or six years ago and had a slightly different take. I still think Kane is a piece of shit, yet isn’t the whole “twist” that Rosebud is his childhood sled supposed to be humanizing? It’s an element to make him appear more gentle, to get us to feel for this horribly despicable character.

Paris, Texas does the opposite. Here, we start with an inherently relatable character. Casting Harry Dean Stanton as Travis was a genius move, because Staton’s face — especially when rugged and sunburned — is one that conveys sadness. He seems so gentle and quiet, so hurt and broken that we, as the audience, are drawn to him. The film’s grammar tells us that Travis is our protagonist, and by virtue of being the protagonist we give him the benefit of the doubt that he’s a Good Guy.

But this isn’t true at all — Travis is horrible. He’s abusive and emotionally manipulative, as we learn in the scene between him and Jane. I don’t view Travis’ monologue as in any way valorizing his actions or whitewashing over them. Instead, this is a deeply affecting moment of reckoning — not of Jane to Travis (who has had plenty of time to do so already), but of the viewer to Travis. We have to come to terms that this person we’ve followed for the past two hours was (is?) a monster. This isn’t redemption because the movie never full exonerates Travis. I had to put the “is?” in parentheses a sentence ago because I’m not sure myself how much Travis has changed. I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, but he hasn’t fully earned it.

Take Smith’s example of kidnapping. That is, indeed, a supremely fucked up thing Travis does. I’m not going to try to excuse that behavior, but I do think Travis’ actions aren’t quite as nefarious as Smith depicts. In the scene when Travis and Hunter are driving after Hunter cuts out of school early, Hunter says he wants to come along to find Jane. Travis responds, “What about Walt and Anne?” because he’s aware of how this is going to affect them.

A few hours later, when they’ve reached San Bernardino, Travis has Hunter call Walt and Anne from a payphone. And here’s where we DO see Walt and Anne’s emotional turmoil. Walt is borderline angry at Hunter for not being home yet, and once they find out Travis is taking Hunter to Texas, Anne sobs. This is the last time we see them in the movie, and I argue that it’s the perfect way to hint at their devastation without turning it into a melodrama. Immediately after the call, Travis reiterates that Hunter can go home any time he wants — just say the word, and they’ll turn around.

The subsequent scenes of Travis and Hunter making their way to Texas aren’t some feel-good buddy road movie — at least not in my opinion. Most of their travel is in darkness, notably how they have to sleep in a laundromat because Travis can’t afford (or doesn’t choose to make?) a hotel reservation. This is foreshadowing of Travis’ more reckless side, the part of him we’ll soon learn when he talks with Jane.

Also, returning to Anne and Walt for a second: the fact that the road trip sequence follows the call from the payphone highlights their absence rather than disregards it, at least to me. The way a musical motif can establish a mood for a scene, Walt and Anne’s distraught conversation hangs over the subsequent scenes like an air of discord.

As I said before, one of my favorite parts of Paris, Texas is the structural reversals. I’ve already mentioned Travis’ arc from sympathetic to unsympathetic, but I’d like to point out a couple more. First, Jane. Our view of her changes as the movie progresses, one that’s an inverse of Travis’: I think the movie tries to get you to dislike her from the beginning, only to side with her in the end. Although both Travis and Jane are absent parents, I feel like there’s more tacit blame placed on Jane. One example is during a scene when Walt projects home movies onto a screen. Here we see Travis and Jane and Hunter on a trip to the beach with Anne and Walter. Everyone appears happy, the way we’re told to smile for photographs. Of course, knowing what we know of Travis by the end of the film, this is more Jane pretending that everything is calm and good. However, upon a first viewing, when seen through Travis’ eyes, here we see a woman who has left her family and continues to be missing. How could she be so cold-hearted???

But of course she’s not cold-hearted. She’s anything but. Jane cares so deeply for Hunter that it hurts her too much to hear about his growth and development during those conversations with Anne on the phone. She’s flawed, too, of course, which is what I love about this movie — no one is perfect. Everyone is complicated. But here, in the case of Jane, we grow to empathize with her the more we learn about her story. As our opinion of Travis diminishes, our view of Jane seesaws upward. She is a survivor of domestic abuse and a mother who never really got to raise her son because she thought she was doing what was best for Hunter.

And here’s another one of those narrative reversals: while most stories clunkily reveal exposition at the beginning of the movie, here the exposition is crammed into the last 20 minutes. We learn more about these characters in the end than we do in the whole two hours prior. In that way, the exposition becomes a twist — and not a gotcha twist like The Sixth Sense, but a genuinely disconcerting and unsettling twist.

Okay, one last example, and it has to do with Travis. If the expected narrative arc is for a character to go from being lost to being found, this film does the opposite: it opens with Travis being found and ends with him lost, adrift in the night.

There are so many reasons I love Paris, Texas. The dialogue is honest, funny, raw. The cinematography is gorgeous — all the colors! Ry Cooder’s slide guitar score is unique and fitting. The acting is phenomenal (aside from Hunter, who is wooden, but he’s a child, so I’m not holding it against him). However, one aspect that I don’t think gets discussed enough is Paris, Texas’ narrative structural elements. There’s a lot to appreciate on the surface of this movie, but it should be no surprise — especially given the subject matter — that there’s way more going on underneath.

One-way glass prisms prisons of their past, pent-up penitence roamed free.

[bettinalevyisdetermined]

It’s been a long day. XD

As most of you know, the tweets that Toby Fox posted on his and Undertale’s Twitter accounts yesterday woke the whole Undertale fandom up and put everyone on the hype-train, including me. I felt fortunate enough to have the time I needed to record myself reading these tweets, edit myself to sound all spooky-like, and then make a good quality video I could be proud to post for Halloween.

I decided it would be fun to make this video my first experimantal run with YouTube’s new “premiere” feature, and because I believed Toby Fox’s 24 hour warning was at 8am (it was actually closer to 9am), I scheduled my video for a 7am upload... Which means I was up at 6:30, chilling and texting with the people who were sweet enough to wait for the premiere of my video. ^,^ It was so fun to see you guys reacting to it in real time! At one point there were about 100 people! I’d love to do another premiere in the future, but yeah, definitely at a more decent hour for me. >_>

But hey, even with my video premiere out of the way, there was STILL the mystery surprise that Toby Fox had promised. My mom was out of the house for the morning (and most of the afternoon), so I took myself and my laptop to the living room and got in a call with my Discord peeps. (Thanks @kana-tokisho and @elric-murphy for joining me!) I decided to record myself reacting to whatever the surprise would be, and HOW GLAD I WAS THAT I DID!

I read the tweets, I went to www.deltarune.com, I downloaded the thing, and expected it was going to be a short survey, or maybe some kind of game demo, similar to the Ruins portion of Undertale... how wrong I was...  Long story short (I don’t want to reveal any more details than I have to), I ended up recording about 5 straight hours of footage on my computer. 0_o (Well, I mean almost straight. A phone rang here, a move to the bedroom there, it was pretty much 5 hours out of my day.)

By the time I stopped recording myself, I felt like I’d run a marathon... but the day wasn’t over! The funny thing was, I’d skipped breakfast in order to play this thing, so I felt pretty weak and crazed, on top of not getting enough sleep. XD Plus I still had to work to do with my sister! (I should really share what I actually do for work besides YouTube with you guys at some point...) I’ll tell you, I had a pretty big feeling of whiplash, going from the world in the game to my regular life...

Have you ever had that feeling where you feel physically weakened, and you know you should be drained of all energy, but the gears in your head are too excited to care, and they’re spinning and humming nonstop with all the inifinite possibilities, and you can’t help but feel super happy?! I think that’s how I would describe it... Annette and I went out for a walk after a work, and I unleashed and unloaded all the things I’d seen and experienced to her (at least as much as I could describe), and that felt amazing... I’m really glad I had her to talk to. You don’t know HOW MUCH I want to discuss my thoughts and theories with you guys, but I feel that’s gonna to have to wait a day or two... Don’t want to spoil the experience for anyone else, after all...

So yeah, all this to say... It’s probably going to be a while before I’m able to tackle that 5 hour recording I made today... A part of me wants to work on it RIGHT NOW, but the smarter part says I should get an early night’s rest, to make up for all my lost sleep this morning... I’m gonna listen to that smarter part... but wouldn’t you know it, my mind is still reeling with the excitement for when it’ll be acceptable for me to make this into a proper gameplay series for you guys!!!

Oh yeah, and on top of that, I forgot that it’s Halloween! XD I finally saw the new Doctor Who episode with my brother and sister, the one with the spiders. It was the perfect thing to see for Halloween. ^_^ I hope you guys all had fun costuming, partying, trick or treating, and being in the spoopy mood today.

Until next time! Bettina out

[intelsought]

So here’s my thoughts on the whole kit ‘n caboodle, in no particular order of events. All under the cut so no spoilers for peeps.

-I’m terrible for being mildly sad that the big conspiracy theory on Sam Holt didn’t actually turn out to be true bc a lot of ppl who have me on Discord have seen me rant about it at some point between seasons four and five. But I’m still happy that the Holt family has some closure for now and I feel like both Pidge and Matt can truly give the war their all now because they know their father is safe and home with their mother and their mother knows that both of her kids are fighting the good fight and are still alive and well.

-The Garrison trio being hilarious children causing all kinds of trouble with the ‘fun’ sentry was a fucking blessing. I was in stitches during that whole scene tbh and I was so glad to see some of the kids get to be kids.

-PETITION TO BRING SLAV BACK

-I’m really glad we finally got a bit more insight on wtf is going on with Shiro, though I know we’re far from having the answers. My own personal opinion on what’s going on with him has altered based on this new information but that’d be a whole other post for another day. It was definitely startling to see Shiro going off on Lance and Allura like he did, but it’s also clear that even Shiro himself is aware something’s just not right right now.

-I always jokingly shipped Lotor and Allura but never put too much thought behind it simply bc of the lack of interaction, but holy Kaltenecker did this season slap us all in the face with this ship. My own personal opinion is that’s gonna be endgame for Allura now. The fact that she didn’t object to the notion of a political alliance marriage with Lotor early on in the season before they actually started spending time together didn’t escape my notice. Personally I ship that a lot more now.

-Mildly disappointed we saw no sign of that woman from the promo image that people couldn’t be sure if it was Allura or Romelle or who knows. Seemed kinda silly to blip introduce a character like that and not have them make an actual on-screen appearance but I won’t lose sleep over it.

-I’m starting to ship Punk a little bit more than I used to. I’d still have to really thoroughly explore it with a Hunk but all the adorable interactions between Hunk and Pidge this season helped water my crops esp since we didn’t get literally any Plance.

-The white lion concept surprised me because I had honestly believed that the white lion was an actual sixth lion Alfor made but had kept secret from everyone and could’ve been piloted by someone. Since we’d seen teaser images of Keith back in his Paladin armor I’d thought that meant the White Lion would officially join the lion lineup and the Paladin’s would’ve gone back to their original lion setup but ah well. Seems we’ll see Keith possibly back in Red next season.

-Lotor’s ladies, I fucking love them. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk on them.

-And the last thing I can think of, the bombshell none of us had seen coming: Keith’s mom. Holy crap. As a Keith RP’er myself I was shook and my muse is honestly in a state where he genuinely doesn’t know how to feel about all this. I kinda wish we’d gotten a bit more screen time with her just to get another answer or two about some of the burning questions we’ve had about her since we found out, but I won’t lose sleep over it because I know we’ll get answers in due time. I laughed at Keith’s blond moment figuring out she was his mom seriously Keith she used your blade and you watched it transform in front of you what more proof did you need after knowing it was given to your dad by her. It was a tiny bit cliche how we got introduced to her but you can’t please everyone. I’m not unhappy with how we met her. As a Keith mun, I’m fucking ecstatic to finally fill in some of those gap of his backstory we knew literally nothing about. Plus the fact that he looks like her made me stupidly happy.

I think that’s everything at this point, I’m sure I forgot a thing or two given I’m running on two and a half hours sleep but I got the bulk of things I had thoughts on from this season. Knowing me I’ll rewatch some if not all of the season tonight after I get home.

[everythingbagels]

Reiki Panda Owner, Panda Hirabayashi Discuss His Work and Ways of Spreading Love, Joy and Positivity.

  Holly: Today we have with us Panda Hirabayashi, a Reiki Master, meditation teacher and soon to be yoga teacher here to discuss his work and ways of spreading love, joy and positivity. Panda: Hello, Holly! It’s an honor to be here! H: Welcome Panda. I thought The Reiki Panda was a very clever and cute business name and then, I realized your first name actually is Panda. Out of curiously, do you have any back story with your name or symbolism you would relate to the Panda and yourself and if so, how do those traits tie into your business model?   P: That’s actually kind of a funny story. My birth name isn’t Panda, it’s Jean-Luc. A couple of years ago, some friends and I were doing basic millennial things, scrolling through Instagram and looking at memes when we came across one with a panda. It read: “Don’t hate, be like a panda: black, white, and asian.” My racial background happens to be Japanese, black, hispanic, and French/euro-white (for whatever that’s worth..I’ve been in the United States my entire life, so I think claiming races is kind of arbitrary), so of course, one of my friends made the connection: “Hey, you’re a panda! Holy sh*t!” The name started out as a joke, and then I kind of adopted it and it stuck. I feel like it’s a perfect symbol for our times, though. To me, it showcases unity and (in a weird way) my heritage in a time where there is a lot of racial discord, and I think that’s important. I love my birth name (yes, my parents were Star Trek nerds and that’s how I got my name), but Panda seems to fit pretty well. As far as tying into my business model, I’m at a very interesting place. I’ve chosen to build a brand around myself and my message in an industry that is about taking care of other people. I know that my services can help increase the quality of someone’s life, but I also realize I have to get in front of their eyeballs first. Promoting yourself in an arena that is about healing/helping others is a very precarious balancing act, and I intend to walk that line by offering negotiable prices, trade exchanges (in the event someone doesn’t have the financial ability to use my services), and just always pledge to put people first. To me, healing or improving your life should never be about the amount of money you have. If you want to seriously take the steps to get in a good mindset and get your life on track, I’ll figure something out for you. I’m sure it’s weird coming from a business owner, but in my experience, putting profits over people never works out and it never feels good. I would much rather get a wonderful thank you note from someone who I truly helped instead of getting an $1000 check from them. One of those things will touch someone forever, the other is just gonna help me pay my rent. There’s a bigger picture here. H: Until I met you, I didn’t know that a Reiki Master could be trained in psychological techniques; can you explain what this means and how it benefits your clients? P: Admittedly, the “psychological techniques” have nothing to do with Reiki or meditation, although I’ve learned far more about psychology and people because of those modalities. I come from somewhat of an interesting background: I joined the Army National Guard at 19 (while I was still enrolled in college), I have 4 years of restaurant/bar management experience, and I’ve worked in the service industry in some capacity for 7 years overall. I’ve dealt with almost every type of person you can imagine in my time in the military, managing, and bartending. (For reference’s sake, I turn 26 in April). While the military did provide some body language and tactics skills classes, I actually say that I was trained in psychology because of my management experience. Believe it or not, when you have to deal with making a schedule for 50+ people, dealing with over-sharing drunks, shady co-workers, horrible bosses, and/or some really cool peeps, you learn how people tick. At this point, I can tell just by how someone is standing or looking whether or not they’re actually paying attention and absorbing the information I’m putting out. Based on that, I structure my approach to that person. In my mind, life is kind of a grand social experiment, and you’re constantly learning the patterns as you go along. There are so many different and beautiful kinds of people in the world, how could you not just want to learn more about everyone? To me, that’s really where the love and benefit is. I love seeing people succeed, it just makes me feel really good. You could call it almost selfish. So, to that end, to know how a person achieves success, you must understand what motivates them. With this understanding, you can engage them at their level. Talking down to someone never works, but if you meet them where they are, someone is much more likely to learn. Each person responds to outside stimuli differently, so you really have to take a unique approach to everyone you deal with. If you can’t get someone motivated or excited to learn a new skill, chances are, they aren’t going to learn it very well. You have to show people how something will benefit them before they commit, and there are a lot of psychological factors that play into that. I thank my blessings for my experiences in the military and the service industry. Without that exposure to a multitude of cultures, I definitely wouldn’t think like I do today. H: Besides this technique I’d like it if you could give us some background about how you got into Reiki, how it has improved your own life and what your clients get out of a session? P: Well, to give you a little background on my experience, I’m actually a relatively new Reiki Master; I was attuned to Reiki III/Master/Instructor in November 2017. I actually had a back injury and I was searching for holistic ways to attack the problem when I came across Reiki. Being Japanese myself and finding out it had Japanese roots immediately drew me to it. I found Caring Palms Massage and Reiki in Jacksonville Beach, FL , went for a couple of sessions, and saw immediate improvement in my back. I was sold. I signed up for Reiki I and received my first attunement in August 2017. If August-November sounds like an incredibly fast time to move up to level III, it’s because it is. My teacher, Brian Dean, explained to me that I was on an accelerated path. As almost anyone who is a light worker can tell you, there has been a massive shift in energy happening, and it’s my personal theory that the huge number of potent new light workers can be attributed to that. I did feel a little trepidation at first, you know, that maybe I had rushed it. Once again, Brian was there to reassure me: “If I didn’t want you to be here and the energy didn’t want you to be here, you wouldn’t be here.” With that in mind, I’ve been practicing Reiki daily on myself, family, friends, and anyone who is interested since. Reiki has been absolutely transformative to my life. Knowing that everyone and anyone has the ability to channel this healing power makes me that much more stoked to spread the word. ANYONE can do Reiki, and if someone tells you differently, they’re probably just after your money. I also realize that not everyone wants to learn this skill and that is totally okay. I’m more than happy to offer sessions for those who just want some of that good healing energy! (: After my sessions, my clients usually report feeling very relaxed, less stressed, blissful, and peaceful. Some report temperature changes in my hands (such as getting very hot) while I’m working on them, while others have said they felt “almost like a static electricity”. The experience differs for every person. H: I know you offer both hands-on Reiki and distant Reiki Healing sessions, can you tell us the difference between the two, your process in-person vs. over distance and, if there is ever a time that one is ideal over the other? P: Really, it comes down to convenience and belief. You mentioned psychology earlier; belief is a HUGE part of everything I do. If you don’t have confidence in me and what I’m doing, the healing WILL NOT be as effective. That may seem convenient, but if you think about it: that’s a rule of thumb for everything. How many times have you believed something bad was going to happen (possibly even for no reason), and it did? As humans, we are EXTREMELY powerful and that includes our thoughts. The power of negative belief is so overwhelming strong, it can interrupt how someone experiences healing. That being said, if someone believes a hands-on method will work better than the distance method, for that particular person, that will absolutely ring true because it is what they believe. Reiki energy is accepted or rejected on a soul level, so your mindset going into a healing session is extremely important. Personally, I like to start out with hands-on sessions, because to me, the proof is in the pudding. If I put my hands on you or show you how I channel energy, you’re gonna feel it, whether you believe in it or not. I’ve turned non-believers around just by having them sit down and putting my hands on their shoulders. Having that foundation of knowing it works lets someone be more accepting of distance healing. However, the nature of Reiki is that is works no matter the time, distance, or place; so I believe that it’s going to be extremely beneficial to you no matter what kind of session you choose. Also, it’s impossible for me to be everywhere at once, and I’m not currently in a position to travel for hands-on sessions, as much as I’d like to. I still want to help people, so I offer distance Reiki for the people I can’t get to in person. However, if someone wanted to offer a travel-for-Reiki swap, I’d totally be into that. :P As far as my methodology between the two, local Reiki is FAR more intimate and personal, so I take the time to make sure the other person is completely comfortable. With local sessions, I’m going to have my hands on you, so everything is going to be clean, comfortable, and professional. Because I’m working out of a mobile office at the moment, I’ve been performing sessions at people’s homes. In the very near future, I will have office space, but since I’m still starting out, I’m just rolling with it for now! Distance Reiki can performed anywhere at any time and doesn’t require the other person to be present. All I need is a picture, a name, and some quiet space and I can channel the healing energy over space and time. H: You also offer Reiki sessions ranging from 10 min. to over an hour; for someone considering Reiki, how would you advise they know how much time is needed to meet their needs? P: It’s entirely what you’re comfortable with. The 10 minute session is a nice little teaser and will get you acclimated with what it feels like if you’re new to it. As far as needs, it’s hard to say what someone will need until they’ve done at least a session or two. Reiki reacts differently with everyone, so some people can be completely taken care of in one session, while someone else may need 7 or 8 sessions. It’s all dependent on how the client feels. H: Besides providing Reiki services, you are also an instructor, can you tell us a little about the classes, who might want to pursue this and how they might get involved? P: Absolutely! So, Reiki is generally taught in at least 3 levels (usually written as I, II, and III), but it is important to note that there are several different schools of thought when it comes to Reiki. Much like any skill, everyone teaches it differently; there are variations like Holy Fire, Earth, Dolphin, and much more. I teach the base level classes of I (intro: healing self and others), II (distance, group, and group distance healing), and III (master/instructor). From there, I encourage people to explore different modalities of energy healing, whether it be the different Reiki variations, kundalini, white light, healing touch, etc. The biggest things I’ve taken away from Reiki and energy healing thus far is that ANYONE can do it, it just takes the desire to learn and Energy healing is only limited by your imagination. Everything I teach is up to interpretation. If something I do doesn’t work for you and you try something different and get the same result, GREAT! Do it! Energy is ethereal. To think it can be contained in one methodology or a rigid set of rules is very limiting. As far as getting involved in this, you can email me at thereikipanda@gmail.com! I’ve been taking students on a case by case basis, and until my volume increases, I’ll keep doing it this way. All I want to hear is why you’re interested in Reiki, what you think it can help you with, what timeframe you have to start, and some other details. Essentially, I’d be setting up a consultation with whoever is interested to see if the fit works for both of us. Pricing on these classes is negotiable. I don’t like to put financial restraints on learning. H: I know as a writer, blogger and native English speaker, you are very passionate about words and language; you are also very passionate about Meditation and as such, offer to write personally created mediations for people. Can you tell us a little bit about why someone might want to have this done for them vs finding a guided meditation online and what your end product looks like? P: I think everyone loves a personalized touch. If it’s made for you, you almost feel like it works better (going right back to that psychology ;) ). Whenever I found guided meditations online, I always thought they were super helpful, but it would’ve been cool if I had a specific kind of meditation at my fingertips instead of searching for it. With this service, I cut out the middle man AND you get something personalized for you. As far as final product, I’ll try to offer as many different options as possible, but it’ll likely be in mp3 or audio/music format, yes. Alternatively, I may create a video with a passive screen and audio background. H: I absolutely loved your quote “Meditation and light work isn't just for gurus and monks anymore, it's for anyone and everyone.” On that note, you also offer mindfulness training but, I’m not really sure what this is so, if you would please tell us a little about the concept, how people use it and to what end? P: I’ll have to admit to a little meditation faux pas here: in this instance, I’m using mindfulness as a replacement for meditation. The term “mindfulness” itself is a subcategory of mediation, but it is so popular, some use it interchangeably, although it is technically incorrect to do so. Mindfulness refers to full awareness and being present in the moment, and this is done by focusing on the body, breath, or environment. There are other modalities of meditation that involve various mantras and mudras out there, but I focus on 3-4 for my training (mindfulness being one of the main ones). If a student is interested in expanding beyond the modalities that I teach, I wholeheartedly encourage that, and I’m planning on adding more material as I mature as an instructor. H: It sounds to me like you’re someone that wants to keep exploring your personal development and spiritual growth with the intention of passing along that knowledge and benefits; that being said, do you have any upcoming plans or offerings? P: You’re 10000% correct. I love what I do and the fact that I can help change people’s lives is an absolute honor and a privilege. I may just be starting out, but I know big things are on the horizon! In April, I’ll actually be headed down to the Sacred Valley in Peru to take my RYT 200 yoga teacher training with my partner, Alanna (my first Reiki I student). Past that, I’m going to continue to try to grow my business consciously, spread truth, love, and light, and just see where life takes me. This has been a wonderful journey thus far, and I’m stoked to keep it going!

H: Before we go, did you have any closing thoughts and how can people get in touch with you? P: Really, I just want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to do this. I want to try and touch as many people as I can and I’m very grateful you’ve been so accommodating to me. You’re awesome! I’m gonna continue to speak my truth and light up the world, and you’ve helped me accomplish that today, so thank you! As far as getting in contact with me, I’ve got various avenues of communication, so feel free to hit me up on any or all of them! Email: thereikipanda@gmail.com Website: www.thereikipanda.guru Blog: www.thenomadiclightwarriors.com IG: @pandainthepages Twitter: @pandainthepages Facebook: www.facebook.com/pandainthepages     Read the full article