#turtle writes tma

[pupil-of-the-eye]

"Ceaseless Watcher"

Date of event: XX XX 2017

An epicene voice echoed down the hallway, catching Elias's ear in his cell. He knew who was coming, of course; he had been watching them since he allowed himself to be arrested a few days before, and he couldn't say he was pleased with how roughly the detective was handling them.

“Basira, what are you doing?” Camille demanded. “Let go of me—”

“Be quiet,” the detective ordered in that impatient way of hers. “You didn't listen to us, so see for yourself.”

A small frown twitched Elias’s lips at the forceful tone Basira took with his spouse before he schooled his expression again.

He wasn't surprised the detective was doing this; he knew it was only a matter of time before Camille was brought in to talk to him. But that didn't necessarily mean he was looking forward to this confrontation, even though a twisted, voyeuristic part of himself was, in fact, looking forward to it.

His own spouse… He could have lied and said that they were the one line he wouldn't cross, that he would leave them out of the Eye's line of sight, as it were, but it would have just been another one of the many lies he told himself about them. He did love them in his own way, but it was a selfish love, one borne of obsession borne of curiosity about the one so heavily marked by the Corruption.

“What are you talking about?” Camille questioned. They were right outside his cell now. “Ow– Basira, you're hurting—” Camille's pale eyes fell on Elias sitting on his cot, dressed in that awful orange prison jumpsuit the guards had put him in, and they fell silent.

“Hello, mon ange,” Elias said coolly, gazing up at his spouse.

They stared at him. They slowly tore their eyes off him and looked back at Basira. “...What is this?”

“He killed two people, maybe more,” the ex-police officer said bluntly. “Just like we tried to tell you.”

Elias spread his hands without taking his eyes off Camille. “Guilty as charged,” he confirmed. He watched as Camille slowly shook their head, backing away from his cell. He stood and placed his hand on the door separating him from his spouse. “Camie,” he purred, the tone of his voice making Basira roll her eyes. He ignored her, keeping his gray gaze on his spouse. Their back hit the wall behind them, and they stopped.

Their ice-white eyes were fixed on him, and they were afraid. He could feel the Ceaseless Watcher's gaze on him as the secret side of himself that he had kept hidden from Camille for most of their relationship began to come to light.

“No,” they mumbled. They crossed their arms as if to defend themself. “No, this isn't—” Their voice died and they shook their head again.

Elias’s expression softened, but he Knew that Camille now doubted how genuine it was. “Camille, darling…” he said, his hand flat against the door to his cell.

“I thought…” Camille shook their head again, blinking quickly as they tried to reconcile the man they thought they knew and the one sitting in prison.

Elias tilted his head and tapped his cheek below one eye. “You thought this was the worst of it,” he deduced. “Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you, my dear, but it wasn't.”

And he was sorry; he hadn't wanted to have to lie to them of all people, but it was necessary. If they knew of his plans, they would try to make him stop, and he couldn't have that.

“Clearly,” Camille muttered. They shook their head one final time and turned away. “I can't,” they said. “I– I can't.”

“Camille?” Elias called, but they were already gone, walking briskly back down the hallway. He sighed and rested his forehead against the door. That had gone about the way he had predicted, but he wasn't happy about it.

It would be a few weeks before Elias saw Camille again. After their last meeting, he couldn't in good conscience bring himself to continue to spy on them and violate their privacy.

His hands were cuffed in front of him as he was brought to a small visitation room. The guard attending him wasn't particularly gentle when pushing him down into a chair. “Tch,” Elias scoffed through his teeth. “Is this really necessary?”

The guard didn't respond, merely cuffing Elias to one of the heavy metal table legs, causing the Beholding acolyte to roll his eyes with another scoff. His eyes fell on the other door as it began to open.

“Darling,” he breathed, watching as his pale-haired spouse silently entered the room, accompanied by a second guard, and approached him at the small square table in the center of the room.

Elias guessed from the guards’ annoyed expressions that they weren't thrilled about his spouse meeting him in such close proximity, but what could be done? Camille Bouchard was, when they needed to be, quite a frightening individual.

Camille looked down. When they spoke, it was clear they were speaking to the two guards. “Leave us.”

The guards exchanged a look. “We can't do that. He's a dangerous criminal.”

“He is my husband.” Elias smirked at those words as Camille's hand, the fingers blackened and discolored from the Corruption infection that had killed them nearly two hundred years ago, rested on the back of the chair opposite the one Elias sat in.

“Leave us,” Camille said again, the chair beginning to decay under their hand, the metal itself seeming to die at their touch.

The guards looked at each other again, the unspoken threat not lost on them. They both left the room without another word, leaving Elias and Camille alone. “Hello, darling,” Elias said.

“Shut up.” Elias obediently fell silent, clasping his bound hands on the table in front of him. Camille paced back and forth on the other side of the table, their fingers pressed to their lips. “I am so unbelievably angry with you right now. Two hundred years—two hundred years—and you just—” They turned on their heel to face him and planted their hands on the table. “How long have you been lying to me?”

Elias sighed. His eyes lingered on Camille's wedding band. “It started around the time your first husband disappeared. I saw how he treated you and I called in a favor from Mordechai Lukas. You remember him, I believe?”

Camille rolled their eyes. “I suppose doing that was out of the goodness of your heart,” they said dryly.

Elias took a breath and confessed, “Would you believe me if I said that it was?” He saw the way Camille's expression soured, and he knew they thought he was still lying; so, he decided to tell them the entire truth.

“No,” he sighed. “I suppose not. So, the truth: I saw something in you that I wanted on my side, something ancient and dangerous, but I knew your husband at the time wouldn't have allowed me near you. I also guessed you wouldn't have mourned him, so I had him… removed.”

Camille exhaled and crossed their arms. “Well, thank you for that. So, why did you lie to me? And don't give me that, ‘You'd have tried to stop me’ bêtises again.”

Elias tilted his head to the side. He hadn't anticipated his spouse to prioritize the lies over his more serious crimes. “What about the murders?”

Camille impatiently waved that away. “What about them? I'm an avatar of the End, you infuriating man.” Elias pursed his lips, but he supposed Camille’s harsh tone was understandable.

“Everything dies,” they went on. “What do I care for the cause?”

“Well, then, why are you yelling at me?”

“Because you've been lying to me!” Camille shouted. They began pacing again, gesticulating in agitation as they moved around the room. “I thought I knew you, you know, I thought, ‘This man isn’t like Isaac; he's charming and interesting and intelligent, and he won't hurt me,’” they ranted. “But no, you've been lying to me for two hundred years!”

Unable to help himself, Elias interrupted to say, “Mm, closer to two hundred and one.”

“Jonah,” Camille growled in frustration, making a rather violent gesture with their hands. Elias's mouth snapped shut, and he leaned back in his chair, gesturing for Camille to continue.

“Just– I–” They practically collapsed into the chair opposite Elias and buried their head in their hands. The room was silent for a long moment. When Camille next spoke, their voice was anxious and weak, as if finally asking a question that had been weighing on their mind these last few weeks: “...Did you ever even love me?”

Elias's fingers twitched. “Of course I did,” he said calmly. “I do, in my way.”

They scoffed, a humorless laugh. “Ah, oui? What way is that?”

“Selfishly,” Elias said simply.

Camille slowly raised their head. They stared in angry contemplation at Elias for a moment before standing and rounding the small table. They hauled him to his feet, noting not for the first time the height advantage they had over his current body, and lifted his bound hands to their forehead. “Show me.”

In a rare moment of uncertainty, Elias Bouchard hesitated. “Darling, are you sure?”

Their grip on his hand tightened. “Do it.”

Elias closed his eyes with a sigh. “All right.”

He placed his fingers on his spouse's forehead and felt them shudder as he pressed into their mind, showing them every detail of not only the complexities of his affection for them, but also the deaths he caused, either directly or indirectly, all for the sake of power and personal gain: Gertrude, Leitner, Barnabas, Albrecht.

He also showed them the fear that he himself had felt that awful day when Camille had suddenly taken ill, doubling over in pain and collapsing to the floor, their skin clammy and ashen. Elias had been unable to do anything but watch as the parasitic thing inside of his spouse ate the light and life out of them.

Elias wrenched his wrists away from Camille's forehead and gazed up at them, his gray eyes locked on their face. He didn't speak immediately, giving both himself and his spouse a chance to pull themselves together. “Well?” he finally said quietly.

Camille said nothing for a moment before their angry expression twisted into something closer to resignation. They huffed and, to Elias's genuine surprise, wrapped their arms around him like the jaws of a bear trap.

Elias took a moment to fully grasp what was happening before laying his head on his spouse's shoulder with a contented sigh. He longed to wrap his arms around them, but the cuffs kept his wrists bound between them.

“You're infuriating,” Camille muttered, turning their head and burying their face in Elias's hair as one hand gripped the back of his jumpsuit, and the other holding the back of his head.

Elias grinned in amusement and kissed their shoulder. “I know.”

“I hate you,” they lied.

“I know.”

---

Mini Fics (Salome, Michael, Peter, etc.)

Mini Fics (Camille, Elias, Jonah, Eleanor, etc.)

[fog-and-isolation]

//OOC: Finally incorporating this pathetic wet cat of a man into my writing.

[librarycards]

whats yr advice how autistic trans ppl seeking a diagnosis should proceed in these deeply transphobic & transmisogynistic times, theres legistlation the juncture btwn transphobia & ableism? for reference Im a TME 1st yr undergrad who is seeking accomodations for ASD and I got interim accomodations before medical documentation but Im not sure if I can opt out of a prof dx or if I want to? I'm really conflicted bc I got "away" with just saying im trying to get accomodations since I started 1/?

2/? at the school (school is on turtle island) but Im not sure if I can defer constantly bc it leads to me having to approach teachers awkwardly - I can't always make it to office hrs - & im fined if i miss dr appointments to assess me. i live in "canada" but there's pretty fucking scary waiting lists & legislation here too imho; I'm not really sure how to navigate these academic and medical contexts when it can influence how easily i can get gender affirming care and letters of mental health 3/3 also i would appreciate anyone providing any tips for TMA ppl as well ofc!! it's crucial for all trans ppl esp the ones most marginalized comprehend the drawbacks of a prof dx if someone is seeking it! i just wanted to be mindful of describing my unique circumstances (also i'm a racialized settler) when receiving advice. i can go off anon & message you too however i know tumblr's not... great as a messaging service or in general

ty for sending and for your patience! okay, this is very complicated and YMMV.

what i'm hearing is that you're weighing the risks vs benefits of going without an autism dx / possibly (?) having easier access to medical transition, vs. receiving a prof dx and having a more difficult time. this is something that i thought about, too, when i was going through the process - i got my 'gender dysphoria' and autism diagnoses around the same time, when i was 18, and i specifically sought the autism one in order to have undergrad accommodations (i already knew I was autistic and had been in autistic community).

for me, and perhaps for you, the accommodation thing was less of a 'my life would be easier' and more of a 'i don't think i'd make it through college without these.' they were mostly housing-based for me, and made it possible for me to live on campus without constant crisis. if you have similar absolute needs for accommodations, i do think you should seek out the formal paperwork. universities are bureaucratic nightmares designed to disadvantage disabled students (and faculty, for that matter) and you need to have every tool in your arsenal to fight back.

i can't speak to transition-related care in canada, but i assume this aspect is similar to the us: providers run the gamut from more to less accepting of (for example) autistic clients, and a diagnosis does not 100% foreclose access to transition. i'm an example of this! i don't think it's worth it to sacrifice your education for the possibility (not guarantee) of a slightly easier time with trans care w/o an autism dx. getting healthcare as a trans person is hard all-around anyway, and i think it's a much more logical choice to get the dx and associated accommodations, and then spend more time researching autism-friendly surgeons (and neurodiversity-affirming therapists to write you the letters necessary for approval).

the only caveats to what i said above are 1) if you could get assessed for another diagnosis that would allow for the same or similar accommodations (many different dx's qualify for extra time, a note-taker, etc etc). if you are committed to getting the surgical/hormonal intervention you want right now, another (risky) option would be to prioritize that and delay university - i don't recommend this whatsoever, but it's there.

my greatest piece of advice is to look frankly at your life and ask, what can i survive, and for how long? can you survive university unaccommodated? can you survive an education put on hold? can you survive a year, two, or five without transition care? these answers will be different for everyone, *and* there is no guarantee that the roadblocks you face as a diagnosed autistic trans person will be exponentially higher than an undiagnosed trans person (sometimes, it's just hard regardless).

one final note - your professors should be available via email to make appointments with you outside office hours. this is part of their job - every semester, some students will not be able to make office hours and still need appointments. i highly recommend speaking to profs as needed about alternative times to meet with them.

so, yeah, that's my 2¢. best of luck <3

[secretly-an-automaton]

Hi, I’m Auto!

This is an intro post; if you’d prefer, just shuffle my blog for a sample of the madness 💚

Pronouns:

I’m cool with whatever

Tag chains:

(and tagging in general)

Feel free to tag me—I won’t always participate if I don’t have the time but I love to see what my mutuals are up to! Don’t be shy about sending asks or DMs either.

What I post about:

(subject to rapid change)

Mostly

Danny Phantom (#dp)

LEGO Ninjago (#Ninjago)

The Magnus Archives (#tma)

Tales of Arcadia (#Trollhunters - I know ToA would’ve made more sense but that’s already claimed in my brain by Trials of Apollo)

Sometimes

Miraculous (#mlb)

Danny Phantom x DC (#dp x dc)

Malevolent (#malevolent)

Starkid musicals - mostly Hatchetverse (#starkid)

How to Train Your Dragon (#httyd)

The Stanley Parable (#tsp)

Gravity Falls (#gf)

The Scum Villain’s Self-Saving System (#svsss)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - mostly 2012 (#tmnt, #tmnt 2012)

Invader Zim (#iz)

X-Men (#marvel)

Other things I love:

(but are rarely found on my blog)

WOE.BEGONE

Project Hail Mary

Alice: Madness Returns

Dungeons & Dragons

Spiderverse

Bendy and the Ink Machine

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog

The Hunger Games

Riordanverse

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power

Tokyo Ghoul

The Crane Wives

The Amazing Digital Circus

Minecraft

Things I write about:

Posted on AO3

Danny Phantom (24 works)

LEGO Ninjago (6 works)

The Magnus Archives (1 work)

TMNT 2012 (1 work)

Unposted (as of yet) but feel free to ask about them

Miraculous

Danny Phantom x X-Men

Trollhunters

Ninjago x Danny Phantom

My tags:

Auto speaks (general ramblings)

Auto does art (mostly digital fanart, occasionally other crafts or cosplay)

Auto writes (writing challenges, AO3 links, and fanart based on my writing)

WAYHiL au (art, memes, and writing pertaining to my dp au fic)

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Resource (mainly for personal use, contains any posts I want to refer back to)

Note: I try to tag common triggers like gore, needles, SH etc. but my TWs aren’t perfect so follow me with caution. If I post something you think I should tag, feel free to tell me.

Requests:

I’m always open to writing/drawing requests! I might not always do them, especially if I’m busy, but don’t be shy about asking! I don’t do commissions, but so long as anything I create is only used for personal reasons and with proper credit, I’m chill with it.

Other places to find me:

Reddit (u/Aut0mat0nWitch)

Archive of Our Own (Aut0mat0nWitch)

Last updated:

December 20, 2024

And that’s all I’ve got for now! Wishing you all a lovely day 💚

Sike; if you want to see a new and …improved… version of this, you can read my friend’s unhinged parody intro post—thanks Rice, your clowning always makes me feel so loved<3

[beannary]

🌿🕯️📡

🌿how does creating make you feel?

i love creating stuff! it makes me feel really good to like get ideas out of my brain and into the world

🕯️was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

ok i spent soooooooooo long working on the lore for my toa x tma crossover fic i have so many pages and pages of notes for all the lore which i really do want to post somewhere even though im not going to finish the fic because i just had so many ideas for it and i still do have so many ideas! if turtles hadn't invaded my brain then i for sure would have continued the fic but alas...turgle

📡why is writing and sharing your writing important for fandom?

i mean i already do a lot of daydreaming and imagining my favorite characters in scenarios, i only started actually writing fics and stuff because i was having a hard time like keeping track of the plot of all of my daydreams, like for me personally, i think its important because i like having all my thoughts in one spot, and posting stuff on ao3 or on tumblr keeps all my thoughts in like one space, because i tend to just write or draw on whatever i can, like i have notebooks filled wtih writing, and then i work at a museum and so i will write or draw on the back of like our membership forms??? so i have like so many of those just tucked away in my desk that are just filled with doodles and with my writing. so like for me its less that i actually want to share my writing with the world (although i do like that a lot and i love seeing people like my work) and more because i need a way to keep track of all my stuff and like the simplest way is for me to just post it all to my social media kalsjdhf

[lesbianturtle]

my tma x sonic au is actually just going to be a really weird rewrite of sonic the hedgehog 06

[geese-ball]

previously im-gonna-squeet

Hi Im Elias, I'm British, my pronouns are he/it/xe, and i am fantastically queer

My askbox is always open!! pls say hi or ask something!!

WARNING: i reblog gore

my spotify

Fandoms:

dimension 20/ dropout tv, toh, hermitcraft, creepypasta, doctor who, empires smp s1, life smp series, heluva boss, hazbin hotel, James Acaster, gravity falls, ride the cyclone, tma/ tmagp , rottmnt, tottmnt, spider-verse, garrett watts, gbbo, Will Wood, Dan and Phil

General things i love:

learning, sharks/marine biology, science, creepy/scary stuff, men, little guys (creatures, beasts), cats

My writing:

Gerry and Michael get a cat (doorkeay fluff) (ao3)

3 times Tim tried to get Jon & Martin together, and 1 time he realised he didnt have to (ao3)

sometimes domestic bliss is an angry goth and his 12ft tall delusion incarnate monster bf (ao3)

Donnie burnout fic (ao3)

i still dont know who you are, i only know that im still lonely (donnie gets a service dog) ch 1 ch 2 ch 3 (ao3)

The turtle and the rabbit

OCs: Timothy Googly, Missile Launcher Hamato

[razmerry]

I added 403 tags in 2021

#warriors - 127 posts

#rvb - 79 posts

#drawtectives - 30 posts

#drawfee - 28 posts

#tma - 27 posts

#wwdits - 27 posts

#sanders sides - 26 posts

#star trek - 21 posts

#comics - 20 posts

#venom - 18 posts

Longest Tag: 106 characters

#and the clan starts going through a famine bc the researchers are unintentionally disrupting their hunting

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

I did the challenge that was made by @satzzzwarriorcats and it’s very fun! 

219 notes • Posted 2021-06-09 15:04:22 GMT

#4

OKAY Drawtectives Finale fanart part two. I died laughing every time I thought of Emery in arm jail so I had to draw it. 

catch me on the ground after getting so attached to these characters,,., blease they gotta come back

223 notes • Posted 2021-02-28 17:37:33 GMT

#3

me: ugh I hate tropes

the trope: a person is host to some powerful entity and they have witty banter with each other

me: omg a person is host to some powerful entity and they have witty banter with each other

Featuring: Venom (moreso from the 2018 movie), Hector and Vincent (Wereworld), Jeremy and the SQUIP (blended from the book and musical), Prosper and Alastor (The Dreadful Tale of Prosper Redding), Greedling (Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood), and O’Malley and Doc (Red vs. Blue). 

282 notes • Posted 2021-06-19 19:35:38 GMT

#2

Drawtectives: Orc Lore

So in honor of S1 of Drawtectives almost being over, I decided to rewatch all the episodes and compile all the “orc lore” Jacob spills, because it is delightful. I know people have suggested doing this but I haven’t seen anyone actually compile it all, so I’m sorry if you already have and I missed it. Also there were some things I left out because they felt more like just a joke, or weren’t important enough, or too non-specific. Some of the lore is contradictory but it’s so impressive for improv worldbuilding. Anyways! Enough of that. Read on: 

Episode 1:

- York is orc on his father’s side, human on his mother’s

- His father is the tribe’s leader

- “Humans are kind of like pets to me”

- “I don’t know anything either, but I’m basically unkillable” - just a good York summary

- Has a case he keeps bones in

- Murder is a normal thing at orc parties

- The bone economy is introduced

Episode 2:

- York cannot write (does not understand the process of writing?)

- Orcs heal sickness by violently shaking the afflicted

- York is pretty good at mental math

Episode 3:

- Common misconception; York can read, just in the “orc runes”, not English

- Does not know what dollars are

- The bone economy is expanded upon; dragon bones are very valuable

- In orc culture you are polite to people who can kill you; rudeness is reserved for those you feel comfortable around

- York only learned about “motives” recently

- York is unaware of what jokes are

- He has never cried before?

- Food is eaten raw and possibly still alive

- In the bone economy, “candle bones” are worth 5 turtle bones, turtle bones are worth 5 rat bones, and a rat bone is worth 5 bug bones (bug bones are being phased out as a currency)

- Northern bugs do have bones

- Things that are the best to eat are the hardest to kill

- York’s hairstyle is popular, because he forced others to adopt it

Episode 4:

- “I’m about to humor your boy out the window” is just a very good quote

- York has trained warhounds before

- Wild trains live in wild train country. They cannot be slain or tamed, and are incredibly fast. It is the only thing York is terrified of 

- Orcs cannot refuse an invitation; half-orcs must give a tentative maybe

- Wild trains are a serious threat to York’s tribe

- York has “bad blood” with the Wild Lands

- Bikes are used to escape wild trains

Episode 5:

- Only one channel on TV is received in the Northern Tribes; orcish soap operas are most common - “Tusks of Our Lives”, “Maul My Children”, “One Fight to Live” (which has 37 seasons)

- Only one band in the Northern Tribes; Birds of Prey

- York is unaware bands other than that one existed

- York does not know what a camera is 

- Also does not know how TV works (”little people inside the box”)

- Cannot recognize his own face in a photo 

- Only lemons grow/are sold in the Northern Tribes

- York had a “yellow-slick toad” named Tammy as a child; previous crying point disproven as he cried at least 15 minutes when it died

- Wild trains are also called “ground planes” sometimes

- York has murdered his brother in an “unrightful claim to the throne” and “blood feud”

- He is apparently an orc prince; this does line up with the lore about him being the tribe leader’s son

- (Non-orc worldbuilding: boker, billiards, Grendan Fury, Go Bish)

Episode 6: (the piss episode)

- Orcs… do both at once, as it were

- He doesn’t wipe………

- “Pee is compliment, blood is insult”

- Class discourse is an important discussion in orcish culture

- Mirrors do not exist in the Northern Tribes

- Northern cats are apparently eight feet long and eight feet tall, roughly cuboid, and kept as battle cats

- “Northern hill squirrel”

Episode 7:

- Orcs are strongly anti-tobacco; instead they do mushrooms

- YORKY SNACKS

- York once held onto an antelope for two weeks

- “It takes five pickles to hold a potata” - common orcish childhood quote

- Fuzzy potatoes are a crop in the Northern Tribes; they are hard to perceive, and if you don’t put on your “pickle glove” before you hold one things will get real weird

- York does possess the ability to write both “eat my butt” and “wow now thatsa potata”

Episode 8:

- Orcs have two stomachs, requiring more food to fill them; they don’t need to eat for two days after the stomachs are full

- He “empties both stomachs at once”

- York has been in many knife fights

- Expansion on wild trains: they can be killed, evidently, but only if you sneak up and attack their engine compartment while they’re sleeping, if confronted you must lure them into a false sense of security. Wild trains do know when they are being depicted in art and can sense it, will attack (?)

- Whatever leg wrestling is about

- Apparently once York killed a rhino by fanning his hand but I’m not sure if that was real or just to push Emery’s buttons

- “Is he doin slammer on me” - I just really like that

- Orcs are only babies for a couple hours

- YORK FEET PICS

- Possibly non-canonical but Jacob said York is on his Rumspringa and that is very funny

Episode 9:

- Non-orc actors and programs are being shown on orc TV?

- Orcs do not have dimples

- Old actors are called “road dogs” in the Northern Tribes

Episode 10:

- Ghosts exist in this world, but not in the Northern Tribes (“when people die, they die hard”)

- Reconfirmed: York is good at math

- Spilled milk is cried over in the North (it will make York cry)

- Has no pockets

(Updating:)

Episode 11:

- Not much but it’s a big one: 

Orcish elders have knowledge of Julia (and her artistic decisions)

One-Shot Stream:

- Orcs “feel time differently” - described as being like dog years (1 day feel like 3 days)

- Semi-related: orcs believe that people are never coming back when they leave and are surprised when they do

- York believed only murder was a crime

- Dogs love York

- York does not know what his birthday is

- After a birth in the Northern tribes, people “take a stick and scratch in the mud” the words ‘He was born’ so others know

- He doesn’t know what glass is? 

- “Faster than you can shake a leaf at a twig”

563 notes • Posted 2021-01-13 23:31:21 GMT

#1

HOLY COW I MISSED THESE GUYS!! 

822 notes • Posted 2021-08-01 19:39:55 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[dinosaurs-last-day]

Welcome to my Blog!

Hello! My name’s Remy! I’m 19, nonbinary (i sorta like the term autigender and i use they/them pronouns), and an asexual lesbian. 

My url used to be genderqueer-turtle, but I changed it...

This is my linktree with my other accounts. Follow me on Twitter and TikTok for more fandom content! And my Instagram is just personal updates and cool stuff I do!

I’m a writer, a performer, and an all around nerd. I’m pretty friendly and am always willing to listen, so feel free to dm me or send me an ask if you want to vent, just chat, or anything! I have a discord as well, so if you want to chat through that, dm me so I can give you my account info!

I love asks and they make me smile, so feel free to send basically anything!  I post a lot of LotR,Steven King's IT, TMA, RWBY, and a bunch of other random stuff! Sorry if I spam your dash, that may happen.

I write fanfics! I'm currently working building an up to date master post but feel free to ask for my ao3! I love sharing my writing

One of my fanfics, Music to the Heart, has playlists for the characters! Check them out here! 

I also take writing prompts! Just leave them in my inbox and I’ll get to them as soon as possible. I don’t really care if you use anon or not for writing prompts, but if you stay off of anon, you’ll get tagged when the story is ready and I can dm you for any details you might want included! 

DNI: anti-lgbtq+, a map, a terf, exclusionist, or pro-r3mr0m.. I will block people who try to support any of these in any way.  I don’t like to talk politics, but sometimes I will reblog political things. I don’t want drama.

Send me an ask or a dm if you want me to tag anything, literally anything! You don’t have to explain yourself, I completely understand. And feel free to correct me if I tag something wrong or reblog something with misinformation! I’d really appreciate that!

Anyways, thanks for checking out my blog! 😊

[tma-valentines-exchange]

Stance on Asexuality and NSFW content

There have been some concerns and controversy regarding NSFW content being made for Jon, a canon asexual character. While we are still in the interest check phase and are thus still undecided whether NSFW content will be allowed within this exchange, I feel there is importance and value in addressing this issue regardless.

Disclaimer: I am an asexual person, but I acknowledge that exploration of sexuality is almost always a work-in-progress. So I am still learning more about asexuality everyday, and I am in no way a spokesperson for all aspec people.

However! 

TLDR; Asexuality comes in many forms (eg sex-favourable, sex-averse, sex-indifferent, and even fluctuating between different forms), and they all deserve celebration and exploration. Hence, if we choose to allow NSFW content in TMA Valentine's Exchange after Interest Check, we will also allow NSFW content involving the canon asexual character, Jon Sims. 

Whether you are an allosexual (ie non-asexual), questioning or asexual person, it can be difficult to talk about asexuality so I’ll state here that I’m very open to conversations on asexuality so if at any point, anyone wishes to talk about it, just drop by in the DMs or asks. If you prefer, you can find me @nyctolovian instead! ((But please do be respectful haha I won’t respond to trolls and bigots.))

- Nycto 

Interest Check | Carrd | Schedule | FAQ

More discussion of asexuality under the cut

Asexuality is much more fluid and complex than it appears to most people. (It’s also a spectrum but that’s a discussion for another day... Here’s a cute comic though!) Asexuality is only the lack of sexual attraction, and that does not say anything about their feelings towards sex/sexual behaviour. There are many subtypes of aces (which I like referring to as “flavours”).

Some common terms to express these differences are: sex-favourable, sex-averse/repulsed and sex-indifferent. (Not sex-positive and negative!!) This post explains the terms a bit. There can also be fluctuations between these "flavours”. They can also differ from context to context. For example, one can be sex-favourable when it comes to fictional characters and sex-repulsed when it comes to themselves. 

All “flavours” are valid and doesn’t make the person any less asexual. And that’s why Jon can both be ace, and engage in R18 scenarios! Putting him in sex scenes doesn’t “erase his asexuality”.

His “ace flavour” and where he is in the spectrum is not specified in canon either so he’s honestly Free Real EstateTM. Some write him as sex-repulsed and that’s cool! However, if you wish to write him as a different flavour, here is a non-exhaustible list of reasons why ace people in general might engage in sex:

To bond with their partner

Because sex is pleasurable and fun

For sex work

To have children

For the physical release

As an asexual person, I love seeing variety in asexual rep. Fics with ace Jon being sex-repulsed and cuddling with his partner is just as important as fics with ace Jon being curious or kinky. Variety is realistic and validates aces of different flavours!

That’s why: Go ahead! Write Jon being incredibly asexual and still wanting sex! I think it’ll be loads of fun!

Personal headcanons since you’re already here haha! I imagine Jon to fluctuate between sex-favourable and sex-indifferent actually. Depends on his mood. BUT! I also imagine him to be averse to on-mouth kissing. Just seems oddly gross to him. Hence why we never hear kissing on tape! Because Jon! Doesn’t! Like! Kissing!

Here are some links to more wonderful posts on the topic:

“AO3 tags-Asexuality” by dathen

“Asexuality and Fandom” by thoughtlessthinkythoughts

“The B(ace)ics: Asexuality 101″ by themacklemorebrothers

“Writing sex scenes with asexual characters” by anagnori

This post by acemartinblackwood

My favourite comic about asexuality involving turtles by dragonheartftherpays

Oh. And PSA: This week is Ace Awareness Week 2020!!!! Shoutout to my fellow aces whoop!

[just-antithings]

Mod Turtle here. TMA antis are a baffling crowd. They generally believe that if you write any fanfiction with sexual violence in it, even if it’s portrayed as evil or just mentioned as something in the past, you’re a bad person. 

There have been several block lists of TMA antis just going through the noncon tag on AO3 and encouraging blocking, reporting, and harassment regardless of the content of the story. 

These same antis are fine stanning characters that engage in gaslighting, abuse of power, murder, and torture. 

can y’all be normal about representation and not threaten violence for 5 minutes

[pupil-of-the-eye]

"Body-Swap"

Date of Event: XX XX 1867

The echo of her footsteps on the stone floors and the dancing shadows cast by their torch on the walls of the tunnels beneath the Magnus Institute were Eleanor's only companions as they followed their husband down the corridors in the dead of night. She had woken up when Jonah quietly climbed out of bed and retrieved his walking stick. At first, she'd thought he had just gotten up for water, but when he didn't come back, she got worried and decided to look for him.

     Eleanor had emerged from her and Jonah's bed chambers on the top floor of the Institute and closed the door behind her with a soft click. She looked around Jonah's office for a moment before hurrying down to the basement archives. She wasn't blind; she knew about the tunnels built by Smirke. She knew they were part of her husband's decision to relocate the Magnus Institute to London, but she didn't know what was so important about them. But that didn't matter right now; for now, she needed to make sure her aging husband was all right. She worried about him.

     It wasn't easy to watch the love of one's life grow old and feeble, and Eleanor worried every moment that someday he would push himself too hard and be unable to recover from it.

     When Eleanor reached the end of the tunnels and climbed the spiral stairs up a tower, she wasn't entirely sure what she was seeing at first, then she realized that she had entered some kind of room that allowed for a full range of vision for what she thought might have been prison cells surrounding the tower, but she didn't look too closely. But it was the stone seat in the center of the room that caught her attention. Holding her torch higher, she slowly approached the throne, which faced away from her. “Jonah…?”

     Eleanor slowly circled the throne, and a bloodcurdling scream tore through her throat when she saw a young man she didn't know kneeling before her husband's eyeless corpse.

Jonah put his blind body into the throne in the center of the Panopticon. He sat down hard, facing the chair, head in shaking hands. He knew that his consciousness taking to the new body would be an unpleasant process, but he was so disoriented that he didn’t know someone was behind him until he heard the bloodcurdling scream.

     Eleanor. Damn it all, he had planned to wait until she woke up in the morning to explain what he had done so they wouldn’t have to see him like this – weak and bloody and in no fit state to present himself to her the way he needed to. Damn it all, damn it all! This was not how it was supposed to go.

     Jonah turned, bandaged eyes gazing up at his ever-youthful wife, picturing her mortified expression with perfect clarity. He held up his hands placatingly, feeling the warmth of a torch on his kneeling body. Eleanor must have dropped it on the cold stone floor in shock when she’d discovered her husband's corpse, the eyes messily removed, and a complete stranger knelt before it. Jonah could feel the Eye feeding from Eleanor’s fear and terror of the situation.

     “Eleanor,” he said in what he hoped sounded like a soothing tone and not an exhausted wheeze, “it's me. It's—”

     Jonah grunted when Eleanor pushed past him. Though he couldn't see her through the bloodstained bandages, he Knew that they were leaning heavily against the throne, staring with tears in their eyes at his own eyeless corpse.

     “What did you do to him?!” Eleanor demanded of Jonah, even though they didn't know that it was their husband they were speaking to. Why would they? They knew Jonah to be an old man, the old man that now sat blind and mutilated in the throne in the center of the Panopticon, evidently at the hands of the much younger man who she didn't know that now sat bandaged and bloody on the floor. Jonah knew how this must have looked, and his stomach twisted at the tone Eleanor took with him. He never wanted to make her sound like that. Not them. Never them.

     “Eleanor,” he began again, “please, just give me a moment to explain—”

     Jonah fell silent at the sound of a pistol’s safety flicking off, and he knew he would need to tell Eleanor something that only he would know if it meant convincing her that he was who he said he was. “You and this man,” he said, gesturing to his own corpse, “first made love in a room at an associate's estate during a masquerade ball held in 1819 after the death of your first husband.”

     Slowly, Jonah heard Eleanor's fearful breaths gradually begin to steady; that had been something they had been worried about going public, and he knew it. “That– That was almost fifty years ago,” they whispered. “You can't– You can't know that.”

     “But I do.” Jonah reached out, feeling for Eleanor's hand. “Because I am your Jonah, darling. I am.”

     Jonah heard a metallic clattering as Eleanor dropped her pistol. He felt her kneel beside him and touch his face. He leaned into her touch, pressing a kiss to the palm of her hand. There they were: the closest thing he had to an anchor anymore. “There you are… That's my Eleanor…”

     Eleanor's hands shook as she held Jonah's face. “J-Jonah…?”

     Jonah's lips curled into a smile against Eleanor's hand. “Hello, darling,” he said, the exhaustion in his voice betraying how awful he felt after transplanting his consciousness into this new, young host body.

     “Jonah… chérie, mon amour, what the hell did you do?” Eleanor's voice was weak and shaky, and Jonah carefully pulled her into his own trembling arms.

     “I found a way for us to be together forever, my love,” he murmured into her hair. It wasn't a complete lie, but it wasn't the full truth, either; not that Eleanor needed to know that. She didn't need to know the truth of his goals for his distant second attempt at Rite of the Watcher's Crown. All she needed to know was that he worshipped her.

     He tightened his arms around Eleanor, who all but melted in his embrace. He buried his face in her pale hair and breathed in her scent. “I missed holding you like this…”

     Jonah sighed and softly kissed the side of Eleanor's neck, and she slowly, hesitantly, finally returned his embrace. It had been so long since he'd been able to hold his spouse the way he wanted to; so many years since his body had begun to age and wear down, unable to keep up with Eleanor's End-given youth and vitality. Nearly eighty years old, and she didn't look a day over thirty. She was so beautiful – his own Venus de Milo.

     Eleanor pulled back and touched the bandages wrapped around Jonah's head. “What did you do?” they asked again, their voice a soft whisper.

     “I'll explain later, darling,” Jonah murmured, the weariness and instability taking over his senses, stabbing into every inch of his flesh like hot, poisoned needles. “Right now, I— I need you to help me back to bed…”

     Eleanor nodded, standing and hauling Jonah's weak body up. She slung his arm over her shoulder, then glanced at the old, blind man sitting in the center of the room. She had known and loved Jonah for most of her life, and it felt wrong to just leave his body, his original body here alone like this. Still, she trusted him, so she left his old, blind body with a gentle kiss to the forehead and began to make her way back home, Jonah's new vessel leaning heavily against her.

     The journey back through the tunnels was almost silent save for the echoing sounds of Jonah and Eleanor’s footsteps and Jonah's labored breathing. “You should have told me you were doing this,” Eleanor finally said softly as the couple reached the beginning of the tunnels and Eleanor pushed the hidden door open. From there, they moved up three floors to Jonah's office and to the locked door to their private chambers.

     “You would have tried to stop me,” Jonah replied, his voice ragged and breathless. Eleanor helped him into sleeping clothes and into their bed.

     “But you could have warned me.” Eleanor sat in the armchair near the bed and rested her chin in one hand. “I nearly shot you.”

     Some of the tension and discomfort in Jonah's new body faded away as he burrowed into the blankets. He held out his hand for Eleanor. “Come here, darling…”

     Eleanor hesitated. She knew that this was her husband, but it still felt so fundamentally wrong to be in bed with him. This wasn't his body. This didn't feel like him. Finally, she said, “It's… difficult.”

     Jonah let out a quiet groan at Eleanor's words. “Ma deésse, please, come back to bed… come to me…”

     Eleanor hesitated a moment longer before giving in to Jonah's weary, needy tone, though his voice was unfamiliar. She stood from the chair and joined her husband on their bed underneath the blankets. His quiet grunt and groan didn't go unnoticed.

     “You're hurting,” she murmured as Jonah pulled her close, his movements sluggish and arduous. He sighed against her neck.

     “I… didn't want to worry you, my love,” he exhaled, nuzzling his bandaged face closer to her neck and breathing in her scent. He groaned. “I… I knew the process would be… difficult… but God, having you here eases the burden.”

     He pulled her closer, the wrongness of his new vessel almost overwhelming his need to have them by his side. But Jonah Magnus was a determined and selfish man, and no amount of physical discomfort would stand in his way of holding his Eleanor. Another heavy sigh passed Jonah's lips as sleep took him.

---

Mini Fics (Salome, Michael, Peter, etc.)

Mini Fics (Camille, Elias, Jonah, Eleanor, etc.)

[fog-and-isolation]

//So, I've decided to post the sporadic mini fics on the relevant blogs (Salome, Michael, and Peter will go here; Eleanor, Camille, Jonah, Elias, Fanshawe, and so on will go on @pupil-of-the-eye; etc. etc.) as well as in Google Docs.

//Do keep in mind, however, that what is posted under this tag (#turtle-writes-tma) is much closer in tone to the podcast itself than the silliness of the blogs; the reason the lore is different is basically I've done some development of my OCs and their stories in ways that are far too late to change on the blogs.

//In this case, Michael the Distortion isn't 100% lovey-dovey and affectionate-cat to Sal 100% of the time. It is a monster that is drawn to Salome both due to the bits of Michael Shelley that became it and the fact that she was marked by the Spiral when she was a kid. In addition, while Salome knows Gerry, he isn't present in this instance because of all the vagueness surrounding the exact timeline of events in Gerry's life.

//That said, let's begin with Salome's attack on the institute.

.

.

.

.

.

.

"Attack"

Date of Event: XX XX 2010

Starving to death was only the second most painful thing Salome Lukas had ever experienced. The grief of losing Michael Shelley was infinitely more agonizing.

     The archivist. Gertrude Robinson. This was all her fault. Salome was certain of it. Michael was dead and it was the archivist’s fault. She was alone, and it was all Gertrude’s fault.

     Gerry was still alive, for now, but he had never been quite enough to ground Salome, to anchor her. It wasn’t that he hadn’t tried. He was just in too deep with the Dread Powers, and that wasn’t what Salome had needed. She had needed Michael. But Michael was gone, and with him, the last shreds of Salome’s humanity. It was all Gertrude’s fault. And she was going to pay for it.

It wasn't unusual for the streets and roads of London to be foggy this time of year.

The screams came first, followed by a sudden drop in temperature until Gertrude Robinson could see her breath down in the basement archives. That was unusual.

     The aging archivist stood, a petrol lighter in one hand and a Leitner in the other. The archives grew colder and colder as whatever monster decided to attack the Institute this time closed in. The door to the head archivist’s office slowly creaked open, a thick, billowing cloud of icy fog spilling into the room in horrible tendrils. “Hello, Miss Lukas,” Gertrude said calmly. “It’s been some time.”

     Salome looked awful. She was thin and gaunt with dark circles under her hollow gray eyes, and half of her dark brown hair had turned a ghostly white. As a matter of fact, the entire right side of her body was engulfed in the Lonely’s fog.

As Salome walked through the chair opposite Gertrude’s desk, her form dissipating and reassembling as if she were made of the cold white fog that surrounded her, that same icy fog like sea fret spilled out of her mouth in time with her breaths.

     Salome shook her head, beginning to hum a slow, mournful dirge. In response, the billowing haze began to swirl around Gertrude, who still looked unbothered, though her grip on the Leitner tightened. “Why are you here, Miss Lukas?” the old woman inquired.

     “I’m going to kill you,” Salome rasped, the icy tendrils slowly creeping up Gertrude’s legs in spirals of pure, isolating grief. Her fists clenched until her knuckles turned white, and the thick, serpentine ringlets of white sea fret gradually inched up Gertrude’s body until it reached her neck, wrapping around her throat.

     “Because of Michael?” the old woman guessed. “I admit, I… overlooked your involvement with him.”

     The vine-like tendrils of fog suddenly tightened around Gertrude’s throat as Salome’s grief and anger surged at the mention of Michael Shelley. “You don’t get to say his name,” she murmured. “He’s dead because of you. And you, you have the weight of the Lonely all around you. You’ll be a filling first victim—”

     Before the All-Alone could continue, another door that Gertrude knew hadn’t been there before but one that she was prepared for slowly creaked open. With movements far swifter than the old woman’s frail appearance would suggest, Gertrude Robinson swapped her lighter for a gun, but the Distortion wasn’t paying her any attention. Its awful, spiraling gaze was fixed on Salome.

      It tilted its head as it stared at her, its brows furrowed in something resembling confusion or curiosity. It said her name in a soft singsong tone, its voice strangely dazed and achingly familiar to the Lonely avatar. “…Sah-loh-mey…”

     Salome took a step back. Her shoulders were tight as she stared at the thing that looked so much like Michael Shelley. She backed into the corner near the door to the archivist’s office, opposite the Spiral’s doorway, her fists clenched so tightly her knuckles had turned white.

     Her voice was a quiet whisper when she breathed, “Michael?”

     Its spiraling eyes staring into Salome’s gray ones, the creature’s lips curled into a slow smile. “I’ve found you…~”

Salome stared at the floor between where she and the Distortion stood, her gaze unfocused as her breathing slowed. Her mouth was dry as she wrung her hands, the one giveaway that she had never been able to rid herself of. She felt breathless, her unbeating heart pounding in her throat. Whether it was fear of the Distortion—an extension of the Dread Power that took her childhood from her—or a warped desire to be closer to the creature that looked so much like Michael Shelley, she didn’t know. She didn’t care, either. Not anymore. She was as much a part of Forsaken as Michael was part of the Spiral.

     Ignoring Gertrude, the Distortion stepped closer to Salome. “Little Lonely one…” it cooed, its hands raising to cradle Salome’s face. Its hands looked normal, but they felt all wrong, like leather sacks full of rocks. “…I know you… little Sah-loh-mey…”

     With a vacant expression, Salome slowly covered one of the Distortion’s hands with her own. Her movements were languid and dazed, deep in a Fear-driven haze. “…Michael…” she whispered, her breath coming out in a cloud of fog.

     “Parts of him,” the Distortion confirmed, the sound of its soft voice familiar and disorienting to Salome.

     “Miss Lukas,” the old woman choked in a warning tone as the tendrils of fog squeezed her throat, ignoring the aching paranormal loneliness and grief slowly wrapping around her body and seeping Into her bones. “Don't— listen to it. It looks like Michael, but it’s not the—”

     The temperature in the room plummeted. “Don’t say his name,” Salome whispered. The Distortion stepped closer to her until she needed to crane her neck to look up at it.

     “You want… to kill her…” The creature giggled, the unnatural sound sending Salome’s equilibrium into a downward spiral. She lost her footing and stumbled into the twisting monster. “But she isn’t easy to kill, lonely Sah-loh-mey…”

     Salome’s fog-gray eyes drifted from the Distortion’s deceptively gentle face to where Gertrude stood, and she took a step forward, stubbornly determined to kill the woman who took her anchor from her. Seeing this, the distorted Michael laughed softly again, its blonde ringlets almost seeming to float around its head. It shifted the location of its door, almost effortlessly taking the Lonely monster that it found itself drawn to into its endless corridors.

     Then, Gertrude was left alone with an aching neck and a lingering sense of frigid grief as Salome’s fog slowly dissipated. She sighed, now realizing that she had underestimated Salome Lukas. She would need to be prepared for the next time the so-called “All-Alone” came calling.

---

Mini Fics (Salome, Michael, Peter, etc.)

Mini Fics (Camille, Elias, Jonah, Eleanor, etc.)

[fog-and-isolation]

//OOC: I'm not even done with the statement part of the fic yet. Oops.

[fog-and-isolation]

“Silence”

Date of event: XX, XX 2008

“Sal. Sal. Hey.” Gerard kicked Salome's leg beneath the table. The hum of the cafe buzzed around them, the thrum of conversation and clinks and clatter of dishware starting to grate on Gerard’s nerves. “Earth to Salome.”

His friend slowly pulled her gray gaze away from the foggy streets beyond the window they sat beside. Her back was to the cafe door when she mumbled, “Y-yes…?”

Gerard started to continue before he noticed Salome's eyes sliding off him, and he rapped the top of the table twice with his knuckles to get her attention again. “You've zoned out three times in the last twenty minutes. It’s getting worse.”

Salome shook her head vaguely, her eyes unfocused as she tried to look at Gerard. “‘m fine Gerard,” she mumbled. “I'm– I'm fine.”

The goth sighed and rubbed his eyes. He never was one to beat around the bush, so he just leaned forward and said, “I know you want Peter's approval, Sal. I know you do. But this—” He gestured at her, indicating the dark circles under her eyes and how limp her dark hair was; “This isn't good for you.”

Salome's shoulders rounded, her body reflecting the guards she always had in place, the way she constantly had her emotions under heavy lock and key. “I'm fine, Gerard,” she insisted. “Really.��

He didn't think she was, but he didn't know how to tell her what was happening to her. Even he couldn't say it all outright, couldn't explain the Fears like they were nothing. He just hoped he'd be able to find a way to get through to her before she did something she couldn't undo.

“You're cutting yourself off,” Gerard insisted. He tried not to let the frustration seep into his voice since it wasn't her he was angry with. “Doing that, isolating yourself, just to make him happy? It's not worth it.”

“He's my uncle,” Salome protested softly. Her eyes were closed and her hands were clasped on the table, her pale knuckles white. “He took me in.”

“Didn't you say it took him two years?”

Salome exhaled softly. “I need this, Gerry,” she said, her words coming out in a hushed whisper, as if she were afraid some uninvited watcher might overhear her moment of vulnerability. “...I don't want to talk about this anymore.”

A bit of the tension left Gerard's jaw. Gerry. That was a good sign. Her calling him by his preferred nickname usually meant she was coming back to herself; he only regretted that it was under these circumstances this time. Still, he might be able to work with this.

He wanted to ask her why she needed Peter's approval, of all people, but he didn't want to risk her retreating back into her own head, so he said, “All right. Subject change. How've those meetings with Bouchard been going?”

“I don't like them,” Salome replied, her shoulders slowly loosening. “I don't like him. It feels all wrong.”

Knowing about Salome's old diary, hearing that didn't surprise Gerard; the Magnus Institute probably reeked of Beholding. She hadn't known her old spiral-bound journal was an artifact of the Eye, of course. Even Gerard wasn't sure until he looked at the inside cover and saw “From the library of Jurgen Leitner” stamped in clean lettering at the bottom. They were thirteen at the time, and after seeing that, Gerard had torn out and discarded the pages Salome had written on and then stolen the book for his mother when his friend wasn't looking. He wasn't sure she had ever noticed it was missing.

“Yeah, my mum's said pretty much the same thing,” Gerard said to Salome. “Why are you still going to those meetings?”

When he asked the question, he expected Salome to start shutting down again and say something about doing a favor for her uncle, so he was taken aback when, instead, her lips curled into a small, nervous smile.

“I… met someone,” she said, tucking a lock of dark hair behind her ear. “Someone who works there, I mean.”

“Oh,” Gerard said. Then the surprise hit him, and his mouth fell open. “Oh.”

“I know,” Salome replied, guiltily fidgeting with her fingers. “My uncle doesn't know, and I'm worried about Mr. Bouchard finding out and telling him...”

“I wouldn't worry,” Gerard said with an unconcerned shrug. His mum had told him again and again how servants of the Eye just sat back and watched things happen, and he didn't think Salome would be exempt from that just because she was a Lukas.

“So–” He crossed his arms on the table and leaned forward, suddenly grinning at Salome like a shark. He lowered his voice conspiratorially. “Tell me about them. What's their name? What're they like?”

Salome's guilty smile turned shy. “His name's Michael,” she said softly. “He's tall, a little awkward, he's got a bit of a stutter, but he's…” Salome fidgeted with her decaf coffee and scone. She never had been very good at putting her thoughts or feelings into words. “He's nice.”

Gerard grinned as Salome continued to try to talk about this Michael of hers. He half-hoped he’d never meet the guy, since he thought the stutter might make him impatient, and he knew Salome would cut Michael out if it was a choice between him and Gerard. She was loyal like that.

For better or for worse, Gerard thought when Salome went quiet again, the way she did when she started to worry about letting her uncle down, this time because of her interest in Michael.

Movement from the front of the shop caught Gerard's eye, and he watched as a tall, lanky sort of man entered the cafe and walked up to the counter to place an order. He had a pair of headphones around his neck. “Sal,” Gerard said when an odd suspicion popped into his mind, “what did you say this guy of yours looked like?”

“Um, tall,” Salome said, gesturing vaguely over her head. “Much taller than me. Maybe six and a half feet. Blonde. Curly hair.”

“Fidgety hands and—” Gerard squinted, peering closer at the man at the bar. “Blue, pink, and white beaded bracelet?”

Salome went still, gray eyes fixed on a spot above Gerard's shoulder. “...How did you know that?”

“Turn around.”

She did, and then she very quickly turned back around, clasping her hands on the table again. “Oh,” she said in a very small voice. “Oh, no.”

“What do you mean, ‘Oh, no’? You like him, don't you?”

“I didn't say that,” the lonely girl mumbled.

Gerard snorted. “You didn't have to,” he said with a smirk. “Oh, here he comes.”

Michael sat down with his coffee and put his headphones on, sitting alone at the table behind Salome, unable to see her face, and started bobbing his head to whatever music he was listening to. He glanced up and gave Gerard a little wave and smile. The goth nodded at Michael and returned to his coffee.

“So, ’re you going to talk to him, or what?”

“Quiet,” Salome hissed. Gerard tried to speak again, but the second his voice left his mouth, it was muffled as if he were speaking into a thick pillow. In fact, the entire cafe had gone completely silent.

Oh, no, he thought. Michael didn't seem to notice anything wrong; in fact, nobody appeared to realize how quiet the small cafe had become.

Salome, however, did notice the supernatural silence. She looked around, gray eyes growing wide. She opened her mouth, but instead of words, fog spilled out. She looked at Gerard with a slight hint of fear and confusion in her eyes. In the eight years he had known Salome Lukas, he had never seen her show so much emotion before, even if it was just in her eyes.

He shook his head and made the gesture for Calm down in sign language, a mode of communication he had tried to pick up when he was younger and coincidentally complemented Salome's tendency to lose her voice under stress.

Salome’s hands were too shaky to respond, so Gerard just signed again: Calm down. Breathe.

Salome hugged herself and closed her eyes, taking a few unsteady breaths. She covered her mouth with her trembling hands.

“Come on,” Gerard tried to say, but his voice was as impossibly absent and silent as the rest of the building and street outside. Don't let it feed off you.

Gerard didn't know when the world came back to life, but as soon as the usual din of the cafe returned, Salome was out of her seat and running out the door. “Sal!” he called, but she was already gone. He cursed and sat back in his seat. He knew he should chase after her, but he also knew she needed to be alone, and when she needed to be alone, she wouldn't be easy to find. He knew, though, that the next time he saw her—if he saw her again—he would need to tell her all about the Fears.

Salome ran. She ran, ran, ran, feet pounding against the ground, splashing in puddles as the sky broke open. Rain poured down on her as she ran.

She didn't know what happened, but she knew in her gut that it was her doing, her fault. So, she ran, hoping to outrun her panic and fear and dread. Whatever that was, she didn't like it. She didn't want it.

Salome didn't notice how empty the Tundra was when she returned to the ship. She just wanted to get to her private cabin and hide in bed under her blankets for the rest of the day.

She was tired and felt hollow when she turned the last corner before her room, and the small, grave-faced crowd of people she found gathered there were unfamiliar to her, save for her uncle. They all had Peter's eyes, though, that foggy gray that always made Salome feel incredibly alone when he looked at her.

“Captain Lukas,” Salome said quietly, expecting the usual cold greeting and empty conversation, when all she wanted from him was an ounce of approval. She was desperate, but she knew this would just be more of the same.

Instead, he stepped forward with a grin and clapped his hands on her shoulders. “You know, I was starting to worry that you didn't have it in you, but I heard what happened. I'm so proud of you, Salome.”

---

Mini Fics (Salome, Michael, Gerry, Peter, etc.)

Mini Fics (Camille, Eleanor, Elias, Jonah, etc.)

[fog-and-isolation]

//OOC: