#uh oh she has polio

[heresbasictwilight]

basic twi is now going to be drawn like this. no this is not a joke. im trying to learn to use my right hand for drawing instead of my stupid poopy left hand

[doloresliddell]

He hit me and it felt like a---Wait, no. Biblically acurrate Lolita fanart.

Dying, dying, Lolita Haze, Of hate and remorse, I’m dying.

And again my hairy fist I raise,

And again I hear you crying.

“You’ve again hurt my wrist, you brute,” said Lolita in a small voice as she slipped into her car seat.

Had Charlotte been Valeria, I would have known how to handle the situation; and “handle” is the word I want. In the good old days, by merely twisting fat Valechka’s brittle wrist (the one she had fallen upon from a bicycle) I could make her change her mind instantly.

Mister Humbert here is a certified wife beater. He casually comments on inflicting domestic violence on Valeria, his first wife (Whom he married because she looked like a child, by the way), and thinking of doing the same to Charlotte (whom he later beats to death and shoves in front of a car). This habit of hitting and wrist/arm twisting continues with Dolores. He also casually mentions punching her again, several times, while she cries.

God, one wonders just WHY no adaptation puts this on screen! With other funny things like her bleeding profusely and non stop while after he rapes her, or raping her while she has bronchitis (in fact, he enjoys it more like that. she can't fight back, and it is...just hotter for him, literally!). Oh, and also that time he attempted to rape her while she was sick again, but had to give up not because he cared for her, but because if it was Polio then that's no longer so hot, uh?

But ok, Lolita is romantic. Lolita is a love story. Rinse and repeat until the earth bursts into flames.

[shivsroy]

“It is not for me to judge my brother. History will tell that story. I can just give you a couple of instances about him. You probably all know we came across the first time during the War, for our safety. But the engines of our ship let go and the rest of the convoy sailed on without us, leaving us adrift. They told us—they told us, children—that if we spoke, or coughed, or moved an inch, that the U-boats would catch the vibrations through the hull and we would die right there, in the hull. Three nights and two days we stayed quiet. A four-year-old, and a five-and-a-half-year-old, speaking with our eyes.

So, there's a little sob story. And uh—once we were over, our uncle who was, so to speak, a character. He, um, well—they had a little money. And they sent Logan away to a better school, and he hated it. He just hated it. He wasn't uh, he wasn't well, he was sick. And he mewled and he cried, and in the end he got out and came home, under his own steam. But when he got back our little sister, she was a baby, but—she was there by then. She, uh… He always believed that he brought home the polio with him, which took her. I don't—even know if that's true. But our aunt and uncle certainly did nothing to disabuse him of that notion. They let it lie with him.

I… loved him, I suppose. And I suppose some of you did too. In whatever way he would let us, that we could manage. But… I can't help but say, he has wrought the most terrible things. He was a man who has, here and there, drawn in the edges of the world. Now and then, darkened the skies a little, closed men's hearts. Fed that dark flame in men. The hard, mean, hard relenting flame that keeps their hearts warm while another grows cold. Their grain stashed while another grows hungry. And even has the temerity to tell that hard—funny, yes, but hard—joke about the man in the cold.

You can get a little high, a little mighty, when you're warm. Oh yes, he gave away a few million of his billions, but he was not a generous man. He was mean. And he made but a mean estimation of the world. And he fed a certain kind of meagerness in men. Perhaps he had to. Because he had a meagerness about him. And maybe I do about me, too. I don't know. I try. I try.

I don't know when, but some time he decided not to try anymore. And it was a terrible shame. Godspeed, my brother. And God bless.” —Ewan Roy

[aeaeaexxzd]

It is not for me to judge my brother. History will tell that story. I can just give you a couple of instances about him. You probably all know we came across the first time, during the war, for our safety. But the engines of our ship let go, and the rest of the convoy sailed on without us, leaving us adrift. They told us… they told us children, that if we spoke, or coughed or moved an inch, that the U boats would catch the vibrations through the hull and we would die in the drink, right there in the hold. Three nights and two days we stayed quiet. A four year old and a five and a half year old, speaking with our eyes. So. There’s a little sob story. And uh, once we were over, our uncle who was, so to speak, a character, he um… well they they had a little money, and they sent Logan away, to a better school, and he hated it. He just hated it. He wasn’t uh… he wasn’t well, he was sick and he mewed and he cried, and in the end he got out and came home under his own steam. But when he came back, our little sister, she was a baby, but she was there by then, she, uh…He always believed that he brought home the polio with him, which took her. I don’t even know if that’s true. But our aunt and uncle, certainly did nothing to disabuse him of that notion. They let it lie with him. I…loved him I suppose. And I suppose some of you did too, in whatever way he would let us, and we could manage. But I can’t help but say… He has wrought the most terrible things.  He was a man, who has, here and there, drawn in the edges of the world. Now and then, darkened the skies a little, closed mens hearts. Fed that dark flame in men, the hard, mean, hard relenting flame that keeps their hearths warm while another grows cold, their grain stashed while another goes hungry. And even has the temerity to tell that hard… haha.. funny yes, funny, but hard joke about the man in the cold. You can get a little high, a little mighty, when you’re warm. Oh yes, he gave away a few million of his billions, but he was not a generous man. He was mean. And he made but a mean estimation of the world. And he fed a certain kind of meagerness in men, perhaps he had to, because he had a meagerness about him. And maybe I do about me too. I don’t know. I try. I try. I don’t know when, but some time he decided not to try anymore. And it was a terrible shame. Godspeed, my bother. and God bless.

[maddiwrites]

Secrets of the Shore

Pairing: Pogues x OC, eventually JJ x OC

Summary: This is just my rewrite of the show Outer Banks with my own twist by adding another main character which also happens to be John B’s twin sister.

Note: Thank you so much for all the nice things you guys have said about chapter one! A couple people have asked to be tagged for every update so I started a tag list. If you would like to be tagged, please message me! I hope I got everyone who asked and if I didn’t please let me know. Next chapter, you’ll learn more about Marleigh and her personality so bare with me (: Gonna post updates every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday (:

Another Note: Apparently my hashtags didn’t work the last time so I’m reposting this. I don’t know what happened. Sorry! Let me know if they worked this time (:

Word Count: 7.9k

Warnings: None

Chapter One

I wake up to the rustling of John B walking through the Chateau, kicking over empty beer cans and muttering to himself. He mentions something about service, but I can barely understand through the fog in my own head that's still heavy with sleep.

"Yo, JJ," He says and I hear a slap against bare skin. "You been outside?"

"I have polio, bro," JJ grumbles into his pillow. "I can't walk."

I peek one eye open. The sunlight coming in through the window blinds me for a second. I'm curled into myself with my back to JJ. He's sleeping on his stomach, his left arm slung over my side.

I groan as I pull myself up and lean against the back of the couch. Stretching my arms, I turn to look out the window. Even with just a quick glimpse, I can see the mess in our back yard Hurricane Agatha made. A wash of frustration runs through me when I think about all the work we're going to have to do to clean it up. Not just here but on Figure Eight too. No way those Kooks get their hands dirty for this.

I swing my legs over the mattress and follow my brother outside after hearing JJ mumble something about me leaving. His morning voice sends a rush of warmth to my chest and I have to hold back the grin that's fighting it's way on my lips.

The first thing I see is the giant tree that now lays across our yard, ripped out of its roots. Had the wind been blowing the other way, it would have landed on our house and we would have been screwed.

"Damn," I whistle, still scanning the damage. John B's pulling branches out of the HMS Pogue. Somehow our small boat has managed to survive the storm. I look over to the chicken coop that's to the side of our home. The roosters are crowing which means they're alive too.

"Agatha did some work, huh?" JJ says from the porch door. He already has a beer in his hand as he studies our yard. I know he's already thinking about the labor he'll have to put into other people's yards too.

"Yeah, she did," My brother says, looking out into the water.

"What you thinking?"

John B looks back with a smirk on his lips. "I'm thinking that storm surge pushed all the crabs out on the marsh maze. All those drum are gonna chase the crab."

"What about the DCS? Wasn't that today?" JJ asks, looking between my brother and I.

He shakes his head. "Nah, they're not getting on a ferry." He hops down from the boat and approaches us. "Come on, think about it. It's God tellin' us to fish."

JJ smirks back at him. "Yeah."

"Let me get changed first," I tell them before turning back into my house.

No lights turn on when I flick the switch on my bedroom wall. Now I know what John B was muttering about when he first woke up. I pull up the blinds on my windows to let some kind of light through my room. Then I hold up two bathing suits in my mirror, trying to pick between the blue one or the floral one.

"I like the blue one," JJ says, welcoming himself into my room. I swivel around in surprise. I thought I locked my door. I glare at the intrusion but he ignores it, his smirk only growing. "Matches your eyes and if I remember correctly, the bottoms are more cheeky than the other ones."

I throw the floral bikini top in his direction, which he skillfully dodges. I don't know if it was JJ's opinion or if I was already leaning towards the blue bathing suit, but that's the one I choose.

As JJ ruffles through his duffel bag on my dresser, I go to the bathroom to change. I throw on another pair of jean shorts and a T shirt and follow the boys out to the dock where they're already getting the boat ready.

Its kind of routine when the Pogues have a boat day. We make our way through the marsh, first picking up Pope and then Kie, who will more than likely have a cooler packed with drinks and snacks. We'll stay on the water for hours, getting sunburnt and drunk until the sun goes down or one of us wants to go back to surf.

I look over the damage that Hurricane Agatha as tortured onto our side of the island. Everyone's yard looks just like mine. Fallen trees and branches litter their back yards. Some boats have sunken into the water, and not a single house looks like they have power.

"Good morning!" John B yells to the residents as we drive by. Always the friendly face he is.

"Sure hope Guffy's boat didn't sink," JJ says, standing on the front of the boat, looking into the yards. "He doesn't have insurance."

"Yeah."

"Hi, Miss Amy!" I wave to the woman raking the leaves and picking up sticks. She looks up at us and waves back, taking a break from the yard work. "You guys get through it?"

She motions to her yard and shrugs her shoulders. "Still here!"

She goes back to her yard work and JJ immediately turns around and looks at John B with a proud smile. "She totally looked at me."

"I saw it." John B smirks back, playing along.

I roll my eyes and lean further back into the boat, pulling my sunglasses over my eyes and muttering the word 'idiot.'

"Dude look at this place." JJ whistles. "Agatha what did you do?"

"She is a crazy lady."

"Hard-core Hurricane surge. We'll be cleaning this all summer."

"That's my nightmare."

"Well, look who we have here," JJ says, making me look up at the dock we're closely approaching.

I make my way to the front of the boat to stand next to JJ as we get closer to Pope's dock where he is standing with his father already on clean up duty.

John B talks into his shoulder like a cop radios his partners and changes his voice to sound like he's speaking through a megaphone. "We have a safety meeting. Attendance mandatory." He even mimics the static noise those horns make.

Pope looks at us defeated. "I can't. My pop's got me on lockdown."

"Come on, Pope!" I groan.

JJ does the same thing as John B and talks into his shoulder, using the same voice. "Your dad's a pussy. Over."

Heyward approaches the railing of his deck and points at JJ with a glare. "Oh, I heard that, you little bastard."

I can't help but laugh at the interaction.

"We need your son!" I add.

"Yeah, and island rule. Day after a hurricane's a free day," JJ says.

"Who made that up?" Heyward continues to glare at him.

"Uh, Pentagon, I think. We have security clearance." JJ pretends to check his pockets. "I have a card."

"Think I'm stupid?"

Pope turns to his father with pleading eyes. "I'll do it tomorrow. I promise. Tomorrow."

Immediately his father shakes his head. "You think - no. No." Pope looks at us, silently conflicted. "Hell no," His dad says, reading his son's face. "You doin' it right now."

Pope looks back at us. When he finds my eyes I nod my head and wave him closer to me. "Come on. Get in the boat."

"Make a run for it," JJ says too.

Heyward glares at us. "Boy if you get in that boat -"

Pope doesn't wait to hear the rest of that sentence. He's already taking off towards us. JJ's there, ready to help him in before his dad can catch up to him. I clap my hands and wrap my arms around his neck in a tight hug when he makes it in. John B immediately starts driving away.

"How does that feel?" JJ says.

Pope can't even enjoy the moment completely. His dad yells at us as we float away and he's waving to John B to drive faster. "Go, go, go, go."

"Bring your ass back up here!" Heyward continues to yell at us.

Pope turns to yell back at his dad. "I promise I'll do it tomorrow, Dad."

"You're gonna clean shrimp, clean fish -"

"Love you pops!"

"Love you pops!" I repeat, falling back in my seat at the end of the boat and laughing up at the sky.

"We'll bring him back in one piece!" John B yells. "I promise."

"And I don't like your friends!" Is the last thing we hear from him.

A couple minutes later, we're driving down Kook land. Kie is already at the edge of her dock, holding a cooler like I knew she would. Her curly brunette hair falls behind her shoulders. I wish I had hair like her's.

JJ walks to the side to help her in. He holds out his hand for her to take. "Oh, top o' the mornin' to ya."

"Good morning," She says, moving to the end of the boat to take a seat next to me.

"Morning," John B and I say.

"Whatcha got?" Pope asks her. "You got some juice boxes?"

"You know, just some yogurts and carrot sticks," She replies sarcastically, using her shoulder to shove me slightly when I scoff.

"How about my kind of juice box?" JJ says, falling on the seat on the other side of me.

"Yeah." Kie pulls out the bottles of beer and hands them out. The three of us cheer when we pop the cap off. I let the carbonated bread water, as I like to call it, slide down my throat. Beer always taste better in the boat in the summer.

John B and Pope switch seats, leaving Pope behind the wheel.

"Brace for impact," Pope says as he picks up speed now that we're past the 'No Wake' zone. My hair flies behind my shoulders as the wind rushes past me.

JJ stands up and holds out his hands in the air, basking in the breeze and morning sun. "Bet you can't do this. Party trick." I narrow my eyes at him, glaring through the beaming sun. "Hey, Pope. Can you go a little faster?"

"Here we go. I'm movin'," Pope says.

John B shakes his and watches JJ hold out the beer in front of his face. "Doesn't work."

"We've tried this like six thousand times," I say through my laugh. I look back down at Kie who is also rolling her eyes playfully.

"I got this. It's gonna work," JJ says.

JJ tilts the beer bottle towards his mouth letting the momentum and the wind pull the beer out of the bottle and splash on his face, barely hitting his open mouth like he intended it to. The excessive beer splashes down on mine and Kie's skin.

"You're getting beer in my hair!" Kie complains, moving to the other side of the boat next to John B.

JJ doesn't stop. He keeps moving his head to catch the liquid but he will never move fast enough to catch the mess he's creating.

"All right. All right. You're done." John B says.

"All right, stop!" Kie says, everyone somewhat annoyed that they're going to smell like beer for the next twelve hours.

Before JJ could even consider listening to any of us, the boat comes to a complete halt, jerking us forward and sending JJ flying off the boat. I slam onto the floor of the boat on my side. A small groan escapes my lips as a dull pain shoots through my hipbone.

"Jesus, Pope!" Kie yells. When I look up, she and John B are also on the floor. The steering wheel broke Pope's fall.

I pull myself up and fall back on my original seat. I twist my body around to look for JJ in the water. John B calls for him, asking if he's okay. His head peeks out from the water's surface and squints back at us with a grimace.

"I think my heels touched the back of my head."

I laugh at the exaggerated statement.

"Kie, Mar, you guys okay?" John B asks.

I look back to see Kie pulling herself off the ground and falling next to John B in the seat next to him. He rubs the skin on her back comfortingly. She smiles at him gratefully and nods her head. I keep my stare there for a few more long seconds. Recently Kie and John B have been hanging out more closely with one another. Obviously, they're best friends like the rest of us, but they're always picking the seat that's next to one another. Touches linger on the other's skin, and even Kie is laughing at John B's not so funny jokes.

"Pope what did you do?" JJ swims back to the boat.

"Sandbar," Pope says, looking out into the water. "Channel changed."

"No shit."

"This is probably gonna mess this whole place up," John B says.

"Hey, I saved the beer, though."

A sarcastic scoff blows past my lips and I shake my head. "Congrats, JJ."

"Guys..." I look back over at Pope who's fixated on something in the water as he stands on the side of the boat, unmoving. Barely blinking. "I think there's a boat down there."

"Shut up. What?"

"No way."

"No, no, guys. I'm serious. There's a boat down there," Pope says.

I follow the others to the side of the boat to find what Pope is staring at. I'm ready to tell Pope he's seeing things and needs to get a couple more hours of sleep, but to my surprise he is right. A couple feet below the murky water is the silhouette of an overturned boat.

"Guys...is this..." John B says slowly.

"It's a boat!" Kie says.

I'm the first one to start stripping out of my clothes, curiosity overwhelming me. I want to see what's down there...if someone is down there.

"Guys, wait up!" I hear Pope yell as soon as I dive into the water next to JJ.

I swim deeper into the water, ignoring the thudding pain in my ears as I sink further into the marsh. The salt water slightly stings my eyes, but it isn't anything I'm not already use to. You kind of get use to it after wiping out in the ocean every time you surf.

The boat's bigger than the water's surface made it out to be. I don't think it's real until I feel the smooth exterior under my fingertips. I push myself a little deeper before I run out of air. I try looking through the open bars into the driver's seat. A part of me is afraid of what I might see, but I have to know. I have to make sure there's no one in here. Trapped and decaying all alone. My biggest fear is that my dad is somewhere in the middle of the ocean submerged in that same position.

However, I'm relieved when I don't see a dead body floating around the steering wheel.

When I feel my chest tighten, I push myself up to the surface. I gasp for air the second the cool breeze hits my face.

"You guys saw that?" JJ pants.

"Yeah!"

"Yeah I did!"

"Yeah!"

We swim back to the boat. John B climbs up first then holds out his hand for me to take. JJ is right behind me and pulls himself up.

"See?" He smirks at me when John B moves to help Pope and Kie up the boat. "Cheeky."

I shove his chest back with two hands. He falls back into the seat I had originally occupied, laughing to himself. I roll my eyes and throw my jean shorts back on when my legs are dry.

I both love it and hate it when JJ makes comments like that. It makes my heart flutter every time and fireworks explode in my stomach. But every euphoric feeling I get dissipates within seconds when I remember that the two of us will never happen. Because he's my brother's best friend. Because he's my best friend. And I can't ruin that like I ruin everything else in my life.

JJ turns to the rest of our friends and runs his fingers through his wet and tangled hair. "That's a Grady-White. A new one of those is like 500 Gs, easy. That's a primo rig."

"Yeah. That's the boat we saw when we surfed the surge." John B says, catching my attention. "Maybe it hit the jetty or something."

The memory of last night sprints to the front of my brain. The boat. I should have expected it to sink, but shouldn't have someone been behind the wheel? Whoever it was, I hope they made it out alive. I can't help but feel a small sliver of hope for that person since I didn't find them trapped inside the boat. With that sliver of hope came the reminder of my dad's disappearance like a slap in the face. Maybe if something had happened to him, he could have made it out alive too.

No. He is dead, I tell myself.

"You surfed the surge?" Kie's voice brings me out of my head. Her voice is strong and laced with disapproval.

"That's my boy. Pogue style!" JJ cheers.

"Why are you only looking at me? It was Marleigh's idea!" John B points an accusatory finger my way, hoping to take some of the blame off of motherly Kie.

Kie turns to glare at me. "What the heck?"

"Pope was there too!" I follow John B's lead by pointing my finger at someone else. This in return earns Pope a glare from our curly brunette friend.

"They guilted me into it! Said if they didn't have another pair of eyes, they'd probably drown and no one would be there to save them," Pope says with a glare. "They're lucky I was there. I was the one who saw Mar go under."

"I was fine!" I roll my eyes at Pope's dramatized version of events.

"Wait, wait." JJ interrupts the bickering. "Do we know whose boat that is?"

John B shakes his head and walks to the back of the boat where JJ and I are standing. "No, but we're about to find out."

"Dude, it's too deep."

"Oh, for the weak and feeble, JJ."

JJ makes his way to the opposite side of boat next to Kie and Pope. He digs into the cooler for another beer and takes a long swig. "Well, I'm not resuscitating you. I'm just making that clear up front."

John B pulls the anchor up and untangles it from the chains. "That's fine." He holds the anchor close to his chest, using the extra weight to drag him down further into the water. He catches Kie's disappointed glare and sighs. "What?"

Pope looks between the two and brings his hand up as a salute to my brother. "Diver down, fool."

John B nods. "Diver down."

JJ walks up to him and shoves him in the water by his chest before he can change his mind. "Yeah, he is."

John B's body disappears behind the muddy water. No one says anything as we wait. Kie bounces anxiously next to me on her toes. Her hands grip the edge of the boat until her knuckles turn white. I want to say something to her, to make her relax, but I don't want to embarrass her in front of the other two idiots on the boat.

"Should we go get him?" Pope asks after it's been a minute.

Before Kie can jump into the water, John B resurfaces, coughing water out of his mouth.

"Oh my God." Kie scowls. "That took forever."

I shake my head with a small smile on my lips and take the anchor from his hands.

"Any dead bodies?" Pope asks.

"Looting potential?" JJ follows up.

John B pulls himself into the boat. I hand him a towel.

"No. No." He shakes his head but holds something small in his hand. "But I found this motel key."

"A key," Pope says with no emotion, clearly not as excited as John B.

"Yeah, a key, Pope."

"Great!" JJ snags the key out of his hand and looks at it. "We salvaged a motel key."

"Guys, we should report the wreck to the coast guard," Kie says.

I agree with Kie. "Maybe we'll get a finder's fee."

"Yeah and not work all summer," JJ says. "Thanks Agatha, ya batch."

John B drives us back to the shore, but we don't go to the Chateau. We go to the coast guard to report the boat.

I'm not surprised to see the coast guard's post surrounded with people, shouting complaints and concerns. There is no designated line for people to professionally line themselves up. At least, if there is, no one is following the order.

I decide to wait with Pope and Kie in the boat while John B and JJ try to report the sunken boat. I rest my legs on the cooler and bask in the late morning sun with the spare couple of seconds I have in silence.

However those seconds are short-lived when I feel someone kick my legs off the cooler, almost knocking me off my seat.

"What the -"

Then I feel an upward slap to the back of my head. "The surge!"

"Ow, Kie!"

"You could have died out there!"

"But I didn't." I offer a guilty smile. When she doesn't smile back, I sigh and sit myself up straighter. "It's fun, Kie. You'll never know until you try it. You should come out with us next time."

"Your brother would have never let you do it, let alone join you."

Her words make me pause. It's true John B use to be more responsible. Out of the two us, he was always the one to keep us both in line. Sometimes he would be like a second father to me. He always protected me, bandaged me up, and took the fall for mistakes I made. Now he is following in my footsteps. Taking more risks with an act-now-think-later mentality. All of our friends know he's doing this to deal with our dad's disappearance. Unlike Kie, I don't think what he's doing is wrong. He's having more fun, and he's not going to kill himself doing it.

It's better than what I was doing when I tried forgetting about what might of happened to my dad.

The boys return with blank faces. I can already tell that the coast guards couldn't care less about their problem, let alone if they even listened.

"Well, that went well," John B says.

"So what's the plan?" I ask, ignoring Kie's deadly stare on the side of my head.

"I know how we're gonna find the guy who owns that boat." John B holds up the key with a mischievous smirk.

"We don't know who's room that is." Pope is quick to try to stop him. "It could be anyone."

Shockingly, Kie doesn't take Pope's side. She slaps her hands to the back of his shoulders and giggles. "Come on. I'll be lookout."

After JJ unties the boat from the dock, John B steers the boat in the direction of the motel.

"Finder's fee," John B shrugs. "Just saying."

"And hey, at least you'll only be an accomplice," JJ says as he stands next to John B, smirking down at a disapproving Pope.

"Man," Pope complains.

"Come on, bubba," John B laughs.

A couple minutes later, we pull up to the dock outside the motel, in front of the parking lot. I've seen run down motels before, but this one looks like it could be used in a horror movie. The wooden siding is peeling off, littering the pavement below. The railing on the balcony looks less than stable, most slabs even missing.

JJ whistles. "I thought the Chateau looked bad."

"This place is a shit show," John B agrees.

"Motel or meth lab?" Kie says.

"You be the judge," says Pope.

"Doesn't look like a place somebody with a Grady-White stays," I say, confused as to why a man living here had a boat as expensive as the one we found.

"No. Looks like a place someone with a Grady-White would get killed," Pope says.

JJ walks to the edge of the boat to tie us to the dock. I come up behind him to help.

"This is your captain speaking. HMS Pogue comin' in for landing," JJ announces.

"We good?" John B asks as I tie the last knot.

"Yeah, we good," JJ replies.

I get out of the boat first and flip my sunglasses on top of my head. There's only two cars in the parking lot, which is good news. Less chances of us getting caught.

"All right. Here goes nothin'," John B says, hopping out of the boat next to me. JJ follows.

As we turn to walk away, Pope calls out for us to stop. "Hey!"

"Yeah?" John B asks.

"Don't let them do anything stupid," He tells my brother, nodding towards JJ and I with his head. I stick my tongue out at him but he doesn't acknowledge it.

JJ wraps his arm around my shoulder and pulls me into his side. "Oh, we will."

I laugh and shove him off of me.

John B laughs too before turning to Pope. "I'm not making any promises."

"Yeah I know," Pope finally sighs.

"Hey!" Kie walks to the side of the boat that's next to the dock. Neither John B or Kie say anything for a moment. They both just stand there, looking at each other for about two seconds too long. If I were any closer, I'd be able to see them blushing like crazy. "Uh, be careful." She looks over his shoulder at JJ and I who are watching them with raised brows and amused expressions. "I mean it."

"Yeah," John B chuckles and follows JJ and I out to the stairs that will bring us to the second floor of the motel.

The smell of the motel is almost as bad as it looks. Like a sweat box drenched in urine with a hint of cigarette smoke. Stacked on the side of the building near every room is a bare mattress, not one of them without a yellow or brown stain.

"Why are all these mattresses out?" I ask.

"After a hurricane, they ditch 'em 'cause they're moldy," JJ answers me before turning to slap his hands on John B's shoulders. He raises his voice an octave higher to mimic Kie and pretends to fawn over him. "Just be so careful, John."

John B pushes him away and rolls his eyes. "God, you're so weird."

"What was that about?" JJ continues.

"I don't know. Maybe she wants us to be careful." My brother plays dumb. It makes me roll my eyes. I don't know if he's just trying to avoid the conversation or if he's just that blind.

"Since she heard you're being threatened with exile, she's just been, like -" Again JJ raises his voice and clings onto John B's arm. "Oh be careful John B."

John B pushes him off again. "Get off."

JJ continues, "Oh, give me that John D already." He drops his voice back to normal. "When are you gonna swoop on that, man?"

I roll my eyes and lead the way. Most of the curtains are pulled down on every window. The doors lining the walls look thin enough that I could fall through them and accidentally whip them open. Even the wood I'm standing on doesn't seem sturdy enough. I feel like I'm going to fall through it with every step.

"Bro, you know the rule. No pogue-on-pogue macking."

"Yeah, trust me. I know that rule."

I look over my shoulder at the blonde boy, only to find him staring straight back at me. He quickly winks at me before I turn back around. Something flutters in my stomach.

"You're the one always hitting on her," John B retaliates.

"Of course I'm always hitting on her," JJ says. And just like that, the flutters are gone and replaced with something that more resembles nausea. "She's a super-hot, rich, hippie chick slumming with us. Why? I can't figure it out either, but who cares, bro? I know that door's locked because I've tried it. Have you?"

"You need help."

"You both need help," I say, keeping my eyes on the numbers on each door. We're getting close.

"Not a little help, you need a lot of help," John B continues, ignoring me completely. "It's like every girl who just has a heartbeat, you're like...'Uhh.'"

We finally reach room twenty nine and I turn to look at the two knuckleheads with a glare. I love being their friend and all but sometimes the bro talk needs to stay within the bros.

"What? It's not a big deal," JJ says more to me than John B which only makes me roll my eyes more. "You do the same thing."

"Shut up. This is us. Twenty-nine," I say.

JJ sighs and walks to the other side of me to peek into the window. When he doesn't see anything he knocks on the door. In an even higher pitched voice he says, "Housekeeping." I look behind us to make sure no one is looking.

"Should we try it?" John B asks.

"Yeah," JJ and I say at the same time, taking a step back so John B can use the key to let us in.

"No power. No security cameras. No one's gonna know," JJ says as a final push to invade this guy's privacy and ransack his room. Find out why he has a Grady-White and how we can get equally as lucky.

The door opens with a loud creak. The inside looks just as bad as the outside. Musty, dirty, and smells like the actual housekeepers haven't visited for weeks. Maybe months. As suspected the power is out and the windows are so dirty that barely any natural light can peek through them.

On the full size bed is a small green duffel bag and a pack of cigarettes. Next to it is a pillow I would not trust laying my head. Dirty laundry surrounds it on the floor and if I listen closely, I'm pretty sure I can hear a mouse squeaking away in a corner.

"Check the bag. See if there's a name on there somewhere," John B tells me.

I grimace as I reach my hand below the zipper. I don't know what I'm going to find in there but my mind immediately thinks there's a severed head laying in the bag. In a motel like this, the idea isn't far fetched. But instead, I pull out a coat.

"A jacket," I tell them. Nothing special but at least it's not a head.

John B holds up a pair of shoes. "Denim slides."

I look at the tag and run my fingers through the pockets. There's nothing that tells me who it belongs to. "No name on the jacket."

"It's a nice jacket though," JJ says, walking up next to me and taking it from my hands to look at it. "Definitely over 50."

John B holds up another pair of shoes. "He's got New Balances."

JJ finds a small map on the night stand and holds it out to the light. "Yo, dude, come here. Maybe this is where they were fishing."

John B grabs the map to look at it. "Let me see."

"Right there." JJ points at the part that's circled in red pen.

"No, that's off the continental shelf. That's Big Swell. Nobody fished there."

John B tucks the map in his back pocket and moves to the other side of the room. He picks up a cup and sniffs it, immediately pulling it away with a cringe. "Coffee?" He offers me the mug.

"Yeah," I reply sarcastically, turning away to shuffle through the random pieces of paper on the nightstand. Just a couple of receipts from the donut shop down the street. Nothing that has a name on it. Plus a piece of paper that has random numbers on it.

"Standard. Tissues when you get lonely," JJ says from the bathroom, tossing anything that seems invaluable over his shoulder into the dirty bath tub behind him. "Oh!"

"What?" I look up at him, hopeful that he found something that we actually came looking for. Although, I don't really know what that is yet. "Did you find anything?"

"A really awesome Dopp kit your brother won't let me steal."

John B smirks at him. "Yeah, 'cause we're not stealing shit."

JJ groans and throws the kit over his shoulder with the other crap he's not taking.

John B opens the cabinet under the TV stand. He drops to his knees when he finds a small safe with a padlock protecting it. I walk up behind him and squat next to him, narrowing my attention at the codes he's trying. I roll my eyes at the first one. "One-one-one-one." The safe beeps at the incorrect password. Then he tries "One-one, one, two." Again the safe beeps at us three times.

"Punching shit at random. That will...definitely work," JJ says behind us. He bends down to pull the map back out of John B's pocket to look at it.

"Wait a second," I say, turning back to the nightstand with the paper that had the four random numbers on it. It suddenly makes sense. "Here."

"I don't know. I don't know about the second one," JJ says, more to himself because John B and I are more focused on the safe. "These coordinates, they...wait. My cousin said you could catch swordfish here."

"Six, one, six, six, six," John B mutters to himself.

"Six, six, six. That can't be a good sign," I say.

"Nah, that wouldn't make any sense," JJ shakes his head to himself. "What about a surf spot?"

The safe's lock clicks instead of beeps at us. The metal door pops open, inviting us in. John B looks at me with a proud and giddy grin. I can't help but let out a breathy laugh and open the safe completely.

"Holy shit," John B curses when we finally see what's in the safe. My eyes grow wide at what we find. Stacks of one hundred dollar bills and a gun. The find only confuses me more. If this guy had money like this, why was he staying here? "Uh...JJ."

"Hm?" JJ finally hums after having a long conversation with himself.

"You're gonna want to see this," I say, smirking up at him.

I stand up from my spot so JJ could get a good look. He crouches down next to my brother and the smile on his face is similar to a child on Christmas morning.

He reaches in and instead of grabbing the money, he grabs the gun. I can't say I'm surprised. This is JJ we're talking about.

"You grabbed the gun," John B scoffs but can't hide the grin on his face.

"This is a SIG Sauer!" JJ exclaims, holding it up in the air and admiring it.

"Put the gun back, JJ," John B says.

"This is a fucking spendy gatt, man. Just..." JJ points the gun in front of him and pretends to fire it. "Bam! Bam!" I duck out of the way. I know he's just pretending but I wouldn't be surprised if he accidentally shot it because he was too excited. "Bam! Bam!"

"Jesus JJ," I hiss. "Quit it."

"Hey, think about it! Bam! Bam!"

"We're not stealing anything," John B says.

"Just take a pic of me. Right here," JJ holds the gun to his chest and points it up at the ceiling, posing with it.

"You want me to take a picture of you?" I purse my lips and raise one brow at him.

"Yeah, like..."

"Make our own incriminating evidence? Is that what you're talking about?"

A light tapping from the back window stops us all from our tiny bickering match. All three of our heads turn to the window, confused.

"Wait what was that?" John B says first.

JJ and I follow him to the window. He pulls the curtain to the side and presses his face against the dusty glass. Pope and Kie are jumping up and down and waving their hands like two idiots and pointing at a car parked in the lot. Their voices come through the glass quietly, but just loud enough for us to hear them say, "Cops! Cops! Cops!"

"Shit," John B pushes off the window.

"What is it?" JJ asks.

"Cops."

On cue, there's knocks coming from the other side of the door. "Kildare County Sheriff's Department!"

"Shit," I curse to myself and push myself in front of the boys. The only way we are getting out is through the window. JJ and John B climb out first. JJ holds out his hand for me to take right as the door knobs squeaks.

The jump is too high. All three of us would break our ankles if we tried. The only option we have is to stick it out on the roof and hope the cops don't look out the window.

The roof is small since the window sits on the side of the building. The only way the three of us will fit is if I'm pressed against the siding with JJ pressed behind me. Which is the exact position we're in. My right foot dangles off the side of the roof to make as much room for JJ as I can so we're as flat against the building as possible. I can hear his racing heart against my back and I can't help but wonder if it's from the adrenaline rush of being caught by the cops or being pressed up against me.

I know why my heart's beating like mad.

I try to even my breathing so I can listen in on what's happening inside. The cops' voices are muffled through the walls. I glance at John B who is trying to peek inside. His brows furrow together in confusion at what he's seeing. When he looks up at me, I mouth "what" but he only shakes his head.

JJ tries to shuffle around his footing, which only makes him fumble more and lose his balance. I can't help the gasp that escapes my mouth. I grip on to both JJ and the corner of the wall so neither one of us fall. Unfortunately, as I try to save both of our lives, the gun slips out of JJ's pocket and creates an even bigger scene.

I squeeze my eyes tight and press myself deeper into the rotting wooden siding of the motel, praying that the police think it was only a bird or a squirrel. When I peek one eye open, I see John B grimacing against the building too. He shakes his head again for me and JJ not to move.

Minutes feel like hours as we wait, but eventually we hear the door close and the voices of the police officers on the balcony outside.

I exhale a deep breath and just about dive back into the room head first.

The boys follow me out the door the cops just walked out of and we meet Kie and Pope back at the boat. When they see us approaching, they both let out a sigh of relief.

"Well, that was fun," JJ says as we step back into the boat. My safe spot with nothing but water if we fall off.

"Could have warned us sooner," John B says lightly.

Kie rolls her eyes. "We would have except Pope was on the math team."

JJ turns to look at our geeky friend. "You were on the math team?"

"The cops took everything," John B says before another bickering fest could erupt between JJ and Pope. I turn to look at John B. That's what he must've seen in the room. "Like it was a crime scene."

"Did you guys find anything?" Pope asks.

"Did we find anything?" JJ says with a smirk. "No I don't think so." He holds up the gun and a stack of one hundred dollar bills. His smile grows wider. "Oh, yeah, we did."

Of course he stole them.

Pope and Kie jump up from their seats and look at JJ like he's grown two heads.

"What the hell?" Pope says in awe.

"What the hell?" Kie scowls.

"Dude, chill. Come on," JJ says, relaxed.

"Why take that from a crime scene?" Kie asks. She looks at me for some kind of explanation but I only shrug in response. I don't know what goes on in JJ's head.

JJ shrugs. "Better than cops having it."

"You serious?" Kie looks at John B who only gives her the same response I do.

Pope sits back down with his head in his hands. "I'm going to lose my merit scholarship."

JJ walks over to him and wraps his arms around his shoulders from behind him. "Hey, hey, shh, shh, shh. At least you have us, right?"

"I'm living the nightmare."

I laugh at Pope's theatrics even though I know he's genuinely worried about losing his scholarship - the only thing he has that will get him off of this damn island and make a name for himself. A selfish part of me hopes he loses the scholarship so he's forced to stay here with the rest of us, but I know that will never happen. Pope is the smartest guy I know and deserves to go off to a fancy college and be successful. The scholarship is going to give him that out we all desperately want. He's not going to lose that scholarship. I've already made sure so.

He just doesn't know it.

~ ~ ~

We dock our boat in town to grab something to eat before going back to my house. I am craving fish tacos and no one is going to stop me from getting them. As we wait outside with a couple other kids I recognize from school a couple years younger than us, paramedics and cop cars show up. Another boat pulls into the dock. A coast guard. Four men haul a stretcher off of it and wheel it up to the waiting ambulance. A sheet is drawn over the body so I can't see who it is but a sick thought races through my mind.

"Who's that?" John B asks the girl sitting near us.

"It's Scooter Grubbs. He was out during the storm," She says. I ignore the look John B casts my way and look at the girl's phone as she holds it out to us. "Check out this pic I got." She smiles sickly at it. "Dead body."

"Insane," I mumble, suddenly feeling sick and not in the mood for fish tacos.

"Holy shit." My brother says.

"What kind of boat did he have?" JJ asks her.

She puts her phone away. "Somehow, that dirtbag copped a brand new Grady-White. Everyone's out looking for it."

As soon as Kie walks out of the store carrying our food, we book it out of there. JJ tells her what happened on the ride back to the Chateau as I sit and think about how screwed we are if we get caught with the gun and money. They might think we killed him!

"So, um...we didn't see anything," Pope says as we walk into the Chateau. "We don't know anything. We need to have total and complete amnesia."

I fall on my couch and lean forward, biting my nails until I reach the nub - a nervous habit of mine. The smell of my tacos makes me queasy. They could have been swimming near that dead body yesterday. Who knows.

"Actually Pope's right for once," JJ says, plopping down on the seat next to me. He takes my hand away from my mouth and leans into the side of the couch, still staring at Pope who looks at him with raised brows. "See, I agree with you sometimes. Deny, deny, deny."

"Guys, we can't keep that money," Kie says.

"Okay, not all of us can afford unlimited data plans, Kie," JJ says which only makes Kie's scowl deepen.

"We have to pass that off to Lana Grubbs," Kie continues. "Otherwise, it's bad karma."

"Bad karma to be implicated in a felony, too," Pope adds. "We gotta go dark."

JJ shrugs. "If that means we get to keep the money, then I agree."

"I don't agree," John B finally pipes up and looks between all of us.

"What? Why?"

"Just think about it," John B says. "This is Scooter Grubbs we're talking about. Same dude that's buying individual cigarettes at the Porthole. Shit, one time I saw this dude begging for change in the Save-A-Lot parking lot because he needed gas. We're talking about a dirtbag marina rat who's never had more than forty bucks in his pocket, and all of a sudden, he's got a Grady-White?" He shrugs and holds out his hands in surrender. "Just saying."

I don't know what to think but I'm leaning towards JJ's idea. We should keep our mouths shut but roll around in the money that we risked our lives for. Finder's keepers isn't just a saying that dies when you've reached your teenage years.

John B continues, "All right, so think about it Pope. How does a marina rat get a Grady-White?"

Pope inhales sharply. "Prostitution."

"Square groupers, bro," John B says. He looks at JJ who will understand where he is coming from. "Okay, flying under the radar, no aerial surveillance. They don't do that stuff during a hurricane. What does that mean? JJ?"

JJ smirks. "They were straight smugglin'."

John B snaps his finger that's pointing at JJ, "Smuggling. And I guarantee there's a serious amount of contraband in that wreck."

"Hell yeah!" JJ stands up and slaps John B's hand in the Pogue handshake. "Fish on!"

Pope speaks up, "For the record, if that is a smuggling ship with illegal contraband on the inside of it...it probably belongs to someone else."

"Minor details."

"They could come looking for it," I say, not exactly taking Pope's side but just mentioning the risk so that everyone knows what we're up against. We don't know what kind of people could be looking for this shit too.

Pope nods. "Taking it would be catastrophically stupid."

JJ bends down so he's face to face with Pope and holds out the money in front of his face. "Right. Well, stupid things have good outcomes all the time."

"I wouldn't say all the time," I say, grinning when JJ looks over his shoulder to glare at me.

"All we need to do is figure out a way to get into the cargo hold of that wreck. Until then, we just lay low. Just act normal."

"Right. And how exactly do we do that?" Pope says.

When his eyes meet mine, a light bulb ignites in my head. My frown is turned upside down into a smile and I lean forward so everyone can see how exciting I am.

"Kegger?"

Tag List: @notyourcupofteax @acvross-the-universe @jjmaybankzz​ @jeeperky​ @realistic-breadstick​

[jj-bxby]

Rudy Pankow x Reader Request - Who’s Who

gif credit @toesure

Request - Can I make a Rudy Pankow request pls?? One where the reader and him are dating and the reader is part of the outer banks cast. They are doing The Who’s Who interview with Buzzfeed. They’re just being like super cute during the interview. Thanks! 🤗

Word Count - 1.2k

A/N - This is a piece where the reader is a part of the OBX cast as another character :)

“Rudy, I swear to god if you don’t stop shaking your leg right now,” you mumbled to your boyfriend as the camera’s light flickered on. He looked at you and grabbed your hand out of frame, giving it a squeeze as he smiled at you. Both of you were rather nervous, this was your first interview since you had told your friends you were dating but hadn’t brought it to public light, at least not yet. Luckily your friends were supportive as always, JD sending you both dumb memes about couples, Madilyn and Chase inviting you on a double date, and Madison always being there for you to talk about any relationship questions you had. It was like a fairytale for now, but the both of you had a few different late-night conversations about how your relationship being in the public eye could affect you. Gently sliding your hand from Rudy’s, you turned to look at Rachel, your interviewer for the day as she scribbled on a piece of paper.

“Alright guys, we’re going to be playing Who’s Who today. I’m sure you know how it works already, but I’m going to give you some questions and you’ll point to who is most likely to do the thing in question! Just be yourselves and feel free to talk more about the questions, okay?” The group chattered in agreement, and Rachel nodded.

“Okay, first up. Who’s most likely to mess up their lines?” You smiled and pointed to Rudy, as did everyone else. Well, everyone except Rudy himself of course, who had looked to Chase. He gave you a mock-gasp, when he saw your hand pointed to him, clutching his heart dramatically. “Seriously? Woooow. I just make up my own lines, sometimes is all!”

“To be fair, you making up lines stems from you forgetting them in the first place,” Madison pointed out, nodding to him.

“Look we got some of my best lines that way. Dare I say some of the best lines in the entire show,” He cocked his eyebrow and you laughed.

You mimicked your boyfriend's voice as you recited one of your favorites, “I can’t walk bro, I got polio.” Everyone erupted in laughter, while Rudy rolled his eyes. “Like I said, best lines in the show, man.”

Once the laughter had dropped off, Rachel moved to the next question. “Okay, who’s the most likely to fall or trip while filming?”

Everyone pointed to Madilyn, including herself. “Yeah, y'know that scene where I walked on the log after the storm? We had to do more takes of that than I’d like to admit, just because I kept falling off the log!” She laughed and looked at you, “And Y/N had to help me cover up the bruises the next day!” You smiled, remembering trying to brush color corrector and foundation onto Madi’s skin to cover up the nasty bruises she’d gotten, and failing horribly.

“Now that I think about it, Y/N did have one pretty hilarious trip at one point.” Madison said, glancing at you. “When we were doing a take of the Midsummer's party and she was wearing heels, she totally tripped on her own feet!”

Chase flashed a shit eating grin as he continued the story. “Yeah! And she wouldn’t have even fallen but Rudy tried to, uh, “catch” her,” Chase air-quoted, “but he ended up making them both fall. Luckily Rudy is just such a gentleman.”

You scrunched up your face and groaned while remembering that scene, but your boyfriend just threw his head back and laughed. “Hey you could have at least let me fall on top of you, that day, mister.” You joked as you bumped your shoulder into his lightly, giggling at the thought. He bumped you back, but it was harder than either of you had expected, and you fell off of your stool.

“Oh shit, babe,” Rudy said as he rushed to help you up. You sat there giggling on the floor as your boyfriend hopped out of his seat and held out his hand.

“Y‘know, I seem to fall a lot more with you around, ya dork.” You smiled as you took hold of his outstretched hand, him helping you to your feet while apologizing profusely. “Oh my god, it’s fine, Rudy! Look, I’m not broken!” You said, spinning in a circle before you smoothed out your dress. You glanced over at the others as you took your seat again, seeing the others had taken to staring at you both and grinning knowingly. You rolled your eyes as Madison wiggled in her seat at you, raising her eyebrows.

Rachel cleared her throat as she went back to her questions. “Alright guys, who is most likely to be found staying up all night?”

The votes were split between you and JD, both of you having pointed at each other. “Look I always get notifications from you texting me memes or dumb reddit posts at three a.m., JD!”

“Aha! So why are you checking them at three a.m., huh Y/N? You know I got read receipts on,” he accused, wiggling his finger at you.

You narrowed your eyes and slowly pointed your finger back towards yourself. “Touché.”

“Who’s most likely to be the ‘Cast Mom’?”

You perked as you pointed to yourself, pumping your fists in the air when everyone else did as well.

“I swear to god she has everything you could ever need in that damn purse of hers.” Rudy said with a laugh.

“She even kept fruit snacks in there for when I wanted something to snack on,” JD nodded. “Oh she has chips for me!” Chase chimed in excitedly.

“You don’t want to be around these boys when they’re hungry,” you explained.

“Yeah, y’all also have like an unlimited supply of Band-Aids and bobby pins in there too,” Madison added, Madi nodding in agreement.

“It’s true, she basically knows what we need before we need it! She’s also the best at making plans and getting all of us to show up to them!”

You look to Rachel dramatically. “What can I say, it’s hard raising five twenty-something’s all on my own.” You let out a little nose laugh at your own joke and saw the others smiling back at you, trying to contain their laughter.

“Alright, and final one for the day here, who’s most likely to end up together?”

Your eyes widened and darted to Rudy’s, before you both looked to your friends. All of them were making heart hands at the two of you while grinning devilishly. The blood rushed to your cheeks at their antics and you squeezed your eyes for a second shut as you smiled.

“Well I guess the cat’s out of the bag for everyone now, huh?” Rudy said as he passed a hand through his hair. He ducked over to give you a kiss on the cheek and flash you a grin.

“C‘mon, you guys are too cute together to keep it a secret!” Madison exclaimed.

“Yep, Madison’s right, guys,” Chase said, Madi and JD agreeing.

“Alright, alright!” You pulled out your phone and opened up your instagram, pulling Rudy over to you for a kiss as you snapped a picture of it. You tapped away at your keyboard as your friends “Awwwed” in the background. Rudy read the caption over your shoulder.

“well, it’s official now. @rudeth and i are dating 🥰”

After sliding your phone back into your pocket, you grabbed your boyfriend’s hand and laced your fingers with his.

“So I think we win the ‘Cutest Couple’ award, sorry guys,” Rudy said solemnly as he nodded to Chase and Madilyn, smiling at the giggles coming from you.

“Hell yeah we do.”

tags + moots ~ @joshy-obx @jjsredhat @jjsbxtch @jjsmaybcnk @drewswannabegirl @starksweasley @starlightstarkey @stargazingstarkey @aesthetic-lyss @shawnssongs @futuretaxcheat @overly-b

[symphonic-scream]

I posted 11,398 times in 2021

6041 posts created (53%)

5357 posts reblogged (47%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 0.9 posts.

I added 5,318 tags in 2021

#feral jocks au - 1386 posts

#ml feral jocks au - 1384 posts

#miraculous ladybug - 367 posts

#miraculous - 365 posts

#ml - 355 posts

#miraculous au - 351 posts

#alix kubdel - 334 posts

#zoo au - 290 posts

#chloe bourgeois - 253 posts

#juleka couffaine - 233 posts

Longest Tag: 94 characters

#which doesnt seem like much but theres a ton more id like to buy that i keep on the backburner

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Thanks for 600 followers so here's the final three heroes

Uh I'll do the description post later j wasn't prepared for it tonight so just the art done by @justanotherpersonsuniverse and the hero names and such

But oh well

Here they are!

Here are the last three jocks! From left to right, I am proud to present,

Pig!Marc, aka Oinker!

Ox!Rose, aka Oxenfree!

And

Rooster!Zoé, aka Chikadoodle!

Hope y'all like em, but let me know what you think! I loved y'alls guesses and shit, and I hope none of them come as a dissapointment

138 notes • Posted 2021-11-20 04:11:53 GMT

#4

Has someone done this yet-

Queen Banana really just looks like

141 notes • Posted 2021-05-28 18:00:23 GMT

#3

Canon can "confirm" the Couffaine's being twins all they want I will continue to ignore it and choose my own option as the mature person I am :)

183 notes • Posted 2021-08-04 04:23:16 GMT

#2

Gabriel thinks he's "Manipulate Mansplain Manwhore" but really he's just secondary to Nathalie's "Gaslight Gatekeep Girlboss"

193 notes • Posted 2021-05-08 18:17:26 GMT

#1

Jocks as Things I've Witnessed Dumb Teens Doing

Kim - applied for a job he wasn't experienced enough for and put down a friend as a reference. Said friend was called to discuss his work ethic, and had to make shit up on the spot. He got the job in the end but quit two days later cause he didn't actually like it

Alix - accidentally packed rollerblades instead of skates for the skating unit but decided to go Full Send and went on the ice in rollerblades. Broke two ribs and dislocated a shoulder trying to outskate a very angry PE teacher

Kagami - volunteered to help demonstrate a move during the gym kickboxing unit with the instructor. He mimed a swing at her head and in what seemed like a second she had him in a headlock on the ground. She broke his arm

Max - participated in the cardboard boat competition but neglected to mention he had a fear of water and screamed so loud when his boat started to sink that he blew one of the competitor's eardrums

Chloe - tried to prove she was "chill" and over her mean girl phase by licking one of the airplanes on exhibit at the museum we visited. Got so sick she had to be taken to the hospital and rumours went around that she got something like polio. Her appendix had burst and that was it

Marinette - baked a cake for the school fundraiser but when it was being brought it, discovered that she had not made an Irish themed cake, as instead of the isle of Ireland she had iced on the Fortnite map, and the flag she had made was for India. When asked about it she groaned and said something like "I stayed up for three days studying for exams. Never again."

Nathaniel - loved the cafeteria chicken tenders so much that he started a cult around them where him and his bunk mates would sneak out silverware to build a shrine behind their cabin, with a drawing of the Wendy's mascot, creating a whole chant around the tenders that the whole group learned and loudly chanted each time they were served tendies

Juleka - wrote lesbian porn and switched all the words for euphanisms until it was barely recognizable, submitted it to a poetry contest within the school, and won

Luka - put his head inside a tuba and told the tuba player to blast. He got a concussion. The medic accidentally gave him Tylenol 4s instead of the prescribed Tylenol 2s and he was so high he had to be carried around cause he couldn't walk

Adrien - asked the school cop to see his gun during a class demonstration and nearly accidentally shot our teacher, who was later revealed to be a child groomer and pedophile. He still cried when he nearly shot him though and covers his eyes when guns are shown in movies or tv

Sabrina - lit a fire in the parking lot of the school and used said fire to burn the hentai she stole from the school library. Reported the books stolen to her counselor the next day and got no fees

Lila - convinced someone that they had died when they were a kid and met god before being revived by a lifeguard, thinking the other kid wouldn't believe them. When asked what god was like they described iDubbz and got punched by an Orthodox Christian girl

Nino - snorted an entire tube of sugar from a theme park. One of the jumbo ones. To this day he cannot smell correctly, but it won him a bet and $40 Canadian, which he spent on a fake tattoo of Enrique Iglesias

Alya - got a chance to ask astronaut Chris Hadfield a question and received a Challenge Coin for doing so. The question asked? "Do you believe the SR-71 Blackbird was built using UFO parts retrieved in a crash in New Mexico?" The coin was used as a shield for a transformer

264 notes • Posted 2021-05-13 21:04:37 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[auroras-blend]

Sick Day

Summary: Vittoria is struck with a cold.

Notes: Told from Leonardo's POV

“Mr. Borghese, your daughter is completely fine.”

“She has a sore throat, a cough, and a-

“All symptoms of a cold,” Dr. Voglbaum reassured.

“A common cold’s symptoms can mask more serious conditions. It very well could be tuberculosis. Or bronchiectasis, polio, smallpox, or pneumonia…” Leonardo insisted, “Have you run every test?”

The minute her symptoms had started, he had done everything correctly. He had called their private doctor, put her to bed, and done thorough research on everything that might be wrong with his little girl. And then Dr. Voglbaum had the audacity to chalk it up to a cold.

The doctor sighed, which Leonardo found quite rude. Does he want my daughter to drop dead? “No sir, but I’m adamant that it’s just a common cold. Vittoria doesn’t even have a fever. I’m really quite certain your daughter is not dying.”

The pure apathy from this man. “Quite isn’t one hundred percent, doctor.”

“She’s your only child, yes?” he asked.

No. “Yes.”

“It’s absolutely normal to think the worst when she’s feeling unwell, but I promise you, if I were truly concerned then I’d let you know. There’s no need for antibiotics. Just lots of rest and fluids. She’ll be fine in about a week,” his doctor smiled.

“Dr. Voglbaum-,”

“Vittoria hasn’t used any word other than, what was the adjective you used dear?” he called out to Vittoria, who was reclining against her pillow.

“Icky,” she said, then sneezed.

“Ah yes, icky, to describe her condition. She’s not dying,” he laughed, “Are you dear?”

“No, sir,” she giggled.

Leonardo’s temper flared, though he made his best effort to hide it. The doctor’s dismissal of his beyond reasonable demands and theories irritated him. It was as if he was laughing at the plausibility of something being wrong with Vittoria other than being simply struck with a common cold. “Mr. Borghese, just give her a Contac- one every twelve hours- and some cod liver oil. Vapo works wonders. It’s nothing you can’t treat without the items in your home,” he grinned as he snapped his bag closed.

“What about her sedatives?”

“Shouldn’t be a problem. If you are worried, then give her a half of the dose for the day. A fourth of a tablet in the morning and the other quarter at night rather than the full dose,” he recommended before turning to wave at his patient, “Good day, Vittoria. Feel better.”

“Have a good day Dr. Voglbaum,” she said pleasantly.

And just like that, he gave the father-daughter duo a farewell. His posture was stiff, full of irritation and anger as his concerns were played off in such a callous and apathetic manner. “Papa,” Vittoria giggled, “You have a funny look!”

He instantly relaxed hearing her amused voice, “Oh?”

“Uh-huh,” she giggled before sneezing again, her nose running.

Ugh. He did his best to hide his grimace as he passed her a tissue. “Bless you.”

Then she sneezed again. “Bless you again…”

Then again, “Bless you times three!”

Her sneezing didn't, and disgustingly some even sprayed in his face. “Vittoria,” he said before his lip curled as she sneezed into her hands!

“Sneeze into your elbow principessa,” he said and watched her wipe her little hands on her nightie, “No, Vittoria don’t do that.”

When the cough started, he instantly had her pop a cotac to prevent her from spraying her germs around the room. This is disgusting but easier than people make it seem, he thought positively and indeed too soon.

***

“PAPA!” screamed the hoarse voice that was amplified by the bell he had given her.

My mistake. He leaped out of his seat to go see her, immediately worried that his valid concerns had come to life and she was coughing up blood. The minute he was in her doorway, he saw herself cocooned in her covers, only her small doll-like head peeking out. She was several feet away but he could actually hear her teeth chattering. “I-I’m-I’m co-cold!”

Is that all? It was a simple enough fix and after spending the next few minutes wrapping her up like a mummy, he thought it was over. “Pa-Papa…” she shivered, “I’m-I’m st-still freezing!”

“Still?”

“Ca-can y-you turn up the hea-heat?”

“No,” he said firmly.

She was much too young to understand this but their home had the best heating installation in the entirety of Garland City. Naturally, that cost him a pretty penny, not that he couldn't afford it mind you, but he wasn’t about to raise their bill on a whim. Besides, their home was the perfect temperature. Vittoria will just have to be content with blankets. “But Papa-!” she coughed before he gave her a hard look.

“I’ll be right back with more blankets,” he said, forcing himself to go to each room to find the warmest ones, including hers.

When Leonardo stepped in, his eyes rested on the bed where he took her mother hundreds of times. The very spot where he may have conceived his first child with her. His chest ached as he remembered his boy. I’m taking very good care of your sister, Andrea, he thought warmly before his own mood turned as frigid as Vittoria’s temperature, La tengo in vita, puttana senza cuore. Leonardo aggressively ripped the duvet off the bed and left the room, closing it with a slam that vibrated against the walls. It was an inconveniently short walk back to Vittoria’s room, but thankfully slipping on his mask in the span of a second was something he had been well-versed in for decades.

As he stepped in, he had to catch himself as he stumbled over the layers of blankets scattered on the floor. Vittoria had stripped off all of the linens on her bed and her robe lay sprawled on the floor and was in the midst of tying her hair up in a high ponytail. How did she kick the blankets all the way across the room? “What-”

“I’m really hot now, Papa!” she whined, her eyes brimming with tears.

She seemed even more miserable now than she had a few moments ago. Vittoria stood up, her legs shaking, “I feel so weak!”

Her desperation to cool down her body temperature led her to grab the glass of water on her bedside and dumping it all over her head. “Vittoria!” he scolded, dropping the blankets on the floor.

“Now I’m freezing again!” she cried, her skin instantly erupting into gooseflesh and her teeth began to grind hard against each other.

“Well of course you’re freezing,” he admonished as he went over to pull her into her bathroom, “You just dumped water on your head.”

He thought her soft sobs were a tad too dramatic. “Vittoria, if the water seeps into the carpet it can grow mold,” he lectured (not that she cared) as he went to grab her a towel.

“I want my daddy!” she sobbed.

“Vittoria, I’m right here,” he said with a blank expression.

“Noo, hold me!” she whined, leaning her snotty face into his neck.

He had to refrain from cringing and pushing her off in fear that she’d spread her germs and get him sick. With a grimace, not that she could see it, he picked her up and wrapped her in the towel. Vittoria clung to him with fervor, her legs, and arms wrapped around him tightly as he carried her to get changed. She had always been clingy and he typically indulged her whims, but now was a time he preferred his space. She’s sick. If I spurn her while she’s ill she’ll never forget and never forgive. Begrudgingly, he let her invade his boundaries and comforted her while she whined and moaned. “This is the worst,” she cried raspily.

I agree. He got her changed, soothing her the entire time, before putting her back to bed. “Now I have a headache.”

I have a headache. Leonardo pulled the covers up to her chest, only for her to push them away. “Papaaaa! Will you cuddle with me until I fall asleep?” she asked, blinking sadly.

“Vittoria, I think it’s best if you just try to go to sleep on your own.”

I’ll definitely get sick. Her frown deepened before she let out a short, congested, and disappointed breath. He could feel some part of him ache from the sound alone, knowing that she was feeling unwell. “Th-that’s okay. I can do that,” she said, “I-I took care of myself when I lived with Mama.”

She sadly turned over, facing away from him. Leonardo couldn’t help but linger by her bedside. Of course, she made Vittoria take care of herself. My poor principessa. Bitterness and competitiveness battled within him. Well, as the better parent, I have to show Vittoria she’s loved. He cast a quick glare downwards, towards hell, you unsympathetic bitch. He sighed, “Oh sweetheart, you shouldn’t have had to.”

Leonardo removed his shoes and slipped under her duvet, using his arm to pull her close. Vittoria eagerly snuggled into his side, entirely pleased and smug with herself that her Papa took her bait. “Thank you, Papa,” she smiled.

“Anything for you, principessa,” he cooed, brushing her damp curls away from her forehead.

And it was true. He’d do anything to make her happy and it just so happened the easiest way to do that was to give her affection and attention. It took time, but Leonardo had noticed that presents weren’t necessary, although they certainly were not detrimental, to winning her love. It’s too easy to win her heart. Martha had given her nothing but smiles and company, and Vittoria had already latched on like a duckling.

As he looked down at his little angel, he felt a swell of love for her. Vittoria was leaning against him, her face buried in his side and her breathing even, but raspy. She’s depending on me. He had always been afraid to tell his father he was sick knowing it wouldn’t do any good and bring nothing but pain. But she knows she can come to me.

If he were being honest with himself, he had never expected to do all of the dirty work that came with being a parent, but it was truly perfect this way. Not without its challenges of course, but Leonardo never had to compete for her affection. She loves me more. When she had admitted that to him, he had felt his heart soar. I never have to share that love.

There was Martha of course, but at the end of the day, she was nothing compared to him. She has her uses but is overall insignificant. Leonardo was happy to have her babysit, particularly because Alberto didn’t want him to. He had sent over a list of nanny agencies and private girls' schools for Leonardo to select from, not that he would. Meddling old man.

Leonardo had been sure that a slight cold would kill Cardinale, but no such luck. He had survived a bout of pneumonia, a cold, a trip down the stairs, and just recently a car crash in the months since he was released from prison. At this point, he wasn’t sure if a hit would off the old goat. His darling daughter on the other hand acted as if this cold would be her end. Her dramatics are amusing twenty-five percent of the time.

“Thank you, Papa. For taking care of me,” she said hoarsely.

“Of course. It’s my pleasure.”

“I’ll take care of you when you’re old. I won’t put you in a home, Papa,” she said softly, lifting her head to look up at him, batting her eyes sweetly.

Leonardo smiled, “Thank you very much.”

I’ll be damned if I end up in a home. “I wish you wouldn’t get old. I don’t want you to die.”

Well, that escalated quickly. “Vittoria, I’m not going to die.”

“What if you do? What if you do and I’m still here?”

“If that happens, you’ll be all grown up. Don’t worry,” he said, trying to move on from the dark topic.

He wasn’t particularly keen to talk about his future death. “Mama died. I was still little,” she said.

Leonardo shushed her, “Don’t get yourself worked up. I promise you I won’t leave you.”

On purpose, went unsaid. Vittoria was silent for a moment, a thoughtful look crossing her face. “I’m glad I live with you,” she whispered, congestion lacing her voice, “I’m happy with you.”

His heart warmed. He truly was her everything and if he were honest with himself, despite everything, he was happier with only her as well. Mia principessa, just her and I against the world. “Oh I’m happy with you too,” he smiled and began to kiss her head and tickle her sides.

In hindsight, it wasn’t the best idea considering she laughed so hard she began to cough, one of those coughs ended up spraying his face. Christ. “Sorry,” she coughed.

“It’s fine,” he said, grimacing as she wiped her nose on her sleeve, “I think it’s time for a nap.”

Vittoria, even when she was tired, never admitted she’d want a nap. Leonardo chalked it up to some pride thing, well, as much pride that could come from a nine-year-old girl. Thankfully, there were times when she did want a nap and when he asked if she needed one, she just silently followed him. No nodding, no comment. Now was one of those times as she cozied up underneath her covers, “Will you still stay with me?”

Leonardo hummed, “Until you fall asleep.”

He reached over and grabbed the lavender mixture, spraying it into the air and ritually said, “Brutti sogni, brutti sogni, vai via.”

Her eyes closed and her face softened as he began to stroke her hair. For a moment, he began to think of what he wished he had his mother do when he was sick. He remembered the fantasy he used to have to get himself through the random bouts of childhood illness, before the cold reality crashed upon him like the frigid icy sea. “Penso che un sogno così non ritorni mai più,” he began to sing.

I wish she’d be this age forever. Forever my little girl. He watched her face grow peaceful as he continued to sing, his voice different but still angelic as it had been all those years ago.

“Mi dipingevo le mani e la faccia di blu

Poi d'improvviso venivo dal vento rapito

E incominciavo a volare nel cielo infinito...”

You are so loved. My perfect principessa. No one loves you as much as me.

“Volare oh, oh

Cantare oh, oh, oh”

Vittoria was everything he wanted her to be. Everything he expected his daughter to be. God truly had blessed him. In his mind, she was perfect because that was what he deserved. After everything. Admittedly, the circumstances were different than he had originally wanted them to be, but it was perfect for him. Their own little family, he and his daughter against the world.

“Nel blu dipinto di blu

Felice di stare lassù

E volavo, volavo felice più in alto del sole

Ed ancora più su…”

Your Papa will always be here for you. No one will come between us.

“Mentre il mondo pian piano spariva lontano laggiù

Una musica dolce suonava soltanto per me...”

No one.

“Volare, oh, oh

Cantare, oh, oh, oh,”

He didn’t know how many times he ended up repeating the song, but even when he finally finished, he stayed with her, watching her and listening to her breathing to make sure she was alright. Leonardo had no idea how long he was with her, but eventually, he managed to pull himself away. “Feel better principessa,” he cooed and then closed the door.

***

“Anthony Nespoli and Matteo Spadoni are good choices for the parole board. I talked to Alberto and he said-” Sawyer continued, not that Leonardo could focus.

Leonardo hadn’t slept for the past three days. Vittoria had made a swift recovery, but the minute her coughing ceased, his cough began. Unlike his daughter, he couldn’t put his life on pause and recover. There was no “day off” for him between his business and his full-time role as a father. He considered calling Martha to care for Vittoria for a few days because if he were honest with himself, he didn’t look or sound his best. Leonardo’s eyes were red-rimmed, his nose stuffed, and his ears plugged. I haven't been sick in over a decade. It felt like he was swallowing pins and needles as he waited for the contac to kick in. Nothing was going through his mind but the thought of how awful he felt.

Perhaps it was because he was older, or maybe it was because he had more responsibilities than he used to, but this cold felt worse than any he'd ever had before. Dammit. “So what do you think…” Sawyer asked before Leonardo held up his hand to cut him off.

With exhaustion lacing his body, he picked up the phone and dialed Martha. Pick up, pick up, pick up. When the line finally clicked, he didn’t bother with pleasantries. “I need a favor.”

“Hello to you too,” she said sourly.

“I need you here at the end of the hour to entertain Vittoria after her nap and until this evening.”

“I have plans tonight.”

Leonardo internally rolled his eyes, “And I’m sure as riveting as they are with a respectable crowd, you’re on the payroll. Earn it.”

“But-”

“Tony will let you in,” he said as the phone quickly met the receiver.

Leonardo turned towards Charles. “Come by tomorrow and we’ll talk about it,” he said off-handedly as he tried not to groan when he stood up on his aching muscles, “I’m going to bed.”

“It’s two o’clock!”

He ignored that comment and left, leaving Sawyer sitting with an exasperated expression. It hadn't been the best idea to lay with Vittoria while she was sick, but it had been a bonding moment that sealed trust between them, and that had been very well worth it.

[hasufin]

On Vaccination

I want to talk for a bit about an issue with the forthcoming Covid vaccine for which we are distinctly not prepared. We have three main vaccine candidates undergoing final testing: Pfizer, Moderna, and AstraZeneca. Of those, the Pfizer one likely won’t see broad distribution in the USA because it has to be kept in liquid nitrogen and the logistics of that are insane. Most likely the one we’ll get is Moderna, but AstraZeneca is a real possibility. However, they all have the same two issues:

1. They’re a two dose regimen.

2. They make people feel really sick.

Now, I want to mention that I’m pretty sure the degree and likelihood of people feeling ill after the vaccination is being underreported. For one, I know someone who is on the AstraZeneca study. As he put it, “I’ve had every vaccine out there - anthrax, polio, smallpox, you name it - and this was by far the worst reaction I’ve ever had. I thought I had Covid. It passed after about 48 hours, but for those two days I was as sick as I’ve ever been.”

Now, the plural of “anecdote” is not data, but... well. Okay, more anecdote. Story time! Some years back I needed a CT scan for some abdominal pain. To do that, I was drinking these magnesium-laced milkshakes for a couple of days. Then, just as the CT tech is putting me in the machine, she gives me a 10cc dose of iodine contrast solution. Not much at all. But... well, it was really something else. I felt a tickling in my throat, and had just enough time to register that this was a familiar feeling but i couldn’t place it, before I was vomiting Contrast Milkshake. Literally ten seconds from injection to full gastric inversion. I didn’t even feel queasy I just straight up vomited. At that point I had three options: puke on the multi-million dollar machine (don’t puke on expensive equipment!), puke on the CT tech (Rude!), puke all over myself and make this trip a complete scrub by having contrast solution on the area we were scanning, or puke on the floor. So, I’m apologizing for the awful mess on the floor, and the tech is like “Yeah, thanks for not throwing up on me, don’t worry this happens all the time.” So I’m “How often is ‘all the time’?” “Oh, maybe a quarter of the patients respond to the iodine solution that way.” “Uh. Maybe a little warning then? If that’s a common reaction?” What she explained is, medically, “instant vomiting” is not in this context considered a reaction or side effect. They just consider it a thing that happens. They don’t report it as a reaction. It’s an expected response and nobody pays attention to it.

So, my strong suspicion is, these bouts of brief but intense feelings of illness are being treated not as a “reaction” or “side effect” but as a-thing-that-happens. Just an expected response. After all, we don’t want people scared of the vaccine. So they’re saying there’s a low chance of mild discomfort which will pass after a day or so.

But the reality seems to be “The first shot might make you feel like you’ve got the worst flu in your life.”

And this is where I fear reality might ensue. The anti-vax crowd is already bad enough. Getting people to take the first dose will not be easy. And when that first dose makes people feel like shit... how many are going to convince themselves that one dose is enough? That they don’t need to take the second shot?

My concern is, right now I’m not seeing viable planning for handling that public response. I’ve tried bringing it up, but the response I’ve had so far has been dismissal and sanctimony - that nobody is actually getting severe reactions (bullshit), that it’s nowhere near as bad as intubation (so? Intubation isn’t as bad as getting an abscess expressed, but that doesn’t mean I’m running to the hospital for a voluntary intubation); that I, personally, must get the vaccine and I’m being a coward and/or antivax, because in their mind anyone who raises any concern about the vaccination is the evil|threat|enemy who is against vaccines; that I am spreading fear about the vaccines and need to shut up... well, you get the gist.

And I’m just going, have you met people? We can’t get everyone to wear a piece of cloth to save lives. There are people living in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone. There were people who wouldn’t leave Mt. St. Helens when it was erupting. It’s hard to get people to do simple, easy things. When you’re talking a thing that takes work and causes discomfort, then a lot of people will avoid it.

We kinda need to plan for that.

[a-whump-muffin]

@eatyourdamnpears introduced me to The Darkest Minds book so I’ve been liveblogging my reactions as I read through. It’s a pretty fun book, not gonna lie, I had to stop myself from reading the entire thing all at once (so this reaction is up to chapter 9 which is where i started getting lazy liveblogging and knew it was time to quit while I was ahead). I was actually quite surprised at how good the descriptive writing was, since I’ve come to lower my expectations when it comes to YA novels or ones written in that sort of style, at least, lol.

Prologue:

Oof, how relatable. I’m mildly sensitive to loud sounds and I’ve done plenty of sound experiments where the signal is so loud in both ears that it feels like it’s living in your brain and not just sound coming from an external source. Highly unpleasant. Do not recommend.

Chapter 1:

I really like this line: And then it wasn’t just Michael’s disease. It was all of ours.

Shout out to all the disorders and syndromes out there that have multiple names because medicine just can’t stick to a singular naming system for anything.

The government was never scared of the kids who might die, or the empty spaces they would leave behind. They were afraid of us—the ones who lived.

This book has some really good lines on death and the gap it leaves in the lives of those who are still alive, which I like.

This is also kind of highly relatable given the current times. Reminds me of polio, too, which is a rightfully terrifying disease that could really make one question whether it was better to have to live with the side effects or have died from it.

Chapter 2:

Ruby actually reads like a kid character in her earlier memories and I cannot say how much I appreciate that. It’s difficult to write kids. But the little things, like arguing in the lunchroom over stupid things, how she notes she would have traced the raindrops on the window of the bus if she could, are all such kid things that I totally forgot ever happened to myself, once upon a time ago, lol.

Ooh, sleep deprivation. Nice.

And muzzles.

So the parents just kind of agreed to sending their kid off to who knows where? It seems like her mother was afraid of her, if she locked her in the garage.

Ah, is she an Orange? It would make sense if a few kids with those powers figured out how to manipulate the system.

Though aww, she thought she had a chance to run. In reality, this place seems so heavily guarded that even if she managed to get somewhere with her powers, she probably wouldn’t have made it out of there, especially tired, cold, hungry, and terrified as she was.

Chapter 3:

Woohoo, let’s add child labor to the equation, huh.

Though I’m surprised there isn’t more experimenting going on. Maybe in the background.

Sick whump! Gosh, reminds me of that one time I caught the flu a few years back.

Welp, I see you, creepy undertones.

So, uh, does she just wipe people’s memories randomly? She said she did it to her mother, and Sam acted like she didn’t know her at all at the end of this chapter. I guess it’s a good thing they don’t really physically interact at all around here, or else she’d have a lot more problems on her hands.

Chapter 4:

Oh, I thought the white noise was a sort of conditioning thing, but it turns out it’s something to do with their psychic abilities. aright.

Ohoho so they figured out other ways to re-check the classifications. At least they’ve improved over a few years.

The curious thing is why Ruby is any different from the other Oranges. They surely didn’t know how to use their abilities either when they first got them, yet hers have remained immature for years.

Aw, story-telling before bed!

Chapter 5:

Uh. Is that a seizure.

Yup.

Aright, mysterious lady lending a hand to help Ruby escape.

Chapter 6:

Huh, so what exactly makes it so that Ruby accidentally wipes the person’s memory instead of just viewing them…

Chapter 7:

“I…just did,” I said. “I told the man who was supposed to run my tests that I was Green. He listened.” “That’s weak,” Martin interrupted, looking right at me. “You probably didn’t even have to use your powers.”

I mean, but she kind of did? Martin, smarten up buddy. She did say “the man who was supposed to run my tests”…

Martin is like a typical teenage boy lol and my gosh is he a jerk.

Not a smart jerk either. Sure, explain exactly how your powers work to total strangers. You survived this long by keeping them a secret.

This is reminding me a lot of an old, old space opera manga/anime I loved way back, To Terra/Toward the Terra, right down to the color classifications. The people with psychic abilities trend comes and goes, and To Terra was one of the sad ones that ripped my heart out. I really hope this doesn’t do the same haha.

It’s super interesting how Ruby experiences people’s memories differently depending on the person. I really love the descriptions in this book, actually, I didn’t expect them to be so good. It really adds life to a work, instead of bland and lifeless descriptions.

Ohoho, so the rescue really was too good to be true and Rob is a murderer. Nice twist there.

Makes you wonder what their motive is for pulling the kids from the camps if it’s such a risk in the first place, since their intentions clearly aren’t 100% altruistic here.

Chapter 8:

Ruby is having such a great time. At least it seems she’s found some safety in the kid she scared half to death, haha.

Two more to add to the magic school bus!

“We’ll just have to try to make better mistakes tomorrow, right, Zu?”

I like this guy. He’s funny.

Ahh the name Suzume fits her! Suzume is a sparrow and she kinda gives off that vibe.

Also, fun car banter is great. As I do not have siblings and never had to suffer cross-country car rides full of bickering sibling banter, I can enjoy these scenes freely lol.

There’s something to be said about the way Ruby’s trauma is written, so knee-jerk and mixed with guilt, fear, and unknowns.

Whoops, car chase time!

Chapter 9:

Nothing to say, I kinda read this chapter really fast. That happens with action scenes like this one.

Except…

Her knee-jerk lies are kinda weird lol. I mean, truth is they were probably going to use her for some propaganda and whatever missions they run, so she didn’t need to come up with such an elaborate lie. But, well, the more details in the lie, the more real it seems.

The car is also a character, haha. Love it.

[pokegeek151]

Word-of-the-day writing challenge - 3/8/21

pivot. noun. a key person, thing, or factor.

Good ev-en-ing, listeners. How are all my favorite hypothetical future historians doing? Should I start this off with something more formal? All my other logs are pretty casual, but this one is very important. It will be studied by scientists for generations to come. *gasp* Maybe they’ll use it in schools to teach kids about my work! I guess it’s too late to start this formally, though, considering I’ve already been “started” for almost a minute now. Whoops. I guess I’ll just...go for it then.

I am excited to report that I finally got the time machine to work. I, Mackenzie Bennet, have successfully invented time travel. Man, that sounds awesome when I say it out loud. Audio logs were such a good idea. Way to go, past me. I could totally actually congratulate past me, now that I think about it. I shouldn’t, though. Time is more resilient than sci-fi makes you think, but it’s still breakable. Going into the past and looking around is one thing; sending a note to my past self and confirming her future is another.

...Where does maybe possibly falling in love with someone from the past fit into that? Specifically, where does maybe possibly having a lovely conversation with someone from the past who maybe possibly is also into me fall into that? Okay, that sounds really bad, but hear me out. Not that you have much of an option, since this is a prerecorded historical reference. Should I be talking about my love life here? Yeah, yeah I should. This is relevant to the time travel thing because she’s from the past. Which brings us back to the maybe possibly paradox thing.

So. My first test of the time machine took me to 1495 CE. I’ll figure out the date later and add it to the notes. The Gregorian calendar won’t be designed for nearly another century, and I do not know the Julian calendar well enough to calculate the date on the fly. And I know what you’re thinking - “Mackenzie, going so far back in time for your first test was super dangerous! Why didn’t you pick a date from a few weeks ago so that if something went wrong, you wouldn’t be stranded somewhere without wifi, AC, and the polio vaccine?” Though I’m sure the future scientists studying my records exist in a world where time travel has been perfected, allowing you to choose your destination, unfortunately at this stage of development, the time machine kind of drops me in random locations and on random dates. I can return home with no problems, at least. I’m just glad I landed somewhere that had recognizable English. Any earlier and I would have been at a loss for words.

Anyway, I swear I was trying to be professional. I was going to look around just a little bit, make some notes, and then leave before anyone saw me. But then someone saw me. I turned, and there she was. She was wearing clothes that seemed a bit out of place, but I couldn’t quite tell how. I think they were a bit too flowing in the wrong places. Simple, but not in a stereotypical peasant way. And her hair. There was something familiar about the style that I couldn’t identify but I knew was not normal for that time and place. The way she moved, too. She carried herself like she was...not from around there. I got so caught up in the anachronism that was her existence that I forgot how out of place I was, and she started talking to me.

I tried to tell her I wasn’t real, that I was a spirit or an angel or a hallucination or something, but then she said she’d seen me before, in a dream. I told her you can’t dream of faces you haven’t seen, but she insisted that I was familiar to her. 

And here is where the situation gets tricky. She told me she saw me in Ancient Rome. While she was in Ancient Rome. She didn’t call it Ancient Rome though because when she was there, it wasn’t ancient. Let the record show that in addition to inventing time travel, I think I also have the first recorded meeting with an immortal. She said I had appeared from the air wearing clothes similar to what I have on now, and I was speaking a language she had never heard before. She now knew it had been English, though an English she hasn’t learned yet. I spoke to no one for just a few minutes, then disappeared again. She hadn’t thought of that moment in a long time, but she still remembered it clearly. 

I thought about telling her that flashbulb memories are as susceptible to degrading and becoming inaccurate as other memories, and that you rewrite your own memories a little bit every time you access them, and so a flashbulb memory from over a thousand years ago would almost certainly be entirely different from what really happened, but then I realized she probably wouldn’t know what a flashbulb is, so I just said “Oh.”

And, uh, from there, I basically spilled the beans. For future historical context, that’s an idiom that means I was an idiot and explained to a fifteenth-century woman what time travel was because she was pretty and looked like she needed a friend. So that’s ethically dubious.

Is it worse that I told her I would come back to see her again?

I couldn’t help it! Scientifically, an immortal is super interesting, but also, she’s been so lonely. Everyone she has ever known has lived and died while she has to remain stagnant. That kind of thing makes it hard to connect to people, makes it hard to want to be alive. Just drifting from location to location as people you might love appear and vanish in the blink of an eye. It’s impossible to really understand what time is like for her. But I can be a constant in her life! At least, I can last longer than anyone else she’s ever known. I’m obviously confined to my ordinary life span, but I can go back in time and see her throughout history. A familiar face amid all the ghosts.

I’m basically just trying to justify this to myself. A hundred years from now, there might be rigorous time travel laws that would make what I did with Aurelia - that’s her name, by the way. I don’t think I mentioned that - laws that would make what I did unconscionable, but for now, since time travel has only existed for about four hours current time and I haven’t had time to draft some bylaws, I’m going to say that I did the morally good thing.

Plus, I think I’m allowed to be a little selfish sometimes. I want to see her again. I haven’t felt like this about anyone in...in ever, really. This might be a little bit of oversharing for a scientific log, but young scientists of the future ought to know that giving too much of yourself to one aspect of your life is really draining. I haven’t had any real friends in...a while, and I think I’ve been basically dragging myself into each day. So maybe a little time travel crime will be good for both of us. If something terrible comes of all of this and I inadvertently cause the collapse of society as we know it and ultimately take over the world after harnessing the infinite power of temporal causality goes to my head, I officially give anyone listening permission to come back to the beginning of this recording and stop me from going on that date with Aurelia.

*beat* That’s that, then. I think we can call this a successful test. Until next time, future historians. Bennet out.

[thelionshoarde]

Voltron legendary defender, Shance, "Hey Beautiful. Oh $hit, wrong beautiful!" (You don't have to censor the swear if you're comfortable using it)

THIS IS SO LATE, but your prompt inspired an au where the galra never pick up the kerberos team and now shiro has to deal with being back home, not being as over adam as he thought he was, sick again for the first time in a while, and with the WHOLE WORLD now aware of his disease because sanda is a dick! And also most definitely some adorable shance. (or at least, i consider it adorable. there will be duck videos!!!) a thousand pardons for the tardiness, i kept waiting until i finished the whole fic but i’m hella slow and i just keep ADDING THINGS instead

anyway, this is JUST the scene with your prompt in it lol

psa: i focused mostly on ms rather than polio when researching for shiro’s disease, but 1) i need to do a lot more research and 2) i have no personal authority or experience over this topic (tho i do have some experience with chronic illness), so while i am trying to be respectful and realistic about what shiro in this circumstance might be dealing with, please remember that i know nothing about anything, thank you

“Hey, Captain!” called a grinning engineer, coveralls down about her waist. “Good to see you up and about!”

Ah.

Shiro let his shades fall down, slapping against the sides of his nose with gentle pressure. He angled a grin and a wave, and said, “Hey yourself,” and was content to shove his hands into the pockets of his jacket and amble on over toward a big beauty all by herself on the far side.

He had been hoping not to be recognized.

More than that, he had been hoping not to be recognized in direct correlation to his disease. It wasn’t as though it weren’t a part of him, obviously -- he had to deal with it, he had to adjust the world around him to factor it in. It was there, always. But there had been a reason he’d kept it so under wraps. Shiro preferred when it was only ever acknowledged as an afterthought -- he wanted people to see him, not some version of him distorted by sickness.

At least the ‘ships were still beautiful and the summer breeze nice. He made it through the rest of the ‘yard without incident, taking a slow, curving path toward what looked to be a Corona Class vessel. Bulky, heavily shielded, made to withstand longer bouts of radiation than most of the fighters. Her cargo bay was a massive belly on the back half of her fuselage; she had to be hell on turns. And she was just as beautiful close up as she’d been at a distance. Even with his sunglasses on half of the ‘ship was a glare of sun on metal too bright to see through. It didn’t bother him; he knew a good freighter when he saw one.

Shiro came to an unsteady, grateful stop in the shadow of her nose, trying to ignore the way the world had slowly started spinning lopsided on its axis on the way over. He really should have brought his cane, but also: fuck his cane.

“Hello gorgeous,” he called up to the cockpit, nearly as bulbous as her cargo bay.

To his surprise, a voice called back: “You flatterer!”

Startled, Shiro took a step backward and nearly lost his footing, muscles not quite responding how they ought. Damn. He hadn’t realized there was anyone here. The ‘ship had been quiet the whole way over, and -- oh.

That was a torso and head rearing up from the cockpit, the top of which was apparently popped.

Shiro hadn’t been able to tell with the sun shining through the quartz glass at this angle. Ohhh shit, Shiro thought, embarrassed, as the person leaned down over the side of it and laughingly said, “I could say the same to you, Captain! I did not expect to see you here.”

“I didn’t mean you,” Shiro muttered, but he had a feeling his voice had carried with the wind because the shadowy blob nearly twenty feet overhead snickered a little. So Shiro said, louder, “I was talking to the ‘ship. I can’t even see you.”

“Just a minute and I can fix that!” the voice said, cheerily enough.

Shiro squinted through his shades, still embarrassed, and watched as the figure disappeared back into the ‘ship. The cockpits on freighter class vessels were only released for maintenance or in the case of critical emergencies out in the black. That high up in the air it wasn’t feasible to get in and out of in anything less than zero-G. A moment later and the cargo door dropped open with a creaking groan beneath the ‘ship’s high-mounted tail.

Shiro considered turning around and wandering off the way he’d come. But --

He had left the apartment because he couldn’t stand to be there, trapped. He had never felt trapped inside a spacecraft, though, even one that was grounded. And what was one person versus a whole Garrison full of them, which he’d have to traverse again if he wanted to leave. He’d been stopped only once on the way out here, yes, but there was no telling how many might stop him a second time.

And besides. He was pretty certain he wasn’t going to be able to make the walk without issue, if the numbness spreading through his shoulder, now, was any indication.

Fuck, this was awful. What was the best option here? Suddenly he felt tired all over again, weary and worn down, hating how something once so simple had become so complex. He’d just wanted to see the damn spaceships. Fuck this relapse, and fuck himself for not putting on the damned pump when his doctor had told him to.

“Hey, Captain!” the voice called once more, peering out at him, crouched absurdly halfway down the lowered ramp. “Do you want to check my girl out or not?”

The grin smudging against the corners of his mouth in response to that casual, boasting question was all the reason Shiro needed to feel better about staying right here, at least. Hands in his pockets, Shiro carefully ambled on over to the back half of the ‘ship, working hard to keep it natural looking. “Corona Class, right? I recognize the body type, but I didn’t realize there were any still in active use. There were only, hm… three? Before I left for Kerberos.”

“Yup. Helen’s the last one standing. And she’s been refitted, too, so she’s super sexy. I bet you’ve never seen anything like her.”

Snorting, Shiro finally came around aft and put a cautious foot up on the heavy metal of the cargo door, converted into a ramp here where it had thumped into the ground. “I bet I haven’t,” Shiro agreed peaceably enough. He always enjoyed it when pilots were a little in love with their ‘ships. Somehow it made him trust them more.

“Come on, come on, get up here! I never thought I’d get to show off for Captain Shirogane, I’m about to pee myself in excitement here, come on.”

“Whoa,” said Shiro, brows skyrocketing and finding a hand thrust down to help him up the ramp. The sight made something tighten inside his chest, and it was on the tip of his tongue to protest that he didn’t need any help, thank you, he knew his way around a fucking freighter. But then he followed that hand up to the man it apparently belonged to and recognized him.

“Oh,” said Shiro, startled. “You’re -- Ensign Maine, right? From the uh. The press conference?”

The ensign had risen from his crouch and come to stand sideways, staring back into the belly of the ‘ship. His hand was wiggling in impatience, and considering his past experience with this particular ensign, Shiro had the sudden, strong impression that it hadn’t been held out in deference to Shiro’s potential delicacy, and instead simply because he was eager to get Shiro in and started on the tour and this was the compromise to coming down, grabbing Shiro by his jacket, and hauling him bodily up the ramp.

Huh.

Shiro was about to go ahead and take that hand, because he could probably use the help even if he didn’t want it, and this kind of offer was far more palatable than his first assumption. But at the question, the ensign squawked, swinging around to face him. Standing farther up the incline as he was, it put him taller than Shiro, and his eyes were dark and wide, mouth gaping open in ridiculous, dramatic affront. “Maine,” he said, indignant. “That -- totally not my name, oh my god. Have you thought -- ? Agh! And all this time I’ve been so excited that I actually talked to you and you didn’t even know my name, what --”

Shiro reached up and snagged the ensign’s hand in his, tugging hard, just to get him to shut up. And also maybe because he wanted to. Just a little. Smirking, Shiro said, “I still remember you. Sorry I got the name wrong. What is it?”

He would have looked for himself, but for whatever reason this ensign seemed determined to make it impossible to see the damned name sewn onto his clothes. He was in orange again today, but this time it was a dirty coverall, the upper portion shrugged off to revealed toned biceps and forearms and what appeared to be a firm chest beneath a too-tight white undershirt. Happily, it was still just bright enough on the ramp that Shiro hadn’t had to take off his sunglasses, so the guy wouldn’t be able to tell where Shiro’s gaze was lingering. He let himself appreciate the way the ensign’s bicep bulged like a softball as he took Shiro’s weight, standing firm.

Nice.

“McClain,” said the man, now grinning down at him. It was a very white grin, big and bright in a lean, handsome face, and Shiro finally reached up to twitch his sunglasses atop his head, because Ensign McClain was officially pretty enough for eye-candy and -- yep, those eyes were blue, dark and a little wicked with that glint in them.

“Nice to meet you, Ensign McClain,” Shiro said.

McClain waggled his brows and drew Shiro a little closer, up half a step onto the ramp. “The pleasure, Captain,” he teased, “is all mine. Trust me on that one.”

[lovemesomesurveys]

Where all have you been in this world?: Arizona, Idaho, Georgia, and Mexico. Oh, and various places in California, where I live. I’m gonna make you brefagust. (: Whataya want?: Scrambled eggs with spinach and shredded cheese. Are there any words that you just cannot pronounce correctly?: Hmm. What’s in your copy and paste?: Well, this survey. What’d you dream about last night?: I had some very weird dreams last night.

Do you know anyone that’s painfully, socially awkward?: Me. Red or blonde hair?: I mean, I like red hair on myself.  What would you do if a gorilla ate your homework?: What’s of interest to me is why there’s a gorilla anywhere near my homework. And me. How do you usually pose in your pictures?: I always turn to the side. It’s about the angles. Are you clumsy?: Yes. Do you know anyone that absolutely freaks out if you try to take a picture of them?: I mean, I’m kinda like that. I don’t freak out, but I don’t like having my picture taken. I look even worse when someone else takes the photo. Do you pick on them for it and attempt to take loads of pictures anyway?: Have you ever caught yourself dancing?: Uhh. I mean I bob along to music sometimes? That’s about the extent of my dancing. I’m aware I’m doing it, it’s not something I was doing absentmindedly and then realized what I was doing or something, if that’s what you mean. How’s your posture?: Bad. Do you play an instrument?: No. Have you ever had to take care of a fake baby in family ed?: No. I actually missed that part in middle school cause I was in the hospital after having surgery. ^ were you a good mother/father?: What’s your favorite way to wear your hair up?: My hair is either in a pony tail, braid, or messy bun. Have you ever played tennis?: Nah. What’s the last thing you drew/wrote on yourself?: I don’t know, I haven’t done that in a long time. Peace or love?: Peace and love. *peace sign* Who do you love?: God and my family. Who do you NEED?: God and my family. Who do you miss?: Loved ones who have passed away. And Ty. Do any of your friends put ‘lol’ in almost every single text they send you?: No. What do you think of Sarah Palin?: Have you ever read a ‘banned’ book?: No. What does your screen name mean?: It means I love surveys. Pretty self-explanatory. Would you like you, if you met you?: No. I don’t like me as me, so.

What’s your first impression of yourself?: Uh. Where was the last place you went shopping?: The mall. How often do you take naps?: Often-ish. I try not to because I always feel groggy and crappy afterwards, but sleep often wins. Have you ever had to take a sobriety test?: No. Do you like movies more if they’re based on actual events?: I wouldn’t say I like them more necessarily, but it does add something to it. What’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever done with your cell phone?: Nothing comes to mind. What’s your opinion on gold diggers? Selfish, or smart? Both?: I don’t agree with using someone for their money. What would you do if your bf/gf was hitting on someone else right in front of you?: I’d be pissed off and upset to say the least and say something. What’s something you’ve done that you’ve sworn you’d never do?: Ugh. Which ex of yours do you talk to the most?: I don’t talk to any of them. If you were given a country to rule, which one would you want?: I don’t want to rule a country, thanks. Why?: Do you know anyone who lives on an island?: No. Can you recall the first person you ever drank/got drunk/high with?: A friend. ^ are you still friends?: I don’t have any friends anymore. What time of day are you typically the busiest?: I’m not a busy person. I spend my days resting in bed, scrolling through Tumblr, doing surveys, watching YouTube, checking social media, watching TV, eating, and sleeping. That’s not what I’d consider “busy.” They’re distractions and things to occupy myself to get through the day... And what are you doing that keeps you thus?: Did the word ‘thus’ confuse you, or is your IQ over 10?: Wtf. Have you ever taken someone else’s vehicle without permission?: Uh, no. What were you doing the last time you were videotaped?: Something on Snapchat most likely. Is that something you’d be comfortable uploading and sharing?: No. Which friend wears the same size clothes as you do?: Is there anyone’s wardrobe that you’d like to steal?: No. What do you do when you can’t sleep?: Every night I Tumblr, do surveys, watch YouTube/listen to ASMR, and watch TV until I fall asleep. How often do you tell lies, including little white lies?: “Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies...” Any secrets you’d like to share with the class?: Nah. How many scoops of coffee do you use to make a pot?: I have a Keurig.  ^ is it flavored or plain?: The coffee is just regular coffee, but I use flavored creamer. Have you ever been lost in the woods?: No. What did you last stretch the truth about?: Hmm. Have you ever had withdrawals from something?: Yes. Someone?: Something like that. How old is 'too old’ for you to date?: Date if you’re 100 I don’t care. What’s something that really pisses you off?: Blah. What’s something that always makes you smile?: My doggo. Have you ever taken your frustration out on the wrong person?: Yes. I get moody and snippy and short and my family are the ones I’m closest to and the only people I see, so they get that moody side of me, unfortunately. :/ How many nicknames can you think of for marijuana?: Mary Jane, weed, ganja, kush, bud... What about the police?: Uhhh. How do you feel about guys in tight jeans?: I don’t care? What about cardigans?: I also don’t care. Do you know how to use roman numerals properly?: Some. Longest period of time you’ve ever been awake?: Over 30 something hours. Favorite hour-long show?: I have a few. Favorite half-hour show?: I have a few of those, too. Best looking person you know of the same sex?: I think my mama is beautiful. I wish I looked more like her. I’m also very envious cause she has the best skin. My grandma did, too. I did not inherit that. What’s worse; flat soda, or warm soda?: Flat soda. Most people who’ve slept over at your house all at once?: 5. Have you ever stapled yourself?: I don’t think so. Steak or chicken?: Chicken. I don’t like steak. What’s one thing you’ve learned from a good relationship gone bad?: Hm. If you could pick to be any person in a movie, who would it be?: I don’t know. Who would you like to spend the night with?: No one. What stripper name would you give yourself?: Quickie. lmao. For those who don’t know by now, I’m in a wheelchair. Is flirting really cheating?: I absolutely would have a problem with a significant other flirting with someone else.  What’s something you own that’s /only/ of sentimental value?:  I’m big on that kind of thing, so I have a lot. What’s your choice of chips?: Doritos, either the nacho cheese or cool ranch flavor. What song would you use to torture someone?: That one song that goes, “this is the song that never ends, it goes on and on my friend. Some people started singing it not knowing what it was, and they’ll continue singing it forever just because it is the song that ever ends...” and repeat. What is the weirdest compliment you have ever received?: Some random woman thought I had polio since I’m in a wheelchair and said, “You look pretty for having polio.” ...... If someone REALLY fat was upset, and saying how FAT they were, what would you say?: I don’t know? I get uncomfortable when people make comments about their weight or appearance and do self-deprecating jokes. I do it, too, but I don’t know how to respond when other people do it. I try not to do it often cause I know it makes people uncomfortable.  What’s the funniest thing you’ve ever heard a kid say?: Kids say the darndest things.  Has anyone licked you today?: My doggo. Three things you can’t live without?: Oxygen, food, water. Three things you want to live without?: I’d love to not have health issues, both physical and mental. A random stranger walks up to you and says 'you’re hott’. You say: I’d probably awkwardly chuckle and be like, “uh, thanks” and keep going. 

[broooklynshere-blog]

Only Love Can Save The World (A Wonder Woman AU)

[So. This is a beginning to my first multichapter fic. It is an AU where Jack is Diana Prince and Crutchie is Steve Trevor. Hope you all enjoy! You can also read it on ao3. ~Eva]

Long ago, when time was new and all of history was still a dream, the gods ruled the earth. Zeus king among them. He created beings over which the Gods would rule. Beings born in his image fair and good, strong and passionate. He called his creation "Man". And mankind was good. But Zeus' son grew envious of mankind and sought to corrupt his father's creation. This was Ares, the God of War. Ares poisoned men's hearts with jealousy and suspicion. He turned them against one another and war ravaged the Earth. So, the gods created us, the Amazons, to influence men's hearts with love and restore peace to the Earth. And for a brief time, there was peace. But it did not last. Your mother, The Amazon Queen, led a revolt that freed us all from enslavement. When Zeus led the gods to our defense, Ares killed them one by one until only Zeus himself remained. Zeus used the last of his power to stop Ares, striking such a blow, the god of war was forced to retreat. But Zeus knew, that one day Ares might return to finish his mission. An endless war, where mankind would finally destroy themselves and us with them. So Zeus left us a weapon, one powerful enough to kill a god. Only the fiercest among us could ever wield it…

Jack knew he was special.

It wasn’t just being the only child and only boy on an island full of grown women. It was more than that. His mother sculpted him out of clay and prayed for Zeus to bring him to life, she wanted him so much. He knew that was special. He could tell in the way that Antiope trained him, harder than any of the others. He could see the way the women adored him, how they loved him. But he could also see the difference in how they treated him, careful with him always. Jack, Prince of the Amazons, knew that it was these things and more that made him special. He could feel it in the tingle that went through him when his mother spoke of the God Killer, the weapon gifted to them from Zeus to defend against Ares. He didn’t understand that it was his being special that would drag him away from the island, his mother, and the rest of his family.

Jack was on a break from training, taking a little walk along the cliffs that overlooked the sea. He enjoyed the ocean. It was calm, serene and blue and stretching on as far as he could see. His mother would tell him stories about the ocean, the great sea god Poseidon who was also slaughtered in the war against Ares. He loved his home. Themyscira was an absolute paradise, his mother was correct. He silently thanked the gods for providing them with such a place, a home where they could be safe.

He was broken out of his thoughts by a whirring sound. His eyes shot up and he stared over the sea, searching for the source of the sound. There was a ripple in the air and suddenly, a giant…thing appeared in the sky. It looked like some type of giant bird, with smoke coming out of it and bits of debris flying off into the air. It crashed into the sea, sending ripples around it as it slowly sank into the water.

Jack hesitated a moment, battling between curiosity and his sense of self preservation. In the end, curiosity won out. He dove into the sea, swimming steadily towards the strange object. It was no bird. It was completely foreign, some type of flying machine. He swam quicker and his heart sped up as he saw there was someone inside it. Not just someone, it was another man. The first one Jack had ever seen. He was unconscious, eyes shut and arms drifting through the sea as he sank towards the bottom. Jack swam faster and tugged him free, swimming towards the surface quickly. Their heads broke the surface and Jack inhaled deeply, making sure the other man’s face and head were above the water. He swam towards shore, tugging his passenger along. He dragged the man onto the sandy beach and laid him down, examining his face eagerly. The man was beautiful. Sandy blonde hair, much like Jack’s mothers, was plastered against his forehead where it stuck out from beneath his cap. It was short, unlike any hair Jack had ever seen. He reached back and touched his own long braid, which trailed halfway down his back. Did other men have short hair? He gently touched his fingers against the man’s cheek, feeling a hint of stubble. He jumped back slightly as the man coughed up some water and opened his eyes, looking around frantically before focusing on Jack’s face.

“You’re a man.” The wonder was obvious in Jack’s face as he stared, awestruck.

“Uh…yeah. I mean, don’t I look like one?” The man sat up slightly and looked around. “Where are we?”

“Themyscira.” Jack replied confidently, not taking his eyes from the man’s face. “Who are you?”

There was a shout behind them and the man jumped to his feet. “I’m one of the good guys. Those are the bad guys, the Germans. We need to move.”

“The Germans?” Jack had never heard of such a thing, in all his reading. Giant ships sailed towards them, along with smaller boats containing more men.

“Jack!” Jack’s mother appeared on horseback, joined by the rest of the Amazons. “Step away from him!” It was then that she noticed the boats, the men sailing towards the shore. “Ready your bows!”

“Come on!” The man grabbed Jack’s hand and tugged him behind the rocks, watching as the Amazons fired arrows at the boats. “They have guns, don’t they?”

Jack assumed that guns were what the men were firing back at the Amazons, weapons that shot tiny metal arrows at a great speed. He watched in horror as one Amazon was shot down as they jumped from the cliffs. Horses rode in, led by Antiope. The battle raged on but seemed to turn in the Amazons’ favor. Antiope and her warriors were a force to be reckoned, each one taking out multiple Germans in a single stroke. The man raced out and wrestled a gun from one of the German troops, shooting at them and joining the ranks of the Amazons. Jack edged out from the shelter of the rock and grabbed a bow, firing at one of the Germans. The arrow connected and the soldier was brought down. It was the first time Jack had killed. He grabbed the sword of a fallen warrior and fought another one off, killing him with a swipe across the chest. It was simple, the same as training. He focused on the task at hand, sending a few more soldiers down. The battle was slowing down. Only a few Germans remained, their bodies littered across the beach along with the fallen Amazons. Jack took out one last solider and took a moment to breathe, staring at the carnage.

“NO!” He heard a scream and whipped around in time to see Antiope leap in front of a bullet that was clearly meant for him.

“No!” Jack sprinted and slid to his knees in front of Antiope. Shots rang out around them but he vaguely heard them, focused on the blood that coated Antiope’s side. “No, no, Antiope…”

“Jack…” Antiope grabbed his hand, clinging to it. “The…The time has come. You…You must…”

“What, Antiope?” Jack cupped her face with his free hand, tears filling his eyes. She was dying and there was nothing he could do about it.

“The God Killer. Jack, go. Go…” The light drained from Antiope’s eyes and her grip on Jack’s hand slackened.

“Go where? Antiope, go where?” Jack clung to her body. “No…no….no!” He looked up, desperately searching for help. There was none. Antiope, the fiercest warrior the Amazons had ever seen and Jack’s beloved aunt, was dead.

Jack was furious. He ran from his mother, away from the women refusing to take action and ignoring their mission. His mother’s words rang in his ears.

Men are easily corrupted.

There is much you do not understand.

You are not an Amazon like the rest of us. You will do nothing. As your Queen I forbid it.

The interrogation of the man that Jack pulled to shore went well, in Jack’s opinion. He learned a lot. His name was Charlie Morris and he was a captain in the American army, wherever America was. He was a spy sent to collect information on the Germans, who were building great and terrible weapons. He was chased down after stealing the plans for a terrible gas that would kill thousands if it was unleashed. There was a war going on, a world war. The war to end all wars. Millions dead, women and children slaughtered. Home destroyed and villages decimated. Jack was absolutely convinced that it was Ares behind the war. His mother and the others refused to see sense. He slowed as he approached the cave where the man was being kept. It wasn’t his intention to go there, but his feet had carried him. He longed to talk to the man- Charlie- again. He glanced behind him, then made his way into the cave.

Charlie was just climbing out of the pools of water when Jack walked into the cave. He spluttered and quickly moved to cover himself. “Don’t you people knock?”

Jack ignored him and examined his body with great interest. He was built much like Jack, but a bit…softer. His wooden leg was off to the side, revealing a stump that ended just above the knee. “Do all men look like you?”

Charlie seemed surprised by the question. He carefully inched down and dried himself, fastening his leg back on. “Not all men, no. I mean, some do. We all look different.”

Jack nodded. “So all men do not have one leg?”

Charlie laughed slightly. “No. No, most have two legs. I lost mine when I was a kid to polio.”

“Polio?” Jack tilted his head to the side questioningly.

“It’s a disease. Killed a lot of people. I was lucky.” Charlie shrugged. “I uh….I didn’t get a chance to thank you before. For dragging me out of the water.”

“Thank you for what you did on the beach. It was…brave.” Jack’s eyes focused on the object in Crutchie’s hands. “What is that? Is it a helmet? Doesn’t look very sturdy.”

Charlie looked down. “This? Oh, this is a hat. My dad gave it to me, before he died. I used to sell newspapers and it was kind of part of the uniform.” He smiled slightly. “So, am I allowed to leave here?”

Jack sighed. “I tried. I tried to convince them, I even asked to go with you.” He blushed. “I mean, all of us. Amazons. The Amazons.” He looked down. “My mother thinks it’s too dangerous.”

“Can’t say I blame her.” Charlie got to his feet and pulled on his shirt, buttoning it. “The way this is going, I wouldn’t want anyone I care about near it.”

Jack tilted his head to the side in confusion. “Then why do you want to go back?”

Charlie huffed a laugh. “I don’t think want is the right word. My father once said that if you something wrong happening in the world, you can either do nothing or you can do something.” He shrugged. “I already tried nothing.”

Jack stared at him for a few moments, then turned and ran out of the cave. He knew what he had to do. Charlie Morris was right. There was a choice, between doing something and nothing. Jack had to do something. An hour later, on a boat sailing away from the only world Jack had ever known and with the God Killer pressed against his side, Jack knew he made the right choice. If he would not fight for the defenseless, who would?

[adobe-outdesign]

BATIM Chapter 3 Liveblog

I’ll be watching Ertyez’s playthrough for this!

Keep in mind these are loose and unorganized thoughts, and some things I say won’t make sense.

I will check out the updated chapter 1 and 2 afterward. Want to get spoilers out of the way first.

Under the cut for length.

hey alice

WOAH ALICE

BORIS HAS A FLOPPY NOSE

rise an fall = steam description mentions something coming to surface, so you’re probably moving between upper/lower levels of buildings

BENDY FELIX CLOCK

hey, the Fan made it in despite it not even being a FNAF game

aww, there’s a nice hammock for naps. be great if a demon wasn’t trying to kill you

Bendy clock says it’s about 7:35

ooh, so that’s where Boris has been living

cartoons have underwear, good to know

henry is vampire confirmed

is there... ink in that toilet? that’s just unsanitary

ooh, those are some nice sexy ink textures

Boris is... adorable

and he has tea!

one of those cards has Bendy’s face on it

boris and henry are evenly matched

has henry like... been down here a while hiding out or

uh hey what the fuck

does joey want to like amalgamate these guys or something?? there’s pieces from all three of them in the college

aww, he has a little TV. does it get reception?

wait did Boris kidnap you

oh yeah, alice confirmed for speaking earlier

boris seems to be mute? alice was probs made from susie, her VA, so that probably means boris wasn’t

awwwwwwwww

cartoons confirmed to need to eat? unless they just do that for pleasure/fun

I wouldn’t sleep on a pillow with Bendy’s face on it

why the fuck is there a stove in here anyway?

warm soup’s gotta be nice. cold soup is just gross

this is so wholesome

you think Boris laps up soup like a dog

why... why can’t we go back exactly

wait are those bacon soup dispensers because holy shit

who the fuck would want cold bacon soup why is there an option for that

oh, so the flashlight has the “Gent“ on it. company name maybe?

don’t point the flashlight down the hallway of N. Bonnie will jumpscare you

denial is the best way to die down here henry

were those the things from the trailer making those noises?

boris... boris that’s the wall buddy

Boris I’m sorry for doubting you. you’re a Good Boy

giant sammy-mask style bendy head... I Don’t Like It

HOLY DICK THAT IS A BIG ROOM

ooh, this must be where they make the plushies!

joey stop expanding the damn studio the thing’s gonna collapse at this rate

singing. Alice must hang out here. maybe Susie donated the bendy plushie?

joey get your passive-aggressive ass posters outta here like half your employees are literally in hell

“I better get overtime for this“ if you can’t joke about the little things

only alice, boris, and bendy plushies. they must’ve been the only main characters, or at least the most popular ones

“why is there always something blocking the door“ he’s becoming too self aware

the new item glimmer is very nice, much more noticeable than the old one

ooh, they had a whole assembly line down here for mass production

by the way, the visuals are fucking gorgeous so far

ooh, new person! and he’s Irish!

that’s like the 4th person in this studio with some type of accent

how do you melt... a plushie...

oh no, alice angel didn’t become as popular as bendy. poor susie

Joey is A) very possessive of bendy and B) quick to temper (the steam description points out that Bendy is pissed). suspicious

joey has like a 1% employee approval rating, and that was pre satan

the ink is thick enough to sculpt apparently. Henry’s pretty darn good at it too (and he actually makes an on-model Bendy, joey)

is it just me or are the camera movements much more interesting?

I like how henry’s solution to open the door is to... start the conveyor belt again. whatever works I guess

is boris still in the vent thing

aww, alice has striped sockings. that’s adorable

no wait I change my mind this is not adorable

such a tiny little voice!

why is that poster upside down

this is Bad

that door has a start with a name on it. was alice already alive and given a room before the studio shut down?

NOPE BYE ALICE HAVE A NICE EXISTENCE

she has five goddamn fingers again

“I see you there“ mmm nope you don’t

oh cool she didn’t murder us up-front. take what you can get

too bad it was hinted out so heavily before the chapter came out that she was gonna turn, but oh well

switching over to this let’s play

oh hey, the candles are repurposed bacon soup cans, that’s a nice touch

are the plushies made of ink? the ink forms into the plushies, and that would explain the “melt them down“ line

her horns are bigger like Bendy’s as well, because, you know, demon

ooh, this is the path of the demon/angel achievement

mm, dreams come true, first wall message this chapter

dressing rooms for each character maybe?

oh no no no please don’t cry susie I love you

oh, so maybe susie isn’t alice and pendle is instead? unless joey still used her, her voice is so distorted I can’t tell

either alice turned to keep the part or she helped turn pendle to get her outta the picture

doesn’t sound like alice has the southern accent..

I thought it didn’t sound like her on the recording playing, that would explain why

there’s gotta be a way to fix this... the creator lied to us... dreams come true on her wall written by sammy... oh no

bendy you ass

something’s gonna murder us as soon as we go down that hall isn’t it

wait, did boris move the cutout or did he just happen to be there when it moved? I mean he was dead when the one moved in chapter 1

hooray, violence!

oh my god, the punch cards are save points. I love it

ooh, new characters! maybe the butcher gang were the ones chasing each other down the halls?

FUCK

oh thank god it’s dead

why the fuck was it behind a poster exactly

ha, I knew there was gonna be a lift

HOW MANY FUCKING FLOORS DOES THIS HELLHOLE HAVE

over here now

come to think it, the butcher boy died when you hit it, but Boris still left a corpse. maybe there’s a difference between making things out of pure ink and human corpses?

ooh new person

I feel like these new people might be the butcher gang folks? there’s at least two so far

take an elevator down to hell for your lunch break, it’s fun

shit how many goddamn boris are there?? this isn’t the one from upstairs, it’s on a completely different level

OH OH FUCK OH FUCK OH

oh, so there were like multiple attempts at making the cartoons, but the ones that didn’t work were torn apart, maybe used for other things

oh my god, Joey and Susie were a thing. because alice and bendy were a thing

YOU SHOULD NOT LIKE HIM CALLING YOU ALICE

okay yeah susie is totes alice, the near voice replacement is what joey lied about

oh shit she’s been murdering all these toons (or... rekilling them whatever)

her face is fucked. does being a demon fuck up the process?

ooh, so toons can kill other toons then? boris I need you to get near bendy pronto

the first vs the second time... ink machine mark 1 and 2 respectively? the mk2 did have a “stability improvement“

‘a few favors’ look I’m just not interested in dating sorry

okay so I was right, she’s more of an anti-hero than straight up villain

so even she’s scared of Bendy. can’t blame her, he kind of fucked her up bad

aaand over here

ooh drill

oh shit bigger searchers

maybe the searchers are looking for more toons to kill and take things from like Alice seems to be doing?

hey I mentioned in an ask earlier than an object-head norman would be pretty damn cool right?? ahahahahaaa

oh man the ink’s spreading through the walls? that is fucking awesome and terrifying

oh no boris

Bendy doesn’t seem to see you. no cutouts either hmmm

“I have you to pick up the pieces“ do I look like wally

which one of these characters had a tommy gun

oh okay, so most weapons are made of raw ink as well

uh hey quick question what the fuck

uuuh no I don’t need to meet norman. I think he’s got his problems right now

ah, I think she’s prying out the hearts of the others and absorbing them to fix herself

maybe that’s why sammy isn’t a searcher? it’s implied he’s the one who killed that boris upstairs

ooh, the cartoons playing on the wall is a nice touch

oh god, the lift’s gonna break like that one tape said isn’t it

‘I don’t think I’ll ever get to see it‘ sweetie...

oh, I think that susie creeping in there before she slipped back into Alice’s personality

called it, stealing things insides to fix herself

this is boris numero uno in terms of being correctly made apparently, so it might be that an emotional connection leads to the best results but isn’t inherently necessary for the process to work to some degree

GIVE ME BACK MY GOOD BOY

aaanaand going back for the path of the demon:

hey how come boris doesn’t get a room

oh look, animation supplies

JOEY YOU SON OF A BITCH I WASN’T EXPECTING YOUR VOICE

“you can even cheat death itself” aaah yep there’s his motivation for turning himself into bendy all right, especially if he was literally dying o polio at the time

“positively silly thought“ like sillyvision

okay, I think I’m missing a few small things like recordings but that’s at least most of the story. in conclusion:

holy fuck

[illusionlockarchive]

Belief and Persuasion- Chapter 8 (Finale)

hey folks! i’ve been working on a little batim prequel fanfic for a while n its finally done! its a little long, so im dividing it in 8 chapters total!

if you want to read more, i’ll be tagging this under ‘bap fic’ on my blog!

summary:

Joey Drew gives an interview about how he managed to build his empire, and focuses on the two things needed most: belief and persuasion, the latter of which is trickier. As he talks about his philosophy, we can see examples of his influence at work.

This chapter: Joey finishes giving his interview, only to be confronted by Bendy.

(note: when Bendy “speaks” in this fanfiction, it’s not that he is actually speaking, but rather whistling, and everyone can just understand him, hence the parenthesis. It’s an old silly little trope, but I like it.)

"So, I think that will be all, don't you agree? You've learned quite a lot!" Joey seemed to be joking around, but the interviewer now seemed confused, as if the roles had been flipped.

He looked at his notebook to find scribbles and notes of some strange philosophy bordering in manipulation, things that he hadn't realized he was so absent mindedly writing, so compliant. Joey drew had really taken him for a spin. It really was true what they said about that man, he could have anyone wrapped up in his world in no time. But still, he had to leave.

"Thank you for having me, Mr. Drew." He stammered, getting up, almost not quite sure how to answer. "I will surely remember this, uh. I'll be making my leave now."

"Sure, sure, see you then!" Joey laughed gently as he watched the man make his way out.

After he had turned the corner, Joey moved into his wheelchair and rolled out, only to be confronted by Bendy, who seemed to have been snooping around, hidden from sight. He did not look happy, with his arms crossed and frowning.

"Why, what's this, Bendy? You look as sour as a lemon!" Joey joked, but Bendy had none of it.

"(I know what you did now. Alice and Susie are like this because you did it, didn't you? All of this, everything you do, it's just a game to you! You don't really care about making us stars, you only really care about what you want for the company. Well newsflash! I'm done bowing to you like a loyal little puppy dog, and Boris shouldn't either, no matter how much food you give him!)" Bendy whistled, pointing at him accusingly.

Joey seemed quiet for a minute, seeming genuinely caught in his deceitful manipulative behavior. Then, he nodded solemnly, and spoke again: "Bendy, you don't understand the true predicament I'm in. If I am rushing things, if I am using deceit and persuasion and every resource I can, it's because I'm truly desperate. I'm dying Bendy. The polio is eating me away." He then grabbed his toon's gloved hands, almost as if pleading.

"(What?)" Bendy took a step back. "(What- I'm sorry, that's really awful, but I still think what you did wasn't right.)"

"Yes, but there is a way to help me, to help this, I can be better, we can be better, together!" Joey grabbed Bendy's hands again, this time holding him firmly, as if not letting him get away.

"(... You... Are you honestly still...)" Bendy looked at him in dismay, trying to wriggle free of his grasp.

"Yes, Bendy, let's become one and the same, then I won't have to ever worry about death again! Won't you save me? Save your dear old creator? And let this studio prosper again? Really, killing two birds with one stone!" Joey kept holding him firmly, trapping him almost.

"(I can't believe it! You're doing it again, even when you're sick like this you're still thinking of what you can do to expand your greed! What about what I want? I'm not ready to have what happened to Alice happen to me!)" Bendy stared at him, visibly upset, his whistles growing louder and more aggressive.

"What you want? How can you possibly be so selfish when the one that has brought you to life is dying? You look positively despicable with that frown you know that! Now you better be smiling up and proud again because you are going to help me or you know what's going to happen? Without me, this whole studio's gonna come crumbling to the ground!" Joey snarled, now actually getting angry seeing as his initial persuasion didn't work.

But Bendy kept shaking his head in disbelief: "(No, no, I refuse to get the blame of YOU wanting to have a perfect little cartoon to dance for you. Maybe you should have never made me, if you weren't ready for me to disagree with you.)" Finally, he managed to tear himself free and ran off down the hall.

Joey huffed in anger and went after him; he had a feeling he knew where the little devil was going to.

Sure enough, Joey found him clawing and pounding at the ink machine, but so obviously unsure of how to attack it (if you could even call it an attack, so meek it was) that it made him laugh.

"Bendy." Joey laughed gently, but obviously mocking him. "What do you think you're doing?"

"(I'm going to destroy this wretched machine. Once it's gone, you won't be able to do any of your weird ideas anymore!)" Bendy growled between whistles, taking out random nuts and bolts and whatever he could out of it. Finally, he managed to reach one of the bigger gears, and started to pull it off, it was almost coming completely loose when...

"Bendy, no!" Joey screamed.

Bendy stopped, startled enough by how loud Joey had yelled.

"If you pull that, the pressure will de-stabilize and the whole studio's going to flood! Don't. Do that. Just gently ease it back into place and-" Joey couldn't finish.

Bendy, even if really had not moved the piece fully away from the machine, had already pulled on it so much it just came loose, and the machine immediately did its job, pipes bursting and flooding the room immediately, large amounts of ink washing over them in waves, pulling both Joey and Henry from where they were in swirls of black liquid. It quickly spread over to the other rooms, the work desks and chairs being knocked over, the items on the pedestals being washed out and spread around, the projectors violently swaying in the ink...

Alice Angel, or rather, Alice and Susie, now made into one being, heard it, from the level she stood, where she was still trying to accommodate her home, to come to terms with who she was now. Even with her having failed miserably at becoming perfect, she had still convinced the others to let her stay. But now, she thought it might not have been such a good idea. The employees that were also in that level immediately looked up, hearing it too, feeling the ceiling rumble. Then came the ink, first dripping down in small droplets, then coming down the elevator shaft, the pipes bursting. Something big and terrible was happening.

"Oh no... Oh my god..." Alice said to herself. Then she looked around, to her ex-colleagues, grabbed a microphone from a nearby booth and connected it to the speakers of the studio, shouting: "Get a move people go, go, go! This place is going to flood! Those who can, get into the elevator shaft, those who can't-"

She stopped herself, thinking about whether there was any other solution. She didn't want any of these people to die, but... No. She couldn't think of anything else. "Listen up people, try your best to keep swimming around the ink if you can, and stay atop big structures if possible! After a while, toons are going to start to form, and... and if you can't hold on until this all passes, and if you fear it's your last moment, coat yourselves in ink and become one with them. I'm serious, it's the only way, I'm immune to the ink, you will be too, but for now, try to stay alive!"

Back upstairs, Joey, who was at least trying to make an effort to hold onto the doorframe, felt himself slipping as the levels of ink rose higher and higher. Bendy on the other side of the room, had managed to hold on still to the top of the ink machine.

"Bendy..." Joey pleaded. "I don't think I'll hold on much longer..."

Bendy kept quiet, almost as if he was trying to ignore him.

"Bendy, look at me! You're the one that's doomed us all and you still refuse to help me?!" He tried an angrier approach, but that only earned him another silent distrustful and angry look from the demon.

Joey gulped, seeing as his last two fingers slipped off. "Bendy!" He yelled, as his hands finally gave out and he got washed away, engulfed by the ink. He tried one more time, using his last energy to yell: "Bendy please! You know I can't swim like this!"

Finally, guilt got the best of the little cartoon demon as he let go of the machine and swam with ease, diving towards Joey, who was now nearly drowning in the ink. Bendy was a toon, so he could keep his eyes open under the ink, and looking at Joey now, nearly unconscious, he did feel in the end, a pang of pity... His creator had been awful to him, his friends and the employees, but surely, Bendy went too far...

Suddenly, Joey's eyes shot up, blood red as they immediately reacted by being in contact with the ink, the human man grabbing the little toon and forcefully pulling him next to him. Bendy whistled and squealed in despair, his sounds muffled out by the layers and layers of ink, as he was pulled in closer and closer to the dark inky figure that had become of Joey...

Finally, the ink machine had given it all it could. The pressure had become extremely low, its fuel, whatever it was, had stopped functioning, it had for all purposes exhausted itself. At the surface of the black sea of ink, all was still for a moment, nearly peaceful.

Then a figure rose from the ink, tall, imposing, almost like a shark emerging from the sea waters, screeching and howling like and unnatural beast being born. But the most peculiar thing about this new monster was its happy grin that went from cheek to cheek.