#welp now he’s not even a third driver

[fcb-mv33]

https://www.reddit.com/r/formula1/comments/13wfwij/comment/jmb9bv2/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=mweb3x&utm_name=mweb3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

relevant to f1 fans everywhere (also LOL @ the thought of daniel ever being good enough to replace max)

I can’t actually read it cause it’s a private form or something BUT the idea that Daniel could match max is so funny to me when you watch back older races and see how close it was between Daniel and Max when Max was inexperienced, a teenager and a car that’s engine was shit.

[jeonghantis]

✧ — NO INHIBITIONS, STRANGE CONDITIONS.

PAIRING ⇝ kim mingyu x reader.

SUMMARY ⇝

road safety could not hold you back from wanting your boyfriend despite how stupid of a idea it is. kim mingyu was just as stupid.

TAGS ⇝ established relationship, smut, pwp.

WARNINGS ⇝ language, gn!reader but with female parts & wears skirts, distracted driving (DRIVE SAFELY PLEASE), explicit sexual content (MINORS, DNI!).

WORD COUNT ⇝ 3.7k words.

note: welp. LOL! mingyu driving drove me mad. this is 2 of 2 fics in celebration of mingyu month. a complete 180 from the first one i fink! oops! and yes i'm aware it's may now and i apologize deeply. but celebrating mingyu should be an all-time thing. the title is taken from the song leaving me feeling confident by the driver era. don't think the song would go specifically with the fic, i just liked the wording. this is completely self-indulgent so as always, not proofread hehe. not as good as i hoped it would be but i hope you enjoy regardless.

reblog for kim mingyu. thats it. (and to support me).

smut tags under the cut.

SMUT TAGS ⇝ ROAD HEAD! (dick sucking while driving), dom/sub dynamics, switch!mingyu, switch!reader, mingyu is kinda sub until he's not, reader is dom until they're not, size kink (reader is smaller than mingyu), use of the petname "darling" "baby" & "angel", dirty talk, praise (reader gets called "pretty"), degradation (whore, slut), hairpulling, mild begging, groping, oral (m), fingering (f), gagging, throatfucking, cunt slapping (once), cum eating, mingyu is ROUGH (man does not know his own strength but is caring afterwards), reader being used as a toy, cockdumb and cock hungry reader, reader probably got major oral fixation, big dick!mingyu like Big Big (could imagine mingyu being ridiculously big or reader just has small hands).

Wandering hands had become quite a shared habit, how natural it was for their fingers to gravitate towards each other. It was always welcomed, of course, when it acted as a need of comfort from the other. When there was not one moment where they were not craving for each other.

But this was a problem. Several problems. Two very conflicting problems.

First, not only is your hand caressing him at the moment, it’s artfully roving over to his crotch. And Mingyu truly loved your bold actions and might have appreciated it if it had been within the confines of their apartment. But it was in the confines of his car, in the middle of a highway.

Second, the problem to the first problem, was that this was his wet dream come true.

It’s a no-brainer what should be deemed more urgent. Mingyu didn’t want to careen their vehicle over the edge and risk their very lives for the sake of getting his dick wet. 

But. 

But the danger, although he knows it should, doesn’t entirely frighten him. It was a wet dream for a reason.

But Mingyu should be smart about this. He has to be smart about this.

Meanwhile, you’re thinking you may be utterly stupid about this. 

Most times, you would consider yourself a cautious person—someone who would always second-guess every decision, and hell, maybe third or even fourth-guessed. Truly, you were an overthinker. Sometimes, you wished you could just stop thinking altogether.

And that time has come now. There was absolutely no question of your decision, not even a single thought process done, when you reached to palm your boyfriend’s clothed dick. You only knew that you were being ridiculous, but it was because Mingyu looked ridiculously hot right now driving the way he does, glancing at you and smiling the way he does. What the hell were you supposed to do?

What you’re saying next is entirely pulled out of the shallowest part of your brain riddled with unbridled lust. And it challenges Mingyu’s logic and worsens his agony.

“Can I put it in my mouth?” you ask innocently, peering at him with big, curious eyes. 

“I might kill us both, babe,” Mingyu said, pearly canines bared when he wore a strenuous smile. He spares an urgent glance at how your hand sits perfectly atop his growing erection, nails dragging on denim. His grip on the steering wheel tightens.

“I trust that you won’t. You’re a good driver,” you claim, smiling sharply as you give him a tilt of your head. “Is that a no?”

There was no immediate response from him, his eyes fixed stubbornly on the road that lay ahead. Yet, you still caught the clench of his jaw under the flash of a streetlamp, the whitening of his knuckles. It was insanely unfair how Mingyu could still look so gorgeous when frustration twisted his features—or was it you who simply loved seeing his frustrations?

Mingyu weighed his options. Their apartment was still many ways away, he doesn’t know if he could tough it out for that long. He’s thankful the highway is nearly void of other cars, but is utterly bitter over how it stretches on seemingly forever, leaving him no room to pull over at all. He had to maintain focus on the winding paths. He tried not to think of the deft work of your hand on him. He tried not to think of how your mouth would soon replace it. But his pleasure-ridden body betrays him miserably—his hips lifting itself into a slow rut right against your hand.

“Endangering our lives just so you could fill your slut of a mouth,” Mingyu spelled out slowly, each word sharp. “Is that what you really want?”

“Yeah,” you chirp, entirely unaffected by his tone and he could practically hear the smirk in yours. “You could say no.”

He looks at you. “I could.”

“So, say it.”

A sliver of a smile as he turns away again. “I don’t think I will.”

“Oh?” The flutter deep in your stomach intensified, the anticipation having you on the edge seat almost quite literally as you’re leaning closer, adding a little more weight on his crotch. “Why not?”

“Because I dreamt of this,” he divulges, an airy sigh slipping from his lips. “Dreamt of your pretty lips wrapped around my cock in the middle of traffic, of your frustration when I’m unable to help you force my entire length down your throat.” 

“How filthy,” you jest, a shit-eating grin pulling your lips wider.

A pointed gaze. “You literally just offered to suck my dick in the first place.”

A shrug. “Fair.” 

Mingyu’s right hand reached for yours. The largeness of his palm fully encompasses your own as he presses down on it, applying enough delightful friction on himself for a strangled moan to get caught in his throat. 

“Just do it,” he exhales, his breathing ragged. “My dick is about to explode.”

“What a poet,” You snicker and give his dick a playful squeeze which only earns more of his choked noises. But thankfully, you’re merciful as you are excited and reckless. He hears the rustle against leather as you’re maneuvering yourself, folding your legs under you. His heart beats a little loudly against his chest, thrumming up to his ears and down to his dick, as lithe, dainty fingers make quick work on his belt and the button of his jeans. 

“Keep your eyes on the road for me, baby,” you say as your hand dives in to finally, finally, bring his awaiting cock out. “We both don’t want to be dead so soon before I give you the best orgasm of your life.”

“Then hurry up,” Mingyu seethes through gritted teeth.

He’s nearly at full length, and though you’ve held him countless times, you’re still marveling at the sheer size of him, how he sits heavily on your palm, throbbing thickly. Your fingers just barely come into a circle when you start to stroke him with an unhurried and leisurely pace, feeling the full extent of him.

“This hard just from me groping you?” you coo, tone a honeyed venom, as you run a thumb over his slit. “Trying to act all cool with me when you’re just as desperate to fill my slut of a mouth.” 

“Baby,” Mingyu said with heavy breaths that taper off into croaked groans. “Please don’t tease.”

“Don’t be so impatient,” you tut. “I promise I’ll make you feel good, but you have to be good and keep driving. Can you do that for me?” 

Mingyu swallows hard, the lump on his throat bobbing, and gives an obedient nod of his head before adjusting himself with a straightened back which might’ve been the umpteenth time he’s done so since you’ve offered your sinful proposal. 

“Good,” you hum, preening at his easy compliance, and dip your head down.

Mingyu bites down on his bottom lip hard when you take one small, tentative lick at his weeping slit. A ditzy giggle bubbles up your throat when he throbs almost immediately in response and your hand squeezes at the base of his cock in return. You continue with a few more teasing flicks, lapping up the bitter taste of him on your tongue, and only when you feel Mingyu’s thighs flex and strain to jerk up into your mouth do you ultimately indulge him.

“Oh fuck,” the poor man cusses out when you down him as much as you could, your mouth a luscious wet warmth as it envelopes around him. “Holy fuck, baby, that’s so good.” 

You hum appreciatively around his unbelievable girth, sending vibrations coursing down the just as unbelievable length that only has Mingyu whimpering praises more. A hand makes up for the rest of him that your mouth couldn’t quite reach just yet; it works in perfect tandem with your slackened jaw as your head begins to bob up and down on him.

Mingyu does not dare steal a glance in total fear of losing all sense of himself at what is most definitely the most lecherous view of his fantasies coming to life. His head stays firmly pinned against the leather-clad headrest, twitching eyes hell-bent on the road. But he could still hear the obscenity of it, all the wet glugs and sucks as your cheeks hollow out for him, and it does all but aid his concentration, gradually winding a burning hot coil deeply set in the pit of his stomach. The wandering habit presented itself as his right hand began to move (thanking the high heavens for making him left-handed), and glided over your back and all the way down under the impossibly short skirt you wore.

“That’s it, angel,” Mingyu drawls out in encouragement, his hand grabbing at the supple flesh of your ass. “You’re taking me so well.”

Hearing his praise and feeling his straying hand only spurs you to dip your head lower, attempting to swallow down more of him. There’s a sense of satisfaction when he bumps the back of your throat and you find that you have been able to take more than half of him in your mouth. But it’s fleeting when the latter half of Mingyu’s dream comes to light sooner than anticipated—that frustration, a consuming greed, of wanting to take him whole. And like he alluded to, you knew it wasn’t possible if he wasn’t fucking your mouth open, which is entirely out of the question. You’re still trying for some form of compensation—a hand wringing at the base, tongue lapping hungrily at the sides of his cock with lewd slurps—and it all comes out good when jerking out moans from Mingyu, but it’s short in appeasing you. It’s desperation now that’s having you creep further along his length, and it’s so so messy with the obscene amount of saliva cascading down his shaft, coating him with a wet sheen. You resist the urge to gag every time he hits the back of your throat and try to veer your focus on breathing through flared nostrils, eyes fluttering shut in concentration. 

It’s laughable how easily that focus is broken when prying fingers begin to pull your flimsy underwear. 

“I couldn’t help myself,” Mingyu averred, flashing a sly smile your way, before he’s gliding a calloused digit over your folds, gathering at the wetness trickling out.

Your mewls are broken and garbled, a new surge of spit gushing down, dripping on his lap. Instinctively, your hips swivel back hungrily in search of more blissful friction, as you peer up at him through wet lashes, a stray tear flowing down your cheek. 

Mingyu catches it when he casts a quick glance again. He notes the utter desperation contorting your expression, the glistening cheeks a sign of your eminent passion, and something deep inside him both inflames and melts at the same time. His eyes are assessing the road when it flickers back up, and there—the greatest silver lining known to man (just Mingyu) kissing the dusky sky—is the end of the highway. He doesn’t speed for it, no, instead he forgoes it, just the slightest bit as his foot eases off the pedal. He forgoes it for the sake of securing the vehicle, for the sake of slipping his a finger inside your wet channel as a reward for the glorious way you worship his cock. 

The surprised, choked-out groan you exude goes straight to his dick, quite literally. And he’s echoing it, staggered but loud enough to drown out the music flowing from the speakers. 

“I’ll pull over soon,” Mingyu imparts, gently hooking the digit and stroking your walls. “Just a little longer, baby, then I’ll fuck your throat. You’d like that too, won’t you?”

You pull off him with a satisfying pop, a string of spit threading between his cock and your glistening lips that’s quickly broken when both hands replace where your mouth’s been, stroking hard and fast. You glance up at him with your bottom lip tucked between your teeth, holding back your moans as your hips sway back into his finger. 

“Be quick,” you whisper, eyelids flickering, and you lean back down to trace the veins along his cock with your tongue. “I want all of you in my mouth. I want you to bury your fingers in me. I want you to abuse me until I'm a mess of spit and tears.”

Fuck. 

Mingyu slams on the acceleration. He’s still commandeering the vehicle securely with one hand, but the finger inside you goes still, letting you use it as you please with shallow rocks of your hips and clenches of your walls. He takes a right when the road opens up and pulls up in a relatively empty parking lot very swiftly with the practiced ease of the seasoned driver he was.

Up until then, you were suckling on his tip, coaxing thick, pearly rivulets out of him onto your tastebuds. If it had been possible to be drunk off of precum, you certainly appeared to be buzzed out of your mind with how much you were giggling and lapping at him for more. You were impossibly gone in the pleasure of giving your boyfriend pleasure that you weren't given enough time to prepare yourself for the absolute reckless and barbaric nature that would be forced upon you.

Safely parked, Mingyu ignored the garbled whines when he pulled his finger away from your clenching walls as he goes to quickly undo his seatbelt. Mingyu reached for two firm fistfuls of your hair, used it as a rein to properly align your mouth for him to shove his way inside promptly without so much of a warning. Gone was his usual gentle nature, he’s completely ruthless. The power of his thrusts is terrifyingly inhumane, his sac slapping up against your chin with ease now that he waives your own comfort. He’s focused on gaining his pleasure and his alone.

“Better?” Mingyu laughs darkly. “Were you struggling all this time? Is your mouth filled up enough now? C’mon, pretty baby. Let me hear those gags.”

You do let him hear it, all the gurgles and violent retches made around him. You fucking know this’ll leave you voiceless the next day—hell, maybe for the next few days if you continue moaning against the repeated force—and yet you’re still indulging him, conceding your entire being to him almost too easily, almost too enthusiastically. 

Like the sick person you were, the brutality has you practically soaking wet through the fabric of your underwear. If you weren’t in such a rough position, you might’ve reached back to relieve yourself of the incessant throbbing of your core. And Mingyu held the mantle now, your authority beaten right out of you, so you weren’t so sure if he would appreciate you doing anything else other than being his cocksleeve.

So instead, with tears a steady stream down your face and lips red and swollen, you let him abuse you, narrowing your focus on the sliding weight of his dick on your tongue, your head laxed for him to fully control with no restraints or complaints. A perfect little toy.

Your pleasurable suffering wouldn’t last for long. Mingyu was close to breaking himself. You feel his thighs tense from where you gripped him for balance, his panted moans rising in volume against your ears. 

“You’re going to swallow everything I give you, you got that?” Mingyu drawled. “Every single bit. You wanted your mouth filled, yeah? You take it all, darling.”  

Your responding, muddled moans are a warm wet ring around him. If you could see him, you’d find how pleasure cruelly contorts his features. It takes a couple more messy, stuttered strokes then the burning coil inside him that wound so tightly snapped so violently. A surge of warmth overwhelms Mingyu, his muscles tensing and seizing, and a long, broken noise is ripped right out of his chest, as he comes in thick ropes of white right into your mouth.

The salty, warm cum of him glides down your throat like melted cream. You do try to guzzle it all down as told, but he always comes in such heavy loads. Coughs threaten to tear your throat but you’re suppressing them with the greatest effort until hot tears streak down your cheeks, your chest heaving wildly. 

“So good,” Mingyu exhales, his grip on you loosened as he takes to petting your hair with such affection as he rides out the remainders of his high. “You’re so good for me, angel.”

Satisfied after gulping down the last spurt of him, you finally let up with a small whimper, your frame quivering as you sat yourself back on your folded legs, your eyes eager when it found him. Mingyu still looked unbelievably good sweaty and flushed. You couldn’t even begin to imagine what you might have looked like with your hair strewn about and swollen lips.

Mingyu didn’t seem to care. He was smiling at you with great fondness as if he had not just abused your mouth like a mere plaything. He reached to wipe some excess cum on your chin with a thumb before immediately shoving past your swollen lips. Still quite pliant, you lick it up earnestly, giving another wanton moan around him.

“Fuck,” Mingyu starts, huffing out a breathy laugh. “You’re my wet dream come true.”

“You’re welcome,” you try to lilt, but it comes out raspy and painful. 

Mingyu notices the wince in your expression and frowns, a hand immediately moving to cradle the side of your throat tenderly. “Does it hurt?”

“Well, you were not exactly gentle, Gyu,” you pointed out humorously, but caught sight of the slight concern lining his face and you quickly followed up with, “But I loved it a lot. It was hot. You were hot.”

Mingyu still looked concerned but at least the corners of his lips twitched at your addition. “I could tell you loved it. You took me really well, angel.”

“And I’d do it again and again,” you said, grinning. “Even though I’m pretty sure my windpipe is bruised.”

His hand lifts to hold the side of your face, a thumb smoothing over your cheek, as he looks over you for a moment. There’s a strange little glint in his eyes, and in your recovering state, you couldn’t quite place what it was, but it has your stomach churning again.

“I should make it up to you, shouldn’t I?” Mingyu murmurs, head cocked to the side as he smiles.

“Could you?” you ask in turn, voice soft. “Please?”

“I’ll take care of you,” he croons, raising his hand up to brush your hair back, his fingers threading through your hair. “Don’t worry your pretty little head.”

Mingyu reaches over you, promptly maneuvering your seat backwards. He eases you until you’re laying flat on your back, and his hands move to grip at your thighs, lifting them and spreading them wide. The breeze that hits your cunt has you trembling and you feel absolutely exposed when Mingyu only watches your tiny frame unfold before him, eyes drinking in the sight with an insatiable hunger. He brushes a knuckle over your soaked folds, tentative, before pressing it roughly against your throbbing clit. You’re whining, arching your back off the seat as a rush of searing pleasure courses up your veins.

You’re whining even louder when Mingyu draws back. You try to reach for his arm but it’s useless when it’s thickly corded with so much power.

“Looks like I didn’t ruin your throat enough if you’re this fucking whiny,” Mingyu remarked sharply with a laugh. He does reach a hand back but your excitement quickly fizzles out just as it spikes when a slap lands quick and sharp on your cunt and you’re jerking in your seat. “Sit still and wait quietly.”

You press your quivering lips into a thin line and nod your head obediently.

With a pleased smile, he pulls back once again. He fixes himself, shoving his dick back into his underwear, followed by sweeping his long hair back and away from his face. He takes his sweet time and doesn’t spare you a single glance as if you weren’t there at all, all the while you couldn’t keep your eyes off of him, the anticipation simmering sickly in your stomach. Then, he’s suddenly reaching for the gear shift, setting the car in reverse, and pulling out of the parking lot.

“W-Where are we going?” you asked urgently.

“Home,” Mingyu replied casually, turning the wheel adeptly with one hand. “Where else?”

You looked down at yourself, at the compromising position he forced you in and forced you to hold. “But - ?”

As if to answer your question, his right hand roves over to you and between your legs. He starts with a press on your clit, then caresses the roughened pad of his finger down to where you leak, before bringing it right back up to start again, and again, and again.

“I promise I’ll make you feel good, baby” Mingyu echoes your words, a vicious smile pulling his lips. “But you have to be good and hold yourself up like that. Can you do that for me?”

“Are you getting back at me?” You meant for your words to come out as an aggravated hiss, but it came out pathetically as a soft whimper.

“Yes,” he responded, not wasting a beat, and peers at you, a dark glimmer in his eyes. “And because this is another wet dream of mine.”

“How lucky,” you start, taking in a shaky breath when Mingyu rubs short, tight circles on your sensitive nub. “How lucky you get to fulfill two of your dreams today.”

“It’s all because of you,” Mingyu grins and, without warning, slides two thick fingers inside you. “Now, answer the question.”

“Yes,” you gasp out immediately, the sudden breach stinging so sharply, but your walls gave a sickly delighted spasm around him anyway. Your arms come up and hook themselves around your knees, bringing it up to your heaving chest. “Yes, I can.”

“Good,” he hums, curling the digits and pressing it roughly against the sweet nerves inside you. “Tough it out because this time, I will not be pulling over.”

© circlesol. all rights reserved. do not re-publish, translate, plagiarise, edit any of my work on any other platform.

[hidefdoritos]

Inspired by one of these conversations happening just today, here's a list in no particular order of weird interactions at the cargo job:

• "Every single safety meeting is the same. 'Don't smoke on the premises. Don't do drugs in the parking lot. Don't do each other in the parking lot.' But does anyone listen? No."

• Watched a longhaired prettyboy step into a loop of scrap plastic, snag his other ankle in it, and drop to his knees. Asked if he was all right. He stated, "Yeah. I, uh, just discovered some stuff about myself."

• Overheard man happily telling his friend, "I know my wife's a slut! That's why I married her!"

• "The best thing I ever saw at this job was when a guy was stacking boxes, and something behind him fell over--I have no idea how this happened!--and the box took his pants down with it. So his entire ass was out. Of course I didn't mind. It made my month."

• [Boyfriend waving his food in front of girlfriend] "This reaches places inside me that you'll never touch."

• Within ten minutes of meeting a driver, he had his boss on the phone offering me a job. He also gendered me correctly before I'd even figured it out.

• [Person leaving] "Welp, it's the best time of day: Not-My-Problem o'clock."

• "I don't even know why I stayed to help out. [Manager] asked me to, and I guess he batted his eyelashes or something. Here I am."

• Convo in which I was asked to be a couple's third. I declined.

• Extensive rant from a domme about the Jack Harlow song "Vanilla" on the radio. "He says 'I'm vanilla' and then says 'I'll choke you.' That's the most serious kink! There's almost nothing I could do with a whip to kill someone. Most everything has injury potential, but breath restriction has a very real death risk. And it's just normalized!"

• Man enthusiastically deepthroating a breadstick.

• Three people conversing: "I just wanted to check on that, you know? Cause I been there. I attempted suicide when I was 14." "What? Oh, no way, I was 14 too!" "Same! I was 11." *three-way high-five*

• Excruciatingly detailed retelling of how my coworker managed to sandwich the tip of his dick between a table and a box.

• "Aww, fuck me!" "No thanks." "...I wasn't...offering?"

• [Hollered over the screech of an industrial truck in reverse] "That's why I never plug these things in, because I have to reverse to an outlet, and it makes the worst noise in creation. But if you're gonna whine about it I'll plug it in. Are you happy now? Is this what you wanted? I bet the people in Guantanamo Bay would love to have a word with you!"

• [Watching a skilled worker] "Damn, you stacked the fuck outta them boxes."

[stillthe1]

5 (& maybe 16) for the fluffy prompts w lestappen 💕

1600k of lestappie following these prompts for u, c!!! 🩷🩷🩷 i tried to make it fun enough n maybe horny enough, so... yeah. kind of nsfw? don't really know what came to me. non-betaed so all mistakes r my own 🩷

Charles’ had the worst fucking weekend, Miami was not kind to him, as he found himself battling with a Haas and losing. And sure, he respects Kevin very much, but come on. Really, Ferrari?

(Maybe he should’ve let the Mercedes rumors continue–)

So it’s not a surprise, really, when Pierre forces him to go out. Let go of the feelings of the weekend, and maybe he’s right. As the music starts to get to him, Pierre comes back with a Cosmo for Charles and a Zombie for him. Fruity and bright, as Miami, non?

As soon as he tastes his cocktail, he makes a face. Holy hell. “Pierre, this is strong. Did you ask for more vodka?” His nose is scrunched up, and his eyes may or may not be watering. Sue him, he knows he’s a lightweight, but this was another level.

He already felt a bit drunk, and it was the start of the night. Welp. Let’s hope he doesn’t do anything too wild, or he would have to sit through another Ferrari meeting about the brand and how he’s supposed to act. 

Fuck Ferrari.

He lets go of the constant voices in his head that sound like Fred, and his management team. Let’s go of all the things and just dances around, listening to Bad Bunny singing about whatever – he just hopes it’s not Max’s song. He needs Max out of his brain for a night. For an hour, at least.

“So,” Pierre's smile is blinding, too bright for today, but he’s still Pierre, so Charles will ignore it for now. “Did you see who was in the paddock this weekend? It was insane!”

And trust Pierre to get all the gossip from whoever he gets it, always the first to know everything. And Charles, too. Being best friends has benefits, sometimes. 

“Huh? Who?” He thinks about guessing, it’s a fun game around the USA, the most random celebrities always show up and act like it’s their catwalk. Whatever. “David Beckham? Or maybe Shakira? Carlos told me way too many times about her leave to Miami…”

“No, Charles! Well, I don’t know, but!” Pierre’s hands do a strange movement, and Charles thinks he’s had too many drinks already. “It was Martijn Garrix and Daniel!”

“Daniel?” His voice sounds weird even to his ears, all flat and no energy behind it. “Ricciardo? What were they doing here?”

He knows that Daniel is Red Bull’s third driver, but he was around in Australia too. Did he really need to be around that much? Around Max—

Do not think about Max. Charles, do not think about Max. Abort, abort, abort.

“They were here to support Max, or so Danny told me. Oh! And they told me they’ll be here too, so we’ll see them!”

Fuck. Fuckity fucking fuck. Merde. No, no, and no. He wanted a night free of Max Verstappen, free of the thoughts he had around him, the way his heart started beating faster and faster around him. He had a bad weekend, a bad season, and a bad year, already. He needed this. Fuck.

He feels his breath come in short, and the familiar feeling of panic settles inside his chest. He excuses himself from Pierre quickly, noticing his friend’s concerned stare, and walks quickly to the patio of the club. 

He needed space. He needed to be alone for a minute. His vision is blurry, and for a moment he thinks it’s the alcohol. But no, fucking hell. He’s tearing up. At a goddamned club in Miami. What a great year, huh?

He sits on one of the couches with a view of the sea and breathes in the salty air. He closes his eyes to avoid tears, or worse, a whole breakdown. He does not have time for a breakdown, no matter what his therapist said.

He needs his bubble of personal space and some minutes to himself–

“Charles?”

He opens his eyes, a bit reluctantly, and looks up at Max. How did he find him? Has he been looking around, praying to catch him? Or was he just casually walking by and thought, huh, let’s stop a moment to talk to my ex-nemesis? Fun times, hah.

He realizes his eyes are full of tears at the same time as Max's. Max’s eyes widen, sitting quickly by his side. It feels nice, and Charles suppresses a sob.

His walls are down, a combination of alcohol and Max’s proximity, and all he wants is to cuddle up to Max, give in to the urge he has always had and kiss the freckle that frames Max’s lips. 

“Charles, hey, love. Can you hear me?” Max’s voice is soft, and it scratches all of Charles’ needs. He nods, biting his bottom lip and trying not to cry. “Okay, can you look at me?”

He shakes his head no and prays Max does not read into it. It’s just. Max’s eyes have always been Charles’ obsession. Deep blue, with the prettiest lashes known to mankind, and. Max always says so much with his eyes, wears his heart on his sleeve, and makes Charles feel untethered. 

“Tell me what I can do for you, honey. Please.” The emphasis on honey makes Charles tear up even more. Fuck, he needs Max. He needs Max for himself, maybe show everyone around them – Daniel Ricciardo, especially — that Max Verstappen is his.

But he is not. They’re not dating. They’re nothing. Charles always feels lost when he sees Max direct his soft smiles at someone that’s not him. Feels like he has traveled through time, feels the scratchy texture of the Sauber fireproofs, and feels the indifference in Max’s eyes when he looked at him back then.

Charles always tries to not be selfish and tries not to ask too much. But right now, with Max asking him what he needs, he can’t lie.

“Stay?” His voice sounds scratchy, even though he has avoided crying for now. He refuses to look up. He doesn’t want to look at Max while he feels like this. Lost, jealous, possessive. 

He feels Max’s nod against his arm, and he startles. Since when are they so close? He can smell Max’s cologne and it’s intoxicating, spicy but with enough vanilla to feel cozy. 

He feels Max’s sigh against his shoulder, and he lets himself enjoy the moment. Enjoy Max’s proximity, the smell of his sandalwood shampoo, everything that makes him Max.

It’s enough to calm him down. Enough for him to see things a bit clearer, without that much panic taking over his brain. Max is here. Max is sitting by his side, when he should be celebrating his incredible win, getting drunk with Daniel and Martijn.

But he stayed. Because Charles asked him to. It’s too much for his brain to catch up, and he can’t stop himself. He can’t help it, not with the amount of alcohol his Cosmopolitan had, not while having Max cuddling up with him.

“Max…” 

Max looks up at him, blue eyes full on display and face smushed against Charles’ arm. Fuck, he looks so beautiful. So freaking cute. Charles almost wants to kiss his nose, but he must refrain.

“Max, can I kiss you?” 

Max nods quickly, biting his bottom lip, worrying it under his teeth, and turning it a very pretty pink. As pink as the blush in Max’s ears, cheeks, and neck. He looks edible.

“Took you long enough, Leclerc. I thought you would never ask.” His smirk is ruined by the nervousness his eyes show, and really, Charles has never been patient. 

And he has always wanted Max Verstappen. So he cannot be blamed if their first kiss is a bit rushed, a bit too quick. Max smiles against his lips, and everything feels like a movie. He almost expects the techno music around them to switch to Taylor Swift.

Charles giggles, finally giving in and kissing Max’s nose, too. 

Max takes a hold of his face with one of his big hands and Charles feels the world around them disappear, his eyes focused on Max’s pretty, pink plump lips. He presses their lips together once more, and it feels like home. Max tastes like gintonic, a bit minty, and it’s heaven. Charles, being his bratty self, bites Max’s bottom lip, and finally gives fully into the kiss. 

It’s slick, hot and fucking perfect. Nothing could have prepared Charles for this, no matter how many fantasies he had as a teenager, not even the ones years later. This was his own personal heaven, with Max’s hand caressing his face softly and kissing the lights outta him.

He stops the kiss to breathe, and smiles at Max, dimples out in display. It feels unreal, having Max so close. So so so close that he can see the damned lip freckle, the one that has taunted him for years.

Without giving it too much tought, he closes in again, and it’s intoxicating to see Max close his eyes. He’s expecting a kiss, but Charles bites his freckle. Gently, extremely gentle, but. It’s there, it’s taunting Charles, and he had to take action.

Max moans, and Charles has a full-body reaction to it, and the urge to grind against Max’s thigh is too big to ignore it. 

They need to get out of here, right now. 

Or Charles will create a big mess for both Ferrari and Red Bull, they will call it Il Predestinato and the Golden Boots.

“Max, Max. Please, let’s go to the hotel. Please.”

He’s begging, pleading with the worst case of bedroom eyes he has ever used against someone. But somehow it works, and Max gets up immediately. Takes Charles’ hand on his, gently as he ever his with him, and guides them towards the private exit of the club.

“Let’s go, my love.”

[scandinavianfairytale]

Savages

Pairing: Mob Bucky Barnes x Mob boss daugther Reader

Warnings: Implied guns, implied reference to violence (not sure if this is a thing honestly 😅), secret relationship, implied sinful things & thoughts, drugging, kidnapping, threats + fluffy relationship moments in between 💙

A/N: Welp, I wrote the third part - a look at the relationship before it all went south 🥺

Part 1, Part 2 & Part 4

"Zemo has been declining my calls and invitations. I am not a patient man and he has been more than testing my limited patience. If I call, he picks up. You two are going to the auction and when you find him, make sure he gets that message." Your father instructed as you sat down in his office. Bucky and you exchanged glances before nodding.

"We will make sure everyone gets the message." Bucky smirked.

"That's what I like to hear. Now go get ready." Your father dismissed you with a nod and you left the office, walking to the armory.

"What's our plan?" Bucky asked as you checked out two small guns and three knives.

"Well, we want to make sure Zemo gets the message, right? So, we need to make a...bold statement, if you will." You smiled at him. "I would say there is no plan, unless you count Cause chaos as a plan." Bucky grabbed your hips, pulling you towards him and kissing you hard.

"Chaotic auction...kinda has a nice ring to it." He smirked at your lips, before grabbing you thighs and hoisting you up.

🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤🖤

Bucky was browsing the keys when you walked in the garage, snatching the keys to Rolls-Royce Phantom from his hand.

"Hey-" The man paused when he saw your dress. The high slit of your black dress completely revealed your left leg when you walked. You turned to him, while still walking away and showing him your tongue.

"You don't know how to handle a car like that, so I'm driving Mr. Slow poke." You winked before sitting in the drivers seat and grabbing at your long dress to pull it fully in the car and slamming the door behind you. Bucky let out a quick exhale and walked around the car to sit in the passenger seat.

You were driving over 100 mph and while you were clutching the steering wheel, Bucky was clutching the handrail, as you sped through cars, switching lanes, sometimes too recklessly.

"Would you slow down?" He finally yelled as you stepped hard on the break when a car jumped in front of you trying to pass a slower one.

"Can you relax and just enjoy the ride?" You smirked as you cast him a smirk.

"You're gonna get us killed before we even make it to-Jesus!" He exclaimed as you swriled the steering wheel to the right, overpassing the car in front on its right side, breaking the law and causing an upheaval of honks. Bucky scowled as you started giggling.

"I know what I'm doing, you know." You winked before switching on the autopilot and turning to him.

"I've been meaning to ask you...do you think we should tell your father about us sometime soon?" He asked, taking your hand in his.

"Perhaps we should wait a bit more. I'm not sure how he will take the news, at least at the moment." You said as you played with his fingers. From the corner of your eye you could see him nod slowly.

"Let's get through this job first and then we can decide, okay?" Cupping his cheek, you smiled at him, before giving him a soft peck on the lips. Bucky smiled as you separated.

Taking control of the car again, you drove the last three miles manually. The guards opened the gates to the estate where the auction was to take place after Bucky showed them the invitation. You slowly drove up the small hill and threw the keys to the valet with his jaw on the floor. Bucky quickly found the small of your back as you entered the mansion.

"There are a lot of wanted people here." You whispered as you took in the large reception room. "What my father wouldn't give to get his hands on half of the people here."

"I think his eyes would transform into dollar signs." Bucky joked, while you had to surpress the urge to laugh too loud and avoid drawing too much attention.

You mingled with the rest of the guests, sipping Moet champagne and discussing current topics surrounding art, history and politics, but your concentration was broken the second you noticed Helmut Zemo enter the reception hall. You nudged Bucky and he excused himself when his eyes found the man in question. He slowly made his way to Zemo and dropped powder into his champagne glass, before gaining his attention with a quick conversation.

The auction began and while there was no restrictions, you still ended up getting a lecture from Bucky after you bought three paintings.

"It's fine. I'll be taking over soon and father won't have a say in my spending habits. Besides, we're talking about art, it's an investment."

At the beginning Zemo was participating in the auction but as you observed him, he was steadily becoming more confused. The drug was taking effect, you just hoped that he will do what you expect him to. Bucky left you to go to the toilet, where he sat on the couch and waited for Zemo to do the same.

Sure enough, the man dragged his feet towards the toilet. You waited a few moments, buying one last picture - a Monet, before following the target. He was about to collaps when you caught up with him and you grabbed his arm just in the nick of time.

"Thank you, Miss. I-I don't know what's happening." He tried shaking off the feeling of drowsiness.

"Don't worry, Helmut, I got you."

"H-How do you know my name?" His words slurred as he tried staying awake.

"My father will be so happy to see you." Your smile was the last thing he saw before he blacked out.

Zemo woke up in a badly lit storage room with three people and strapped to a metal chair.

"Ah, he's awake. Did you have a nice nap, Helmut?" Your father asked, faking cheeriness.

"So that's your father, Princess." Helmut turned to you, ignoring your father completely. There was something in his voice you couldn't place, but a shiver ran down your spine due to it.

"What do you want, John?" He turned to your father when he saw Bucky clench his jaw and his fists, glaring daggers when Helmut's attention focused on you.

"I want my money." Your father chuckled. "And I want you to pick up the goddamned phone when I call you!" Your father screamed in rage, closing in on the baron, making the man gulp. The thing that made your father so feared among his colleagues and employees were his rage and his ruthlessness, but Zemo was for the first time since he started working with your father, on the receiving end of it.

"Now, I'm going to release you and my daughter will see you out. If I don't see my money tomorrow, mark my words Helmut, there will be hell to pay."

"I-I can pay you now, with interest, for the inconvenience." Zemo reached inside his jacket's pocket to retrieve his phone and entered the amount he suggested. Your father's phone lit up and Zemo put his hands up in surrender.

"Good. Care to join me for Mallacan scotch?" Zemo nodded with a smile and clasped your fathers extended hand. He glanced at you from the corner of his eye before focusing on conversing with your father.

Bucky pulled you out of the room, knowing when his presence is no longer needed. He spun you around, pressing you into the wall and kissing you hard, his tongue invading your mouth.

"God, I wanted to do this since we entered that mansion." He panted into your lips as he leaned his forehead against yours. Staring into his eyes and trying to catch your breath, you thought about earlier conversation.

"We can tell my father about us tomorrow." You beamed at him.

Thank you for reading! 😊💙

The GIF doesn't belong to me - belongs to the talented creator 🙏😊

So...the third part is somehow here 🤣 The funny thing is, usually the stories turn out much darker then I planned and this one...just turned softer 🙈

It was inspired by this song:

Tagging: @marvelassassin221b @identity2212

[whumpurr]

Adrien and Sawdust part 1

cw: pet whump (and everything that comes with that), whump recovery, past whump, emeto, disordered eating, unreliable narrator, 'it' as a pronoun

part 2

--

Adrien didn’t know what possessed him to show up to that sale. Maybe his house was finally too big for him, with it’s cold, empty, dark corridors and uninhabited bedrooms. He knew that he wasn’t looking for any sort of uncouth company, and he wasn’t searching for something to keep his bed warm. The days had blurred together enough that he’d decided to find something to space them apart, to mark each day from the next and to make life interesting again.

And he wanted to help someone.

So he wound up getting in his truck and driving away from his house, the skyscrapers of his fencing fading off into the rest of the woods that surrounded it as he put the wheels to the dirt and headed out.

Adrien was shocked to see that there were only a handful of cars and trucks pulled up to the sale. It was a lot less formal than he had expected as well. He had anticipated more of an auction type setting, in a building with rows of chairs and someone bringing the pets up to the stage to parade them around. He wasn’t too experienced in the matter, but he wasn’t thinking that it would just be the equivalent of a yard sale. The pets are mostly in cages, arranged haphazardly in the mud and grass. Some of the pets are curious, scarred fingers picking at fallen leaves or pebbles that they can reach through the bars of their dog cages. The pets that were not left in cages were either standing or kneeling down in the dirt. There were maybe eight pets, give or take. Adrien couldn’t account for ones he might not be able to see past people’s cars, boxes, and empty crate kennels.

The air had a little bite to it. Adrien was in a heavier jacket- not a full on winter coat- but the majority of the pets were dressed in tattered t-shirts and shorts, kneeling on the hard cage floor or on the cold ground. Adrien couldn’t help but feel his gut wrench as he looked on while people did their deals, talking to some of the ones Adrien could only assume were the sellers. People in simple black polo shirts, scattered about the scene, talking to customers who came in their casual clothes. It really was no big event to many of these people, but for Adrien, this was something he would likely only see this one time.

Welp.

Time to pick one.

Adrien shoved his fists into his jacket’s pockets, trying to look comfortable and blend in with the other patrons. He had been stuck at the entrance just staring for long enough to see a good number of the pets get snatched up by other customers. Adopters? Future owners? He didn’t know what the right word for it was. As dirty as this all felt, leaving a bad taste in Adrien’s mouth, he had only found the event through an ad on his social media. The fact that it would be pushed so casually made him feel even worse about being here.

He approached a cage that had a seller standing near it. The cage had been looked over and passed by a good number of times by the other patrons, and that piqued Adrien’s curiosity, as uncomfortable as he was.

“So,” He cleared his throat, glancing at the opaque plastic dog crate and the worker, “What’s wrong with this one?” He pointed his chin to the crate, trying to sound as gruff and uncaring as he thinks everyone in this event does. The worker looked down at a small clipboard they were carrying.

“This one was a rescue from a previous owner.” The worker stated. Right, rescue. Adrien remembered that the people running this whole even claimed they were ‘rescuers’ of pets. That being said, Adrien still recalled having seen a couple articles exposing them for being viciously cruel to pets while they were in their care.

“Right… And that’s an issue because?” Adrien pushed. The seller looked at him, first like he was stupid, but then with a sense of respect.

“That could mean the previous owner could want them back, at some point.” They put a hand on their hip, “Either you’re dumb or you’ve got a maximum security prison for a house. Speaking of, the old owner was arrested. Something about a dog fighting ring, and the pet’s here now. Got surrendered to us by the cops, they even gave us all it’s shit.” With that, they pointed a finger to a dirty blue duffel bag set next to the crate. “You want it or not?”

A quick look around the venue let Adrien know that most of the pets had been bought already. He hadn’t even gotten to look at this one, but he knew that if he waited much longer, it’d be snatched out from under him.

“Yeah, yeah I’ll take it.” He extended a hand and the paperwork was shoved into it. Listed were places to sign his name, and fill out his information, legally putting the pet under his name. He got to work on signing it. “How- how much is it?”

“Forty five bucks.” The worker said, nonchalant. Adrien’s seen dogs sell for more, much more. He pulled out his wallet and took out forty five in cash, putting it on top of the clipboard as he handed it back. “Thanks. Need someone to help put it in your ride?” The seller must have been asking as a courtesy, they looked like they already knew the answer as they looked up and down Adrien’s muscular body.

“No, thanks.” Adrien picked up the duffel bag first, putting it in the car before returning to grab the pet. Warily, he held onto the handle at the top with two hands, preparing to heave it up. With one solid pull, he almost sent himself flying backwards as the crate weighed maybe a third of what he was expecting. As he stumbled, he heard a small gasp from inside the crate.

Hurriedly walking over to his truck with long, striding steps, he put the crate down on the back seats, pressed against the back of the passenger seat. The metal grate of the front door was facing him as he peered into the dark cavern behind it.

In the cage was a small person, a pet, as he had expected. It had long, matted, brown hair, and deep brown eyes that stared wide at Adrien before diverting. The pet had on at least a shirt, from what Adrien could see. It was cramped in the crate, but even so, the pet pressed itself against the back wall to get away from Adrien.

“Okay,” Adrien sighed out, “I can see that this is all scary for you.” He shut the side door as softly as he could and got in the driver’s seat, turning the car on and turning the heat up. “I’m gonna take you home now. Might be a bit of a rough drive over the dirt, road’s not paved.” He didn’t know if he was talking to himself or to the pet. He didn’t know if the pet could even understand him, or if his voice was possibly freaking it out even more. He drove with the radio off, not wanting to spook the pet.

The drive home felt like it stretched on for ages, but Adrien was eventually greeted by the metal of the gate that surrounded his house, rising up like a series of spears from the earth, glinting in the sunlight that cut through the tree canopy. The worker wasn’t wrong when she assumed he must have some pretty extreme security around his house. He’d had an issue with a stalker before, and with the help of some heavy fencing, a handful of cameras, and some other measures, he intended not to repeat that experience.

The truck came to a stop in front of the house, having cleared the long driveway. Adrien shut off the car, hopped out, unlocked and propped open the front door of the home. He once again brought in the pet’s duffle bag first, then returning for the massive- but light- plastic crate. As he moved it, he could feel the pet trembling so hard that it rattled the cage.

“Shh, shh, you’re okay. I’m just taking you inside. It’s nice and warm in there.”

The cage was put down with a soft thud, Adrien leaving it in the entrance hallway, just before the hall opened out to the kitchen and living room. He undid the latch on the cage’s door, swinging it open.

“You can come out now. You’re safe.” He said in a soft voice. The pet simply trembled, eyes squeezing shut and backing up more against the back of the cage. Adrien took a few steps back, sitting cross legged a little ways away from the pet’s cage. The creature inside it shivered, keeping itself as far into the kennel as it could. Adrien couldn’t even get a good look at it.

“You must be hungry.” He sighed, standing up and taking the few steps he needed to to get into the kitchen. “I’ve got something, here.” He pulled out a box of colorful, fruity, sugary cereal, pouring some out into a bowl and sticking a spoon in it. Next, he went to the fridge,

“Do you drink m- ah.” He quickly came to realize that the pet probably wasn’t going to speak. Rather than risk it, he shut the fridge and set the bowl of dry cereal down in front of the cage, backing up again. A few minutes of frustrating stillness later, Adrien chose to give the pet some space, standing and moving out of the foyer and going into the living room.

“You can come out. That cereal is for you, I hope you like it.” He sat himself down on the sofa. ‘Would it- they? Would they be more comfortable with some background noise?’ Adrien wondered. He took up the television remote from the coffee table and put on a random channel, some kind of reality show. The volume was low, but it was enough for a soft chatting to fill the quiet. Adrien tried to keep himself busy with his phone, scrolling through social media, but he couldn’t stop himself from glancing back at the cage every now and again.

Slowly, gradually, Adrien managed to keep his attention focused on his little device, knowing that if the pet finally did decide to look out of the cage and caught him looking back, it would most certainly panic and retreat again. The room was relatively quiet, save for the sound of the television.

The pair of people on the show were speaking to one another. One man and one woman, and at their feet was a black dog. Adrien wasn’t really listening to what they were saying, but the dog barked. The only reason that that sound suddenly caught Adrien’s attention is because he heard it be repeated.

From behind him.

A dog’s bark came from behind him in the house, from the direction of the foyer. It was almost identical to the one on the television, and as soon as Adrien heard it, the very next thing he heard was a thunk and a rattling from the cage as he assumed that the pet must have moved too quickly or lurched back and hit its back or its head on the ceiling of the crate. Adrien spun around, throwing an arm over the back of the sofa to look back at the crate.

Back in the foyer, Adrien tried to not look too obvious as he stared as the pet inched out of the crate. It kept it’s head low, ever so slowly creeping out of the crate. He watched as he saw pale skin littered with marks and bruises, and light brown eyes, and long, matted brown hair that’d gone too long without care. Around its neck was a bright red collar with a golden tag. The pet’s skin was stretched tight over his body, the raised ridges of bones showing easily.

The pet was dirty, old mud caked on its body, smears of something all over its body, Adrien didn’t know if it was blood or more dirt. Despite that, there was something strange. Sat atop its head in pristine condition was a pair of fake dog ears on a hairband. They looked awfully realistic, but Adrien could see the black band that they were attached to. As the pet fully left the cage to investigate the food, Adrien could see something else, too. Its shorts were filthy and ill fitting, but around its waist through the beltloops of the shorts was a long piece of string. Hanging from it, over the pet’s rear, was a short, fake dog tail, again in perfectly clean condition.

Looking down to the pet’s hands, he saw that they were balled up. Over the small fists was layer after layer of duct tape, dirty and loose from sweat. If the pet wanted them off, Adrien’s certain it could easily pull them off with its teeth, but it makes no move to do so.

The pet lowered its- his, Adrien could see that now- head to the small ceramic bowl filled with colorful cereal. He sniffed it, then quickly pulled away, making a repulsed face. Immediately after his rejection of the food, his eyes went wide and he looked at Adrien, then instantly looked down, trembling.

“Hey, hey,” Adrien lowered the volume on the television and got up, going to the pet and kneeling down. The pet drew back, lowering his head down to the floor, forehead pressing against the wood. “You’re, ah, do you speak?”

“Wruf!” The pet let out another eerily realistic dog bark, though he kept his head on the floor.

“No, no, like… Words? English?” Adrien was kind of at the end of his rope, not quite sure what he should do. “And uh, you can sit up.”

The pet sat back on his legs. Adrien caught sight of the golden tag hanging from the red collar. ‘Sawdust’, it read.

“Sawdust? Is that your name?” Adrien asked. He wanted to reach out and hold the dangling tag so he could make sure he read that right, but he was certain that if he tried that, the pet would get even more scared. The pet glanced over to the side, nodding its head. “Okay, you understand me at least. Can you speak with words?”

--

“Y- Saw- Uh…” Sawdust stammered out, voice rough and looking as though he was on the verge of tears. “Sawd- dust can speak, sir.” He wanted to know why his new master would want his pet speaking to him, but he knew better than to question his owner.

“Okay, good, good. That’s good.” Master sighed, dragging a hand down his face. “Is there something wrong with the food?”

What little color was in Sawdust’s face immediately drained as he went pale. He couldn’t let his master think that he was ungrateful, lest he took away the food altogether. Sawdust looked down at the bowl of rainbow colored cereal.

“N-no, no, Master, thank you for the food.” Sawdust dropped back down onto his paws and knees, lowering his head and chest to the floor. He sniffed at the bowl again. It smelled sickly sweet, sugary unlike any dog food he’d been given, but the sound it made when it was poured and moved did sound like dog food. Hard. Crunchy. That was familiar at least. Maybe it was dog food after all?

“There’s a spoon in there,” Master spoke, his deep voice rattling Sawdust’s bones. “You can use that if you want.”

Sawdust’s breath caught in his throat. Was Master mocking him? Pets can’t use things like that, especially Sawdust with his paws. Was Master testing him? Sawdust hiccupped and swallowed down a whine, not wanting Master to see how upset he was. Instead, he buried his face in the bowl of dry, colorful dog food. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to ignore how fruity it smelled, it smelled like things dogs weren’t allowed to have. He took some into his mouth. It crunched, but it was far easier to eat than dog food. It wasn’t as hard, it didn’t hurt his wounded mouth to chew.

Sawdust trembled. Did Master want him to be sick? That must be it. He hiccupped, tears threatening to roll down his cheeks as his stomach turned. He chewed and swallowed as quickly as he could, resorting to panting and breathing through his mouth to try to not taste the cereal as much. He took another bite.

He gagged.

“Buddy? Sawdust?” Master called. Master’s voice was soft, but Sawdust knew that he was faking it. Sawdust swallowed the bite in his mouth. This wasn’t dog food. He couldn’t eat this. Dogs can’t eat people food. His mouth was filling with saliva that he tried to swallow down, but his body wouldn’t let him. He panted, drool dripping down onto the floor as he pulled away from his Master. Goosebumps erupted across his body and he shivered, body rejecting the people food. With a heavy heave, he turned away from his master and threw up onto the hardwood floor.

[leupagus]

Welp:

The branch-twig pencils were, David will admit, a mistake. He realizes this almost immediately upon unpacking them and Patrick remarks how they look "rustic" with that little Canadian passive aggressive thing he does; he then realizes it again when they have the soft open and manage to sell a grand total of one, which Ted bought in order to give to his own sister so he still hasn't actually gotten rid of it.

And he realizes it for the third time as he watches Patrick stab a guy in the throat with one of them on the following afternoon.

"What the actual fuck!" David said, in a very calm manner, because he'd been trying this new meditation app and it's all about breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth and counting, or something, and it's definitely working, because David is very calm right now, even though there's blood all over the floor and on a lot of the product and also there is a dead man who is twitching.

"Uh," Patrick says, and yanks the pencil branch twig thing out. There's a gurgle and David runs to the bathroom to hide and to call the police and also to throw up.

He doesn't get a chance to do any of those, though, because Patrick — Patrick! Who wears vaguely slutty business shirts and awful braided belts and whose haircut is, David is forced to admit, only explicable if he's some sort of government stooge and/or a mercenary — grabs him by the elbow and instead of murdering him hustles him out the side door, where his shitty car is parked next to Mom's garden.

"Get in," Patrick says, opening the passenger door.

David's had to get Alexis out of way too many attempted (and that one partially successful) kidnappings to comply; he braces his hands against the frame and balks with every almost six feet of him. "Absolutely not, you just murdered someone!"

"CSIS agents are permitted to use lethal force when their asset is targeted," Patrick tells him, with such authority that David actually gets in the car before remembering that Patrick is an accountant with fugly shoes and dimples, and not a fucking international spy of mystery. By the time he’s figured that out, though, Patrick’s flung himself into the driver’s seat and yanked the car out onto the road.

David fumbles for the seatbelt just as there’s a loud bang behind them — a black SUV, two men with sunglasses and even worse haircuts than Patrick’s hanging out of the windows with guns aimed directly at him. “We need to go faster,” he recommends.

“Noted,” says Patrick, flooring it.

David’s about to make some comment about how ineffective this is likely to be considering they’re in a ten-year-old Toyota Corolla, but he’s too busy getting slammed back in his seat. He looks over at the speedometer: 75 and climbing fast. “Turn left here,” David says, urgent.

Patrick does, but he looks confused and a little suspicious; he’s got a speckle of blood on his right sleeve. “What is it?”

“If we kept going we were going to hit the school zone, and I’m guessing neither you nor the—” David ducks, for all the good it does, as another bullet thunks into the back of the car, “—charming homicidal maniacs behind us care about it, but school’s about to let out and I don’t want my sister getting run over.”

“Your sister’s fine, Ted will have gotten her and your folks out,” Patrick says absently, turning again on about one and a half wheels while the SUV spins out behind them.

“That’s good—wait, what?” David realizes, just before Patrick turns again and David almost concusses himself on the window.

The SUV is falling behind, but only a little bit; they’re already out into the rolling bucolic fields that surround Schitt’s Creek and that Stevie once described as the blank open space in a video game that signals you have to go back before you hit the invisible wall. Mostly right now it means that the bad guys with the guns that look considerably more high-tech than the turkey rifles have an easier time aiming, and David wonders if Sh’ma Yisrael can pinch-hit as a Lord’s Prayer, even though he doesn’t really believe in either of his parent’s gods.

“Don’t worry,” Patrick says, “They’re not going to kill us in this car.”

“The qualifier is perhaps less reassuring than you think it is,” David hisses, and Patrick just smiles at him like he said something funny and fuck, it’s still working for him.

Right up until he remembers something. “What the hell do you mean, ‘asset’?”

[wild-flower-art]

The Old Guard- Andy x Reader (F/F)

I’m baaaaaaaack, hope y’all enjoy!

Chapter 1

Chapter 2:  That’s a Chance We Have Always Taken (third person POV-- 1,192 word count)

“What the hell was that about, Andy?!”, Nile quietly asked her as soon as they were away from the door. “What do you mean?” “You know exactly what she means, Andy. Why are you acting so cold towards her? She saved you! We should all be grateful, including you, that she has given us more time together!”, Joe says quietly, trying not to raise his voice as to not alarm their new visitor. “It’s not enough now you guys have to risk yourselves to protect me, but now a civilian has to? And a mortal, no less?! I am grateful for what she did, but people shouldn’t have to be doing that for me! I’m the one who’s supposed to protect you and people like her!”, Andy all but yells, bringing her tone back down.

She sighs and looks down at her hands, “Every time someone gets in front of me to take a bullet or block me from harm I’m reminded of my own mortality, and the fact that a mortal did that for me only solidifies it harder in my mind. Watching her almost bleed out only made it worse.” Andy looks back up at her team, her family. “What if the next time one of you saves me it’s your last time as an immortal and your body can’t heal itself? What then?”

The pressure of tears builds behind her eyes as Nicky moves closer to her. Looking earnestly into her eyes and with a light squeeze to her shoulder, he responds in almost a whisper, “That’s a chance we have always taken. We don’t know if the next time it goes dark will be our last, and it’s a chance we have all been willing to take…even more-so for you, boss.” Fighting back tears, Andy gives him a watery smile and a light squeeze to the back of his neck, a gesture of thank you and I love you and so much more.

Joe clears his throat and voices what everyone was concerned about as they brought (Y/N) to their safe house. “What are we going to do about (Y/N)? I mean, when she’s healed she’s free to leave, but what do we tell her in the meantime if she asks what we do? Or why we were in a shootout at a human trafficking house? Did she see us get shot and see those wounds heal?...” Joe trails off as the team looks at him in contemplation. He’s right…they know he’s right. How much does (Y/N) remember? And whatever she does remember, can they convince her that those memories are false due to the loss of blood? Maybe they can convince her she was hallucinating…

“We’ll remain calm and reveal little-to-no details about who we are. Lie when you can. Treat her like anyone else we’ve come across in our travels. Treat her like any other passerby on the street. Be cordial, but be brief. We are grateful to her, and taking care of her is obviously the least we could do.” Andy instructs them. They look around at each other and nod in affirmation.

“What about me?”, Nile asks. “I’m not too used to lying about my identity yet. Hell, I just found out about this 6 months ago and I immediately wanted to reach out to my family. It’s taking some getting used to, so I think I’m gonna need some help.”

Andy directs her attention at Nile. “Tell her whatever you feel comfortable with. You are still new so your experiences and life are still fresh and relevant. Just don’t tell her you can’t die and you have superhuman healing abilities, okay?” She smirks and raises her brows at Nile, who just snorts in response. “Ha, yeah okay, boss.”

Sitting on the arm rest of the couch, with his chin resting in his hand, deep in thought, Joe speaks up again, “What was she doing out so late? She didn’t seem phased by the commotion or the gun shots. And she obviously had no problem getting the squatters outside out of the way or jumping in front of Andy. Who is she?”

Andy had considered these questions herself as she sat in the back of her car with (Y/N)’s head on her lap, her hand still on her diaphragm applying pressure as Nile had instructed. She can’t remember the last time she wasn’t in the driver’s seat. Always leading her team. She was always in charge, from the jobs they took to the jobs they declined; she even tried in vain to be in charge of her fate and that of her teams’. It became second nature, next to breathing and not dying. As much as she and the team don’t want to admit, things have changed, not so much on their approach to who gets saved, but how it’s executed. Her life has taken a sudden turn they knew would eventually come, but it doesn’t make it any easier to navigate. But luckily, like with everything so far, Nicky, Joe, and now Nile will be by her side, riding out this sharp turn, side by side, until the road straightens out, and they eventually have to carry on without her. They won’t go too long as a trio since they’ll have Booker back…fuckin Booker, she shakes her head. She doesn’t blame him for what he did, but it doesn’t make the betrayal any easier to deal with. They were supposed to be in this miserable game together, but now that she thinks about it, maybe it won’t be so miserable for the amount of time she has left. Seeing Copley’s board of all the positive outcomes of their fighting, and with the addition of Nile, she has grown more hopeful than she had been in decades, maybe centuries.  

She looks back down at her hands. They’re clean for the most part, save for cuts and bruises harshly painting them, some old some new, and the dried blood from (Y/N) that remains under her finger nails. Some people could benefit from taking a page from (Y/N)’s book.  She was willing to sacrifice herself and risk her life without being immortal, and with little fear for her own life. She’s a warrior, there’s no doubt about that. New immortals come into their lives at a time when they need them most, maybe the same could be said about mortals. Maybe the same could be said about (Y/N).

Finally, she speaks, “It doesn’t matter who she is. We will provide her the same anonymity we are giving ourselves. If she wants to disclose any information to us, she can. If she opts out, then that’s okay, too. It’s obvious she’s willing to get injured or die trying to help people, that’s all the information I need on who she is. She’s a warrior.”

Nile claps her hands together suddenly, “Welp, that’s fine by me too! Now, can we eat? Reanimating my body leaves me so fuckin hungry!”

They all laugh in unison. Joe and Nicky lightly bump shoulders as they walk to the kitchen. Andy rolls her eyes.

I can’t believe I’m stuck with these idiots.

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 13/02/2021 (Digga D, AJ Tracey, Cardi B)

It’s not as big of a week as it is just a confusing one, so there’s no pre-amble. Olivia Rodrigo spends a fifth week at #1 with “drivers license” and let’s start REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

I started writing this a bit later than usual so I just want to rush through most of what’s here. The songs dropping out of the UK Top 75 are either debuts from not long ago like “Notorious” by Bugzy Malone featuring Chip and “Lo Vas A Olvidar” by Billie Eilish and ROSALÍA, or songs that have been here for a while, like “Monster”  by Shawn Mendes and Justin Bieber, “Holy” by Justin Bieber featuring Chance the Rapper and “Dynamite” by BTS. We even have some #1 hits dropping out of the Top 75 this week, like “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac, “WAP” by Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion and “Shallow” by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper. In terms of fallers, we have, seemingly, some of the older Winter cuts being replaced, as we see “Sweet Melody” by Little Mix getting a harsh streaming cut down to #30,  “Whoopty” by CJ down to #33, “Levitating” by Dua Lipa and remixed by DaBaby down to #34 (although this could rebound given the album release), “you broke me first” by Tate McRae at #37, “SO DONE” by The Kid YAOI at #57, “All I Want” by Olivia Rodrigo at #61, “Looking for Me” by Diplo, Paul Woodford and Kareen Lomax at #62, “Train Wreck” by James Arthur at #63, “See Nobody” by Wes Nelson and Hardy Caprio at #64, “Take You Dancing” by Jason Derulo at #65, “Therefore I Am” by Billie Eilish at #68, “Before You Go” by Lewis Capaldi at #72 and “Golden” by Harry Styles at #73, as well as some more recent debuts, including the entirety of Fredo’s album impact from last week, as “Money Talks” with Dave is at #11, “Ready” with Summer Walker at #31 and “Burner on Deck” with Young Adz and the late Pop Smoke at #32. “Skin” by Sabrina Carpenter and “Apricots”  by Bicep aren’t faring that well either, at #51 and #56 respectively. When I said these songs are being replaced, I wasn’t overestimating anything as we have our new crop of hits seemingly all surging, as “Martin & Gina” by Polo G is at #54, “Be the One” by Rudimental, MORGAN, TIKE and Digga D is at #49, “Best Friend” by Saweetie featuring Doja Cat is at #42, “My Head & My Heart” by Ava Max is at #35, “Love Not War (The Tampa Beat)” by Jason Derulo and Nuka is at #27, “Heat Waves” by Glass Animals is at #24, “Your Love (9PM)” by ATB, Topic and A7S is at #23 (it’s honestly starting to grow on me), and “Blinding Lights” by the Weeknd is somehow back up to #20. Speaking of the top 20, we also have “Friday” by Riton, Nightcrawlers and Musafa & Hypeman dopamine re-editing itself up to #16, “Save Your Tears” also by the Weeknd at #15, and two new top 10 hits, both songs with basically the same chart run and genre. “Goosebumps” by Travis Scott, remixed by HVME, remixed by Travis Scott is at #10, becoming HVME’s first and Travis’ fourth top 10 hit here in Britain. We also have “The Business” by Tiesto grooving up to #7, becoming Tiesto’s fourth top 10 hit. I honestly feel bad for the still completely uncredited vocalist. We also have a third new top 10 entry but that’s a debut that we can discuss later. I should also note that “Roses” by SAINt JHN and remixed by Imanbek is back at #74, and a winning Eurovision song, “Arcade”, by Dutch singer Duncan Lawrence is also back at #39 off of the back of some TikTok traction. I think this is the most streamed Eurovision now – I’d watch out for this being a big hit. Welp, time to get into our really, and I mean REALLY, varied and weird crop of new arrivals, starting with...

NEW ARRIVALS

#75 – “Roadtrip” – Dream and PmBata

Produced by Banrisk and Perish Beats

Okay, so this is a song by Minecraft YouTuber Dream, or at least that’s who I think he is. I think there was some kind of scandal related to him, and a couple people got involved and someone got doxed... listen, I don’t care. Not only is this song really not worthy of reviewing on the principle that unlike Wilbur Soot a couple weeks ago, Dream has never been a musician, which is clear from how involved no-name singer PmBata was in this, but I care for my private information not being made public so... What ridiculous excuse do I have to not review this? Okay, 1997 reggae-rock classic “Doin’ Time” by Sublime returns to #75 after Boris Johnson made a TikTok in the Houses of Parliament where he says “Pogchamp, Brexiteers, I just got tested for COVID-19” with the song in the background, and Joe Biden is on a Zoom call with him a few seconds later visibly annoyed because he prefers the New Radicals. Sure, let’s go with that. What was this entry about again?

#71 – “Goodbye” – Imanbek and Goodboys

Produced by Joris Mur, Imanbek and Goodboys

Everyone’s favourite Kazakh house producer Imanbek is finally back on the charts with his collaboration with British pop trio Goodboys, who you may know from their carbon-copy hits made with MEDUZA. After listening to that EP he made with Rita Ora, I’m slightly less impressed with Imanbek’s production, but that EP’s impact, if any, will be seen when the lead single featuring David Guetta and Gunna debuts low next week. Yes, seriously, all four on the same track. Anyway, this song, “Goodbye”, is actually pretty okay, with a generic deep house groove and fake hand-clap effectively saved by the Goodboys’ really intriguing vocal delivery and processing, which ends up in a Travis Scott-like Auto-Tune harmony that’s honestly pretty endearing right before the anti-climactic slap-house drop. The song’s lyrical content probably isn’t worth talking about, but it’s about a generic struggle with a break-up, and how hard it is for one of these good boys to say good bye. The build-up with the pre-chorus before the blue-balls second drop is kind of genius, and that’s probably my favourite part of the song outside of the abrupt vocaloid drop at the end. For what it’s worth, it takes more risks than most of these house-pop songs, most notably by having only a single verse in the middle of the song, and being really short, clocking in at less than two and a half minutes. It’s not as infectious as “Piece of Your Heart”, but this is fine. I’m glad it’s here if it’s going to give Imanbek another non-Rita Ora-assisted hit.

#60 – “Little Bit of Love” – Tom Grennan

Produced by Jamie Scott, LOSTBOY and Daniel Bryer

Tom Grennan is an English singer-songwriter who released their debut record in 2016 and was crowned by the BBC as the “Sound of 2017”, before dropping off the face of the Earth. He was brought to fame by a guest feature on a Chase & Status song that didn’t even do that well and now he’s back with the lead single from his upcoming sophomore effort, and his highest ever charting song. Well, is it any good? I mean, I like OneRepublic too. The rising strings here in the intro and chorus are pretty cool, and I’ll give it to Grennan for having an interesting voice but the odd level of grit in it does not fit well for this plastic production, which quickly devolves into vaguely danceable synth-mess that’s just not interesting. The content is mostly about unconditional love, particularly one that feels not particularly reciprocated, although some of the detail in the second verse feels like it’s going somewhere. I’ll admit, the chorus is catchy, but this mix puts way too much emphasis on a flawed vocal take from Grennan, which really detracts from the pathetic excuse for a bridge. I do enjoy how this feels like a flash-back to the mid-2010s, where happier, synth-based pop was this prominent, and I do love how the strings come back in the outro, but good production can’t do much to save a song that just feels under-cooked and definitely under-written. The OneRepublic comparison feels particularly fitting here too because their stuff tends to be just as stagnant, not to mention the lyrical riffs off of “Counting Stars”. I mean, when you start your first verse – in the first 10 or so seconds of the track – with the most recognisable part of a very recognisable song, I think Ryan Tedder deserves at least some royalties.

#58 – “Astronaut in the Ocean” – Masked Wolf

Produced by Tyron Hapi

Masked Wolf is an Australian singer and this song is actually from June 2019, just gaining enough traction, presumably off of TikTok, to debut on the charts this week. The song got a 2021 reissue and I assume a remix and, well... for God’s sake. The Kid LAROI should not have been an entry point for Australian trap, because outside of a second or two of distortion in the intro, this is far from unique. It has a guitar-based trap instrumental with dark 808s that even Gunna would pass up on, and an Auto-Tuned delivery from Masked Wolf, clearly trying too hard to replicate Drake in the intro and bridge, Kid Cudi in the chorus, G-Eazy in the first verse, Eminem AND Kendrick on the second verse, to the point where he even directly references Kendrick Lamar’s much better music. He suffers from the same problems as all of these artists combined, with lyrics that seem like they’re building up off of something interesting about depression before going into aimless flexing like a mid-tier Kid Cudi track, flows that sound as meandering and checked-out as Drake’s, the failed attempt at some kind of white-boy swagger that G-Eazy hasn’t pulled off successfully since 2016, the substance-less content hidden behind fast flows from Eminem and... oh, my God, this guy’s just like Australian Logic. I don’t like American Logic, why do we need this guy too? Yeah, this is bad, and there’s not much worth nitpicking in this mix or even the lyrics to even point out. I guess the worst bar is when he says he believes in G-O-D but not a T-H-O-T. So he’s a slut-shaming NF now? Jesus Christ, I’d take a full album from The Kid LAROI over this.

So the next two songs are ones I’ll actually need to somewhat lump together, as they are consecutive on the chart and both from the same album, and the same washed-up band.

#53 – “Waiting on a War” – Foo Fighters

Produced by Greg Kurstin

We have two songs from Dave Grohl and friends here from their latest album, Medicine at Midnight, technically three if we count the entire top 100, which means, yes, the UK just had a Foo Fighters album bomb. I’ll focus on the album as a whole with the next song because this is easily the worse track here and the worst track on the album purely out of how misguided it is. Dave Grohl wrote this song because he felt inspired by the current hell-scape of the political climate, reminding him of his own youth when he was surrounded by rising Cold War tensions. His young daughter asked him if there was going to be a war and naturally this song came out of it, reflecting on the fears he and his daughter have and that everyone deserves a future and a lifetime not taken away from them by conflict and fear. This is a good song idea but it absolutely does not work, and that’s partially down to the production. When I first heard this track on the album, I genuinely grimaced at the vocoder-mumble that Grohl takes on against the scratchy acoustic guitars. The whole point of the instrumentation is that it builds tension with rising strings, multi-tracked acoustics and eventually some electric guitars and powerful drums, yet because of how slow-paced the song is, it fails to mirror the rising tension of the prospect of there being a war. Instead, it’s a slog and its pay-off by the end feels unwarranted in the most boring way. Sure, the squeals of the guitars in the back of the mix sound good, but surely a song like this should not end like any of the Foo Fighters’ other pop-rock anthems, especially not as abruptly as it does. Wouldn’t you want a more subdued outro to comfort your daughter’s fears that at least right now, everything’s okay? That would make the most sense to me, but that’s thrown out of the window, with pathetic songwriting, with verses that play word association with the blandest of rhymes, seemingly irrelevant pop-song-generator filer and a chorus that is mind-numbingly repetitive but ultimately fails to build tension because of the content asking us to wait, constantly, even when it gets into its heavier rock tone. We’re supposed to wait for something that is only implied to never come, because there isn’t finality. Sure, that could work as a way of saying that Grohl is just as uncertain and scared as his daughter is about political conflict, but that would imply this song gives off any further emotion than the fact the Foo Fighters felt the need to cut a vaguely political track out of necessity. As a song, and as an album, Dave Grohl is utterly confused, and “Waiting on a War” is way too slow and non-specific to act as a protest song, as well as being way too on-the-nose for it to work as a ballad. Let’s talk about this next single.

#52 – “Making a Fire” – Foo Fighters

Produced by Greg Kurstin

What the hell is Greg Kurstin doing here? This is the first track on the album and is supposed to make some kind of gripping impact but is instead just a snoozefest. The choral female vocals sound bored, but at least it’s not as strained as the struggling Dave Grohl trying and failing to yelp over a stiff groove which has its momentum killed by drumming too slow and mixed too oddly to make this pre-chorus even coherent, not helped by Grohl’s butt-rock delivery and non-descript lyrics. There could be a guitar solo here, to make this track feel memorable, but no, it’s hidden under a pre-chorus with an extended gospel bridge that doesn’t build up effectively to a chorus that just comes crashing in and hence has no effect. Maybe I just can’t listen to arena  rock in a quarantine context, but I can’t even imagine this making much of a fuss in a packed stadium without desperately needing tweaks in the songwriting and especially the production, because this just sounds stunted. It’s telling that Grohl made his best tracks as the Foo Fighters on his own and those first two records, alongside a pretty decent 2014 comeback in the form of Sonic Highways, are still great. I’m not denying that Grohl can write a good song, or that the Food Figures can’t play, because they’re all talented guys. This is just one album in many that leaves me with the feeling that these guys just can’t do much more outside of their comfort zone than fail miserably. These songs won’t stick around, and thank God for that.

#50 – “Believe Me” – Navos

Produced by Tom Demac and Navos

Another week, another... okay, but we already had a generic pop-infused deep house track from a couple EDM randos, do we really need another? Okay, well, this one is even less interesting than Imanbek’s effort as it doesn’t even try for a verse, instead going for a deep house groove I’ve heard countless times before, drowned out by some square synths and, yes, you guessed it, 90s piano loops and an uncredited female vocalist repeating basically the same couple lines over and over. This is made for the clubs, but I feel like even regular club-goers would tire of this vocaloid drop and cloudy production two minutes in. There’s nothing worth discussing here, because this probably took as many minutes to make as it did to listen to. I have no idea why Navos debuts a song so high, but I’ve got to assume TikTok’s to blame. Apparently this guy makes tech house, where’d any of that skill or intrigue go here?

#21 – “Up” – Cardi B

Produced by Sean Island, DJ SwanQo and Yung Dza

Anyone else surprised at how such a big name gets production from people I’ve never heard of before? Not that it matters, it’s just odd. Anyways, this is Cardi’s new single, presumably from that ever-elusive second album, debuting around 20 spots lower than it will in the US, and it’s going for a more gangsta-rap content than the hyper-sexual “WAP”, but does she keep the same energy? Well, yes... in fact, after all the mediocrity, I’m glad to have a genuinely great song debut this week. This is a great, bass-heavy beat that gives a Memphis phonk feel in the dark keys as well as the hard-hitting 808s and spacey percs and sound effects that add some needed distortion, even if there’s going to be some brief clipping along the way. Cardi brings some necessary energy from the brilliant opening lyrics and continues with a fast-paced, chanting flow that accentuates some of her funnier lyrics with her charisma that she always brings to a trap track like this. I’d say that this is maybe too repetitive – with very little of the verses to speak of – or even somewhat derivative of her previous song, “Money”, but there’s a lot better lyrical content in this one, not to mention how well she complements a more straight-forward but still killer beat. Oh, yeah, and Cardi’s stacks are Shaq-height as she dismisses haters with an impressive level of swagger and confidence, that carries the refrain, but that’s not to say the lyrics aren’t really great in the verses. There’s genuinely funny and sexy wordplay here, especially in the second verse, and also some great liners: “hoes speakin’ cap-anese”, accusing her haters of having pink-eye and their breath smelling like “horse sex”. This is a short, probably underdeveloped song, but it’s the type of surreal, high-energy trap I kind of really love and I hope this sticks around further in the UK.

#19 – “Latest Trends” – A1 x J1

Produced by ShoBeatz

A1 x J1 are a British rap duo with no other songs. Yeah, something’s fishy here: this is their only song on Spotify that blew up from a 15-second clip on TikTok, and their Spotify bio is trying to decide whether they’re the next D-Block Europe or the Beatles, as well as really emphasising how the song grew “all organically”, even though they’re already signed to Universal... yeah, there’s nothing subtle here, so I won’t buy this TikTok fame schtick, but does it matter when the song is good? Well, not really, and honestly, I’m kind of into this guitar-based drill-R&B fusion in the beat, but it doesn’t really help the fact that J1’s Stormzy impression is janky and unconvincing, especially if he’s going to try for some shallow wordplay, and that A1’s Auto-Tuned croon is just boring, reminding me a lot of A Boogie wit da Hoodie, but with a less recognisable voice and delivery, even if the first verse contains a funny line about a woman making that ass clap “for the NHS”, although he totally took that from Swarmz anyway. Yeah, I’m not a fan of this fake attempt at an organic pop-drill crossover, but unfortunately, I can very much see this working, though I’d be happy if the British public will see through this dishonesty as soon as possible.

#5 – “Bringing it Back” – Digga D and AJ Tracey

Produced by TheElements and AoD

Now for a rap duo that makes more sense to debut this high and are actually, you know, separately successful rappers, therefore they debut in the top five, which is impressive. The whole concept of this song is that Digga D and AJ Tracey are using old flows, those that would be nostalgic to their deeper fan base, to spit bars on a new track called, fittingly “Bringing it Back”. The flow AJ Tracey brings back is from his overlong “Packages” freestyle, a five-minute track from 2016, that works more as a freestyle than it does as a song, where he uses a familiar UK drill flow to go off for a really long time, and, yes, it is pretty impressive but the flow becomes stale too quickly. Digga D uses his flow from his “Next Up?” freestyle from 2017, a similarly badly-mixed UK drill freestyle but with a much more palatable length. Digga D’s flow he uses in that track is arguably slicker but honestly one that I see used a lot in UK drill and by Digga D, so I’m not sure it’s not worth “bringing it back” when you could come up with a new, catchier flow. I’ll admit that “Bringing it Back”, however, is a pretty damn good song, with Digga D’s more technical and fluid flow allowing for a lot more intricate internal rhymes that sound really great over the triumphant, string-heavy drill beat, as he trades bars with AJ Tracey’s slower but more confident, laid-back flow, which allows him to spit some more specific, interesting bars, some of which really hit, like when he says he “locked up the food for the kids like Boris and then I let it go like Rashford”. Hey, I respect it, I haven’t heard a more clever way of intertwining political commentary with cocaine smuggling since Pusha T last released a record. The way AJ Tracey and Digga D play off of each other’s lines is really smooth, and especially how Digga D plays with the beat, as while his lyrics may be less interesting, they mash perfectly with the beat’s frantic fades in and out, especially in his last lines before the first chorus, where he asks for the track to literally be turned off... and it is. So, yeah, I’m pretty damn happy with this debuting so high off the energy alone, even if Digga D is going to pronounce “LOL” like a one-syllable word. I’d say this is actually a really good starting point for people who want to get into more UK drill because it has a lot of the grit and menace of the genre in a more accessible, catchy form, even if it may run a bit too long for my taste.

Conclusion

Wow, what a weird, weird week... and a lot of it was straight garbage. I’m giving Best of the Week to “Up” by Cardi B, with an Honourable Mention to Digga D and AJ Tracey for “Bringing it Back”, though Worst of the Week is pretty much a toss-up. I’ll give it to the Foo Fighters for “Waiting on a War”, with a Dishonourable Mention tied between “Astronaut in the Ocean” by Masked Wolf and “Believe Me” by Navos for just both being worthless. Anyways, here’s our top 10:

The UK Singles Chart is honestly kind of chaotic right now – even more so than usual – and I don’t see that changing. Even if I don’t like all of the songs, it’s at least compelling. Anyways, thank you for reading and you can follow me @cactusinthebank on Twitter if you want. I can’t really make any predictions for next week other than Taylor Swift re-recording her own music and I guess some impact from Rita Ora and Imanbek, or hopefully, slowthai. Regardless of what happens, I’ll see you next week!

[stellarbisexual]

#24 for reddie???

literally bumping into each other

I took this *super* literally.  Enjoy!

I channeled @speakslowtellmelove for this Richie... and myself for this Eddie. XD

***

Richie tips the styrofoam cup up as high as it’ll go, tapping on its bottom to release the hot cider sediment-y goodness, swallowing it down with a happy hum and hook-shotting the empty cup into the nearest bin.  He’s a little disappointed that Stan and Mike left him doing bumper cars solo so they could smooch while cozied up in front of a plate of funnel cake, but there’s nothing he loves more than the autumn festival, so he can’t be that mad.  

“I work on cars for a living; why wouldn’t I be the driver here?”

His attention’s suddenly grabbed by the couple in front of him: a douchey jock-looking dude who’s almost as tall as Richie and his much shorter, saltier companion, who’s just gone from zero to sixty.  From his profile, Richie can see he’s got fiery hazel eyes and a pretty mouth.

The jock turns to his boyfriend, clearly trying to be cute and make a joke of it.  “Aren’t you supposed to be at least this tall,” he levels a palm a few inches above Short Fuse’s head, “to drive?”  He nudges him playfully with his shoulder, but Short Fuse isn’t having it.

“That’s not fucking funny.  Don’t patronize me.”

“Eddie,” Jock Guy sighs, “you’re taking this way too seriously, babe.”

“Well if it isn’t such a big fucking deal, why won’t you just let me drive?”

It’s a good point, Richie thinks, one for which Jock Douche apparently doesn’t have a response.

Short Fuse–Eddie–shakes his head as they finally approach the conductor at the front of the line.  “You and your bullshit ego can ride alone.  I’m getting my own car.”  He pays for a second ticket and splits from his boyfriend in an admittedly adorable huff.  

Richie seizes on the opportunity, jetting over to the car nudged up right next to Eddie’s and launching himself inside.  He straps himself in and leans on the tiny steering wheel while they wait for the other cars to be filled, Eddie gripping his own wheel with murder in his eyes.  

“Eddie, right?  That was very well handled, that whole situation.  I’m impressed.”

Eddie deflates somewhat, hurt flashing across his features.  “He’s being a dick.”

Richie licks his lips and raises his eyebrows.  “‘Being’?  Orrrrrr…?”

“Undecided.”

“Welp,” Richie drums his fingers on his wheel, “either way, I’m gonna fuck with him.  I’ve made up my mind.”

“…What?”  Eddie turns to him, an amused smile playing at the edges of his mouth.  

“I don’t like the way he was treating you, so…”  Richie purses his lips in mock-consideration.  “I’mma ram his ass into a wall.  Repeatedly.”

Eddie cackles, and it’s so fucking cute, Richie silently vows to himself to try to blow up his boyfriend’s little electric car, even if it isn’t physically possible.  “I don’t even know you.  You definitely don’t have to–”

“Richie.”  He lays a hand over his heart.  “I never play to win, anyway.  If my friend Stan hadn’t abandoned me, I’d be ramming his ass into a wall instead–only in that case, it’d be out of love.  Besides, I’ll help clear the way for you to dominate and prove your boyfriend wrong.”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Eddie confesses in a lowered voice, mindful of the other drivers.  “It’s our second date.”

Richie bites his bottom lip, leaning over the wheel even more in a move that he hopes looks seductive instead of like a six-foot-four guy in a toy car.  “Is there gonna be a third date?”

“Doubtful.  I don’t know what happened; he was nice on the first.”

“Sounds like the tagline for a Lifetime movie.  Now I have to ram him into a wall in self-defense.”

Eddie hides another smile, his cheeks flushing.  “Is this your preferred tactic for hitting on random guys at carnivals?”

“Pssh.  I’m not hitting on you.”  Richie leans back in the driver seat, shifting into game mode.  “If I were hitting on you, you’d know.”

Just then, the grid turns on, their cars humming to life and hovering above the floor.

“Get your game face on, Eds.  It’s go time!”  The buzzer goes off, and Richie blows him a kiss as he peels out.

Richie stays true to his word, putting on quite the show, pinning Jockface into a corner almost immediately.

Eddie’s date whips his head around while trying in vain to separate from Richie’s car.  “What the fuck?  Are you serious?!”

“Stop underestimating the vertically challenged!  It’s not cool, bro!”

Across the floor, Richie can hear that now familiar cackle from Eddie again.  

“Get away from me!  What the fuck is your problem?!”

“You’re my problem, my dude–and everyone else’s!”

Pretty soon after that, the Jock is threatening actual bodily harm on Richie, which is his cue to peel out and zip clear across the floor and far away from him.

“I didn’t think you’d actually do it.”  Eddie’s pulled up next to him and breathless with laughter.  

“I’m a man of my word, Eds.”

“Too bad I don’t play so fair,” Eddie teases–right before he slams Richie into the nearest wall.

“OHH!”  Richie clutches his heart.  “BETRAYED!”

Eddie quickly tries to get away from him, but Richie gives chase, tapping his car playfully in a bumper car version of grab-ass.  They continue on like that for the rest of the game, having forgotten nearly everyone else on the floor, including Eddie’s asshole date.  

When the cars go lifeless, the guy storms off in a cloud of testosterone and self-righteousness, and Richie chuckles to himself, fully planning to celebrate with another cup of cider.  Except Eddie’s standing right in front of him when he exits the vehicle.

“Shit, you’re tall,” Eddie laughs, looking up at him as he stretches to full height.  

“Tall with the reflexes of a mongoose.”  Richie does a faux karate move.  “You’re not trying to reconcile with…?”  He looks around for Eddie’s date.  “Guess not.  He’s gone.”

“Good riddance.”  Eddie stuffs his hands in his back pockets.  “Wanna go get a funnel cake?”

Richie smiles wide.  “Am I your date now?”

Eddie spins on his heel, walking ahead of him.  “I wouldn’t go that far.”  Then, he turns over his shoulder.  “Not yet.”

permatag list: @reddie-to-fight @hurleyhugo @raspberrywind @losver-kaspbrak  @geckolover001 @its-stranger-than-you-think @gazebo-motherfucker @waypunsarelife @reddietofall @happytozier @librablossom @aesteddie @tapetayloe@spagheddi-kaspbrak @sadhelianthus @adhdtozier @justcallme-trashmouth @fuckboyrichie  @bandaids @20gayteeneds @richietoaster @burymestanding @speakslowtellmelove @notsugarandspice @richiefuckfacetozier @noahsschnapp @mrs-vh @adhdtozier @loveoflosers @constantreaderfool @lizacore @yikesitsrylee @mars-14

[mama-germany]

Submission: {IIRC, submission format is bad. This is feminists-against-feminism, hopefully unedited by Mama Germany :^), and ill end my submission with “/submission”, and the rest, if anything, is mama-germany. Also, hopefully the paragraph breaks take, and if they dont…. welp…}

Imma be real with u chief, I dunno what you want me to do with this.  I’m a Jew.  I don’t like communism.  I don’t actually live in Germany.  And I’m not reading all this.  Idk.

Karl Marx’s “On: The Jewish Question” seems a prototype for conflict theory, but has ‘the real jew’ as the 'Haves’ the in place of the 'bourgeois/rich/capitalist’ 'oppressor class’. Conflict theory, icydk, is the collectivist egalitarian pseudoscientific theoretical paradigm taught in sociology, underpinning essentially the whole social justice perspective, and directly encompassing marxist theory, feminist theory, critical race theory, critical theory, gender schema theory (and likely influenced John Money’s gender theory, and builds on gender theory), queer theory, gender critical theory, postmodern theory, lysenkoism (mostly abandoned), standpoint theory,  post colonial theory, animal liberationism, and of course, intersedtional theory which synthesizes them all together wherever they can be synthesized. Marx said the nature of jews is huckstery, he said the real lofe manifestationnof the god of israel is money itself, he said eliminating money would render the jew an equal and normal person. His whole theory, and every conflict theory since, relies on the presupposition the indovodual is irrelevant and what matters is only the aggregate disparities between groups. This turns his theoey ultimately against all boundaries of the individual, their private property and necessarily their innate natural self ownership, their right to self ddetermination. Marx viewed liberalism/individualism as egoism. His whole family was actually jewish, IIRC, he just didnt succeed like they did, he was jealous and a mooch, kind of a beta, likely an aspie if i am to go off the symptomology. He hated them, he was jealous, he wanted success and they had it and he didnt, and so he was basically spot-on like the character Cain from hebrew legend.

Martin Luther. He wrote “On The Jews and Their Lies”. He described jews as piglets suckling from their mother pig, israel, and blamed jews for pretty much everything he viewed as wrong in society. He was basically the predocessor to Hitler and Marx. And one might actually say Marx was an additional predocessor to Hitler. I sure would posot that as likely, even if by proxy of Hitler being influenced by left socialists. I mean, he literally modified the marxist “'class struggle” into his own version of “the struggle”, “MY Struggle/Mein Kampf”. Which brings us to out next german collectivist philosopher. If youre picking up the theme im putting down.

Third subject, Hitler. Self explanatory. Jew-hating anti-egalitarian ethno socialist. Obviously fits in with the last two subject entries. BTW,I have a larger point to all this random pattern listing. One more.

Slightly diverging from hatred of jews, and more toward the begining of postmodernist thought, Max Horkheimer who said freedom and justice are incompatible opposites, and argued everything are oppressive social constructs, every letter and word and phrase and interaction. He said there is no way to know what a just society is, but that we can complain and struggle against the things we dont like and dont find just. And so if you also consider he in the same sitting said freedom and justice are opposites, and this was while summarizing his academic ideas to an interviewer, we can deduce he was directly opposed to freedom, despite considering himself anti-authoritarian…. Anyways, he was bonkers, hope you dont live near Frankfurt, theyre bonkers around them parts, and i know someone who has told me firsthand just how horkheimer style bonkers that town is.

{Honorary mentions. The Kaiser Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albert. Although there was clearly nuance here, Prussia WAS part of the German Empire, but the german youth injunction/sinker was still set in him, to which collectivism was his driver/floatation. He was a nationalist and refused advisors compelling him into an anti-left policy. Honorary mention 2. Antifasciste Aktion, the communist vanguard formed by the german communist party, the KPD, formed to forght fire with fire, using brownshirt tactics against the brownshirts (to whom they lost).}

All four, all German. All of them. 5 if we include the Kaiser. The father of protestantism, the father of communism, the left reformer whos students sparked the “New Left” movement, and Hitler, HITLER. ALL GERMAN. Which is not an implicit racial claim im implying, but one about a sour philosophy. I refer to this as German Collectivism. It is the archetype if collectivism which germany seems particularly possessed by. These have ravaged the whole world, toppled entire nations and enslaved likely over two billion people considering just the PRC, USSR, and Nazi Germany esp with its labir camps. Luther could be viewed as the origin, certainly the origin of modern german collectivism (protestantism & lutherean conspiracy theory, left socialism, and nazism), but the purpose of germany has not changed through any of its past or present phases. It’s purpose seems to be unintentionally destroying itself in the process of intentionally trying to destroy the rest of Europe in attempt to conquer Europe and/or the world. Maybe it came from its clash with Rome, and it never left that modality of picking away at its neighbors. Perhaps its influence from the abrahamic faiths it long traded with, maybe that caused the sort of over-populate-and-make-conquest-youth-army kind of societal reproductive modality, by influence of the abrahamic faiths that did that in the middle east for millennia (with obvious great success, whereas Germany fails at the same niche). Maybe it’s because of their empire-orientation, their pre-lutherean state where they were catholic, and so the culture, thinkers and leaders became oriented toward empire. I dont know. But i do know Hitler, the Kaiser, and Marx were all three alienated children who were very disturbed, and assume Horkheimer and Martin Luther were of similar origins, it seems the common theme among these german influences. Disturbed children make for great communists, and germany has long been riddled with communists. Communists & new left communists like intersectionalists have been frequently compared to a religion, and germany was previously, according to Neitzsche who overtly shared my distain for German philosophy (to my surprise, i love him even more now), he said it seemed to him 4/5 people in germany  were part of protestant clergy. The whole state seems in an unending modality if one total hegemonic culthood after another.

The purpose for german collectivism being so consistently against jews, i assume. It is that jews are very successful on average by comparison to every other category in the west. So theyre integral to the structure of society, particularly around power. So to do the sort of semetic strategy, the strategy of Mohammad and Moses, the strategy of just toppling societies and inheriting the remains, in the west, one must (perhaps in a sidenote of historical irony) go through the jews. If they want to make their collectivist totalitarian ideology dominate, they have to go full cain, and stab their brothers - the jews. And just as stabbing Abel didnt wirk well for Cain, obviously taking out the most success oriented demographic (OF WHICH THERE ARE TWO) in your country is not going to work well for Germany. The other the German Collectivist opposes is the individualist - the English liberal, the stoic, the empiricist, the existentialist, the naturalist, the skeptic, these sorts. These sorts of ideas bring success, and so the authoritarian german collectivist requires their demise as well. The Kaiser hated types like us, the Fuhror hated types like us, marx hated types like us, Horkheimer, and Luther to a clear extent.

i should mention, im not a supernaturalist, the supernatural is all metaphor taken as superstition, im woth Neitszche. Theres certainly no supernatural, and race is a politically meaningless concept to me. But what is contained within the borders of germany…. There seems to be an eccentric kook persona, as a sort of cultural clone prevalent in germany, parallel to the American redneck or hillbilly. Theyre not all terrible people, but theyre often super fucked up like longislanders are in NY, or hillbillies from appalachia, or rednecks from alabama. Or just extremely eccentric like a german lady i knew IRL or Joerge Sprave, or oh my god, Max Horkheimer the kook. And it doesnt miss the city, theyre like that, but converted to progressive ideology. Crazy brutes from yesteryear, mostly tamed, or stubby and eccentric out the wazoo, or tall frail and vegan and metro af. And it’s not limited to the old german. Einstein, (not shitting in einstein, not calling him collectivist, but) absolute weirdo jewish german, Horkheimer, absolute nut job, jewish german, Marx, jewish family, the only correlation is they lived in Germany, like Hitler, the SS, and the kaiser. Even the nations east of them who share similar culture, look at Freud, absolutely a german collectivist type, but from Austria, which today is apparently an ethno national socialist state in all but admission. Prussia influenced the Kaiser’s collectivism. Even people i know from america who have all german ancestry and only third gen american, theyre bonkers, like ICP & Twisted clown-rap omega bonkers, and believe in shit like vampires and wicca and werewolf “lychen”. Oh, and i forgot to mention in summarizing Hitler, his wackjob supernaturalist beliefs. What is that? Why is this so normal there for so long and nowhere else for so long? It seems to spread from there more than anywhere else.

It has to be cultural, and deep seeded. It can be changed, and it needs to be. A german lady mutual of mine sees it and is clearly very weighted by it; i was hindered by it drastically, and i live in America. The nihilism, the self hatred, the narcissism, the psychopathy, the selective empathy (ie, selective psychopathy), the tribalism, the scapegoating. You live in germany, you must see it. You dont seem to like sj or right socialism. You seem closer to an individualist. A westerner despite Germany.

Would you consider it a real phenomenon? 'German Collectivism’? A label for describing the seeming german modality of collectivist government and the german philosophical origin of the majority of world’s largest, most wide spread, and deadly collectivist movements? Particularly today regarding the medium of marxian/intersectional conflict theory ideology? I can easily empirically trace intersectionalism and the french fake-gobbldigook-espousing 'intellectuals’ Peterson points at, back to the ideas of Marx (a german). What are your thoughts on it? What caused it? Why is it so historically persistent to this day? It’s still trying to domineer and control Europe via the proxy of the EU. And what the hell is wrong with so many (#notall) German children?! Or, likely, should i moreso be asking about ***the (#notall) parents***? But today, those parents were raised by nazis, or people raised by nazis. (#notall) but those nazis were raised by communists and imperialists, and those imperialists and communists were raised by communists and lutherean protestants, and those communists and lutherean protestants were raised by more protestants, and then catholics before them, and tribalist pagans before them. The hegemony is just unending waves of wacky who begat waves of wacky. Id like to see the origin of this crap fixed, see germany liberalized, just to show german collectivism undone SOMEWHERE it has been established for once, and in Germany itself no less. My first thought is just end the EU.

Is it real? What’s the cause? How do we undo it? 

[sailor-cresselia]

The Great Ex-Aid Rewatch: SPECIAL EDITION! Ex-Aid “Tricks”, Kamen Rider Genm

…Oh, no, I’m stuck with tv-nihon subs again, since apparently nobody else got around to subbing the Genm specials. Welp.

Like, I do want to say, right off the bat, that I’m grateful that they sub pretty much everything, but the formatting tends to sleave… a lot to be desired.

Anyway, here we go, with the awful legend rider forms and the first time we see that bright yellow should never, ever be put onto the Ex-Aid suit.

Ever.

––

We open in Dan Kuroto’s secondary lair, panning over the first fourteen Heisei Legend Rider Gashats. I am struck by the realization that I like the colors they used for these a whole lot more than the Ridewatches.

Kuroto’s also just got a Ganbarazing game cabinet in here, implying that the game is a joint project between Genm Corp and Bandai in-universe. This implication is only further enforced when he holds up three unlabeled gashats in front of the cabinet, data streams from the screen into them, and they gain labels of their own.

Introducing the Legend Rider Gashats “Magic the Wizard,” “Toukenden Gaim,” and “Full Throttle Drive.”

Legend Rider Gashat names are weird.

Kuroto says that he finally has them – gashats with the powers of legends.

…Okay, so this implies that you went and got battle data from the other 14 Heisei Riders, but I’m just saying that might have been a little difficult in a lot of cases. You know, seeing as Godai doesn’t transform because of the risk of going monstery, Kenzaki is basically in hiding while wandering the world most of the time, nobody ever knows where Tsukasa is, and Takumi is just flat out dead at the moment.

(Right here is where, up until this week, I would have thanked Zi-O for fixing two of these issues, but nooooo.)

(gfdi Sougo.)

––

After the title screen, Emu and Asuna are walking through a park, where apparently Kuroto’s called them out to meet.

…Actually, now I kind of wonder why half of the time, early-series Poppy refers to Kuroto as ‘Genm’s CEO’. Straight up using those terms, or ‘chief,’ or similar. Later on, she’ll use his name, but… like, she knows who he is. She’s not unfriendly with him. I know it’s probably some sort of formality thing that I’m not picking up on, but it still feels weird.

Anyway, he’s called them up to get back the Kaigan Ghost gashat. They’re walking, right up until a Gekitotsu Robots Collabos bugster steps out into view. Emu, being an absolute sweetheart, asks Takeru to lend him his power as he readies the gashat.

…I still don’t like the legend rider helmets.

There’s a distinct problem in his choice of gashat, however. Namely, he’s using a squishy mage form against a heavily armored robot, meaning his punches have less than no effect, and he gets sent flying just by being sideswiped by not-Gatton’s fist.

Kuroto runs up, asking if Emu’s alright.

No, no he’s not, but he’s also more concerned with making sure you stay safe, because as far as he knows, you can’t do jack to defend yourself.

Kuroto looks ‘taken aback’ by the sight of not-Gatton, and tells them that the gashat in it’s head is proto-gekitotsu robots, one of the gashats that Dr Pac-man had stolen, and asks them to get it back for him.

Emu, being Emu, immediately agrees, and runs off to go fight again, despite having just gotten knocked on his ass. Kuroto hastily opens the breifcase he’s carrying, and tosses Emu the Full Throttle Drive gashat.

Said Gashat, when activated, briefly summons an energy Tridoron out of the Game Start screen, which promptly goes and hits not-Gatton. This car also promptly disappears off screen.

(At this point, my torrent of a higher-quality version of this special finishes, and I get some much cleaner visuals. Looks like I’d been using the lower-res one, and this is much better. Also, some of the wording has been fixed up. Emu’d said that he’d made a ‘newb mistake’ in his choice of using Ghost in the DVD version, but in this one he says a ‘huge mistake.’ Much better.)

I’d like the Drive armor, because the general aesthetic converts far better into an Ex-Aid suit than Ghost’s does, but… there’s that stupid eyepiece overlapping with the eyes on the Drive helmet. This is the only problem I have with the anime eyes on the gamer suits – that the frames stick around in the legend forms, cutting into the rest of the visuals. That’s it.

As Emu starts wailing on not-Gatton with his shiny new Steering Sword, Kuroto admits that he was collecting battle data during the fight against Dr. Pac-man. We have a brief shot of him just. Lurking around a column and watching Shinnosukes fight against Robol’s minions, with a notebook in hand. Because that’s totally how he usually collects battle data. Sure.

Whatever. Anyway, Emu thinks that’s really impressive, beats on not-Gatton some more, and readies a finisher. I can’t even get mad at TV-Nihon’s typesetting habits for making the announcement a nigh-illegible red with white pinstripes, because they’re just matching what the show already had on screen, so this one’s on Toei. (Toei had a better font choice, though.)

Also, the background for the attack title card is a road, with a pair of Type Speed tires in the corners. The energy Tridoron makes a re-appearance to let Emu do Shinnosukes base finisher, and not-Gatton gets the Proto Gekitotsu Robots gashat knocked out of him.

Impressed by Drive’s power, Emu tosses the proto gashat back to Kuroto, and Asuna reminds himt hat he still needs to actually finish off the bugster.

Whoops. That warning came a little late, because the Collabos shoves the Proto Giri Giri Chambara into it’s forehead slot, and immediately goes to slice Asuna and Kuroto.

…Okay, I did not remember this – Kuroto shouts for her to look out, shoves her out of the way, and gets his back slashed in her place. As in, he’s knocked to the ground. And bleeding.

I’m pretty sure that’s for real on his part, I don’t think Kuroto expected his minion to do actually attack him. He does, however, still manage to pass Emu the Toukenden Gaim gashat, saying that since the enemy’s using a katana, this would be a better choice.

He’s right, of course, and I’m pretty sure this is, at least in part, him trying to stick to the plan, despite the ‘holy shit I am very injured right now’ factor.

The Gaim start screen opens a Helheim crack – my gaim-watching instincts immediately recoil – and the Orange Arms… well, orange drops onto Emu’s head, as robo-fruit are wont to do, at the same time as the level up screen passes by. So, he’s using both transformations here! That’s really neat!

Now please put that back because I do not want any more Helheim here than necessary thanks.

Gaim’s suit doesn’t translate nearly as well as Drives does. The flattened version of the eyes and chest piece just… they don’t do it for me. It looks like a cheap imitation. I mean, the non-chest and helmet parts of the armor work, but those… urgh. No.

Emu winds up chasing not-Kaiden down a path to another section of the park. Hah. Get it? Because part of Kouta’s armor announcement is ‘The flowered path’? I’ll see myself out.

Asuna comments to Kuroto that Emu’s doing amazing – except she’s not talking to him, because Kuroto’s taken off.

He’s leaning on the corner between a wall and holding wall for a grassy area, breathing very heavily and holding his side. He’s. He’s genuinely injured. And he’s pissed. I mean, he was sliced on the back, and he’s holding his side, but I can’t even say that it’s because he’s actually holding his driver, because he pulls that out with his other hand.

Also, uh, Rider Wiki? I have you open for easier access to names… and I don’t think ‘ruffled, but well’ is an accurate descriptor of Kuroto’s state when he hands over the Gaim gashat. Not if how he’s panting and pausing while he’s saying that that it’s time to enter the final stage of data collection is any indication.

Harutos very textured helmet, much like Kouta’s, does not translate well to the flattened image of the Ex-Aid helmets.

––

Looks like Emu and not-Kaiden have made it to another plaza, where Emu has since swapped out Kouta’s sword for his own, likely so he can actually use a proper sword-based finisher.

He wipes out not-Kaiden, and properly, this time. The proto Giri Giri Chambara gashat clatters to the ground, and the Collabos bugster appears to have finally been destroyed. Emu, cleraly remembering that there were three protogashats stolen, immediatley starts looking around, saying that “if there was a second, then there’ll be a third… Or not.”

He’s proven… sort of right, when a black and purple suit with a red and black longcoat steps into view.

“Aw, come on! You’ve got to be kidding me!”

The not-yet-named Black Ex-Aid doesn’t say anything, even after Emu realizes that “hey, you’re that asshole!” No, he just starts laying a beatdown, with lots of very Wizard-y kicks and arm strikes. Nice touch, having him use Haruto’s fighting style.

Kuroto starts up a finisher, to which Emu seems resigned to his fate of being about to take a Rider Kick to the face.

Getting knocked out of his transformation, Emu goes tumbling to the ground, the three legend rider gashats he’d been carrying clattering away.

Kuroto picks them up, switching back to his usual Proto Mighty Action X form. He activates all four gashats in turn, tossing them to the ground as their areas start generating. In his creepy, we-wish-you-had-stayed-silent disguised voice, he says that he’s obtained all the data, and the lights from the four gashats stream into one pale blue one.

Emu, picking himself up off, asks what that gashat is.

Black Ex-Aid doesn’t dignify him with an answer, instead going over to the still not defeated Collabos bugster, who is basically sprawled out on the ground. He kicks it into a sitting position, and sticks the newly-created Kamen Rider Ganbarazing gashat into it’s forehead.

This is about fifty percent payback for cutting him, I just know it. “You went off script, and now you get what you deserve. And what you deserve is an untested gashat taking control of your body, and summoning a game start screen that our local genius gamer has never seen before.”

…I really hope he picked up one of those regeneration energy items before he came out to kick ass and take data.

Anyway. Three ‘riders’ jump out of the screen before it goes blank. No, Emu, these aren’t actually them. These are Game World data copies, and they care not for your morals or history.

…Uh. The, uh. The hips of the Double suit have seen much better days. Those joint sections are completely falling apart. This isn’t like the issues with Takeru’s driver being grungy, or Kenzaki’s belt being really worn out during Zi-O, or the numerous dents in Decade’s armor. This is… it’s sad and it makes me sad.

The three ‘Riders’ advance menacingly on the very much not transformed Emu, before…

Before a figure in a white labcoat and yellow helmet shoves them away, and stands over Emu.

Kuroto: Wait, what.

Emu: Wait, what? Dr. Pac-Man?!

Kuroto asks what he just did.

Dr. Pac-Man just silently holds up three gashats, for Pac-man, Xevious, and Family Stadium.

See you next game.

––

Or, see you right now, because I’m going right into the second part!

Dr. Pac-Man momentarily stares down the three ‘Riders’, before pulling out his bugvisor – on the opposite arm from in the film – and firing, providing a distraction for him and Emu to get away.

Kuroto growls.

––

Dr. Pac-Man is basically dragging Emu by the arm to a warehouse as they run, before they come to a stop.

Emu asks, hurriedly, what Dr. Pac-Man is doing here. They defeated him!

“I have no idea how, mind you, but I’ve been assured that you were very much re-killed, and I’m willing to chalk Takeru’s reluctance to say anything up to his not quite remembering either after his near-death experience.”

Suddenly, a wild Taiga appears, punching directly for Dr. Pac-Man’s face… which is at about the same level as Emu’s, so when he dodges, Emu’s forced to leap out of the way, landing in a sprawled heap on the ground.

“So, you’re back from hell? We’ll just have to keep sending you back.”

“Wait, hang on!” Emu scrambles to his feet. “He did save me, this time!”

“That’s impossible.” Hiiro emerges from yet another column. Seriously, how did you two even know to be here? “I don’t know who that is, but we’ll just have to cut him out.”

The black Ex-Aid approaches, flanked by three figures whose suits have seen much better days.

Taiga, rather justifiably, assumes that they’re a new strain of bugsters. Emu quickyl puts a stop to that train of thought, saying that they’re fellow Kamen Riders… although they are being controlled as game characters.

Taiga’s still taking them out, though.

Dr. Pac-Man seems to approve, and tosses each of the three a Classic Namco Gashat. This pisses Kuroto right the hell off, and he pursues the now running Dr. Pac-man.

As the three inspect the new Gashats, they… well, Taiga admits they sure seem like the real deal.

Emu’s excited, because he’s a nerd and way too nice for all of this, and says that he told them Dr. Pac-Man was a good guy now!

EMU. Emu, you need to learn not to take strange gashats from people who are really, really ominous. I know this advice will go unheeded, but really. Survival instincts. You need them. Badly.

Hiiro agrees with me that your huge grin is entirely baseless, and as the imitation riders prepare to attack, the three real riders transform.

There’s some brief fighting, noticeably not in the matchups that they’ll be having soon, before Ex-Aid pulls out his new gashat. He winds up giving a quick description of Pac-Man while he’s basically got not-Fourze’s arm locked, and not-Fourze is trying to break loose from his grip.

Nice.

Brave shoves not-Double away, and describes Family Stadium, an old NES baseball game. …Okay, sorry, old Famicom baseball game, because this is in Japan. Also, I have to wonder how Hiiro of all people would know literally anything about video game history, much less that Famista basically set the standard for baseball games.

Snipe palm-strikes not-OOO off of him, and… says ‘let me try this.’ Are. Are the Namco Gashats somehow giving them these lines?! I mean, there’s no way they don’t have a heads-up display in their helmets, so… is this info just streaming from the activated gashats to the riders who would otherwise have absolutely no idea what they’re talking about? Because that is the only way I can see Taiga knowing anything about Xevious, including the name of the ship you pilot.

So, all three start up their newest gashats. Oddly, Pac-Man is the only one with an individualized name – Pac-Adventure – and Xevious doesn’t even get a jingle beyond the driver just saying ‘Xevious.’

Emu and Hiiro both charge their opponents, while Taiga, who is once again wearing a plane, makes the logical decision and activates stage select.

––

Snipe, now in a forest-esque stage, proceeds to engage in combat with not-Fourze, via copious use of miniguns and fists.

I like the Xevious recolor of Jet Combat a lot better than regular Jet Combat. The colors aren’t nearly as awful. The blue goes a lot better with Snipes usual color scheme than the garish orange. There’s a little too much linework from the source material, but I can let it pass for the better color scheme.

––

Ex-Aid and not-Double are in one of the many, many factory fight locales. They charge at eachother, but Ex-Aid leaps over Double’s punch, and books it in another direction.

I. I don’t like the Pac-Man armor. It’s a yellow and orange recolor of the torso section of Gekitotsu Robots. Color-wise, neither of them work with the bright magenta of Ex-Aid’s suit. The dark red of Robots looks out of place, more-so in motion than in static images,while the garishly bright yellow is just. It’s bad alongside magenta. It just is. The orange boxing glove fists don’t work, either.

…Actually, are those gloves from Knock-Out Fighter? Let me check real quick…

Oh. No, no they’re not. They get re-used for Ex-Aid’s version of Knock-Out Fighter 2, though.

––

Famista apparently doesn’t just equip it’s user with new armor, it comes with its own battlefield, a bugster baseball team, and gave not-OOO a baseball bat.

…Let’s just not ask why Hiiro, of all people, knows how to play baseball, and instead focus on the little baseball decals that get added to the speaker system for Doremifa Beat.

The red and white of this upgrade doesn’t quite suit Braves cyan, but it’s far and away better than what Emu got. Also, the baseball cap/visor? It has an ‘N’ on it, for Namco.

Additionally, Hiiro is able to throw a baseball so hard that it caught fire and blasted the bugster mook catcher and umpire into the wall.

I am no longer going to question anything Famista Gamer does, because that was awesome.

––

Snipe and not-Fourze exchange some decent punches, before not-Fourze remembers that he has switches! Including a rocket, which he uses to get in the air.

Snipe immediately follows suit with his jetpack, and they begin an aerial dogfight between Snipes miniguns, and not-Fourze’s gatling powerup.

I’m just going to assume that these gashats are giving the riders info, because I really can’t see Taiga knowing what the names of weapons and such are in here for any other reason.

Not-Fourze is shot out of the sky.

––

Meanwhile, Ex-Aid is running for his life. Because right now, he’s Pac-Man, and Pac-Man is on the defensive for most of his game.

It’s a nice touch that when we see Emu and not-Double running through new sections of the factory, the dots that were in the game projection disappear. They managed to get this right in the maze scene in the film, too. Nice attention to detail.

Same attention to detail goes to the small gust of green-lit wind at one point when not-Double’s Cyclone half punches, and the purple effects when his Joker half tries to land a kick.

Unfortunately for not-Double, this is right about where Emu finally finds the power pellet, and is able to fight back. To great effect, at that.

(Come on Toei, those grunts don’t sound anything like Shotaro!)

––

Snipe has unlocked a targeting system, and isn’t giving not-Fourze a chance to get airborne again. After a sizable amount of gunfire, he finally relents and just goes into his devastating finisher.

You can practically see the ‘oh crap’ on not-Fourze’s face before he gets defeated.

––

Brave manages to get a Strike on not-OOO, via the pitch going fast enough to just go right by him…

And also hit the poor, abused bugster umpire in the crotch.

The umpire and catcher feel true fear as Hiiro readies his finisher, but not-OOO still tries to hit the ball. All three of them get launched bodily into the air and explode.

––

Emu relents on his beatdown of not-Double – I feel awful about the things that poor stunt suit has gone through – and starts up his finisher.

Said finisher summons an energy Pac-man around him, and he jumps onto poor, poor not-Double. Energy Pac-man then eats said false rider, leaving only an explosion behind.

Emu realizes what I hadn’t with the other two riders, and that’s that there’s no ‘Game Clear’ announcement.

––

Poppy warps to the still unresponsive collabos bugster, who is just standing stock still as the blank Ganbarizing is projected from the gashat.

She spends a fair amount of time trying to get any reaction from it, including shouting at it, poking at the screen, and punching him, with distinct metallic clangs.

The Ganbarizing gashat flickers back into color, and the collabos’s eyes light back up. It starts going on the flailing, ineffectual offensive, chasing after Poppy.

This is just sad.

Even more sad is that Ex-Aid, in his usual armor, does a flying hip-check to knock it away from her. She takes this opportunity to get out of there.

“Now, let’s just get this gashat out of there… What’s Ganbarazing- ohhh no that didn’t work, you’re still flailing around and trying to attack me.”

Emu manages to kick the poor, useless collabos bugster away before inserting the Ganbarizing Gashat into his Gashacon Breaker for a finisher. This summons a floating swarm of Heisei Rider emblems into the air.

I like these, actually. They’re not the usual plain black silhouettes that the emblems usually are – they’re all colored, and some of them have multiple colors, namely Hibiki, Double, OOO, and Ex-Aid. It’s a nice touch.

They all merge into a giant version of the Ganbarizing logo, which Emu strikes with his hammer to blast it towards the Collabos bugster.

(Now is that thing dead?!)

I think it’s a bit early for you to say ‘Game Clear,’ Emu, or for Poppy to be giving any congratulations. I mean, this was cool, but we still haven’t heard the announcement.

And yup, they both realize that, as well, just in time for the Ganbarizing Gashat to start shaking, and pull itself out of the finisher slot in Emu’s hammer. This is fine.

It then proceeds to float into the Game Start screen, which is still here for some reason. This is fine.

Drumbeats and bells can be heard as a silhouette approaches within the screen, and pulls out a pair of drumsticks.

––

As all of that is happening, Kuroto’s still been chasing Dr. Pac-Man. He manages to corner him against a chain-link fence, and demands to see who he is. Pulling off the helmet, he startles.

Dr. Pac-Man still doesn’t speak, and holds up a Taiko no Tatsujin gashat, conveniently blocking his face.

See you next game

…Wait, what?! I thought I had- shit, now I have to find the third part in this mess of files.

…Okay, I guess I kept the DVD version for a reason, and that would be that the third segment of this was never individually subbed? I guess?!

FINE. Lower res, DVD quality it is.

––

Okay, cutting back into the unified version, with its horrible artifacting around the text, the shadowy figure hops out of the Ganbarizing Screen, and Ex-Aid and Poppy are brought face to face with not-Hibiki.

Somehow, Emu knows who he is, presumably the same way that the other guys knew about games, because nobody ever sees Hibiki.

Poppy doesn’t stick around for any more explanation, and runs the heck out of there.

Emu complains that he wasn’t done yet, as Dr. Pac-man walks up. Emu asks what happened to the black Ex-Aid, but receives exactly zero answer. Instead, he receives the Taiko no Tatsujin gashat, and gives some information on that.

He starts the finisher right away.

How better to fight the Oni drummer rider, than to play a drumming game on Oni difficulty?

And with the Ex-Aid character skin for Don-Chan when he starts up TV-Size Excite, no less!

The duel winds up being not-Hibiki launching small fireballs, which Ex-Aid cancels out with strikes from his gashat-supplied drumsticks. Once the majority of Excite is done, he truly activates the finisher, and the notes he hits during the repeated chorus start to charge up fire of their own… which grows to a massive fireball, which gets launched at not-Hibiki, defeating him.

Finally, finally, the Game Clear announcement plays.

Snipe shows up as Ex-Aid goe to pick up the Ganbarizing Gashat. He’ll be taking that, thank you very much.

Or not, if Brave has anything to say about it.

And it turns out none of them will be keeping any of their Namco gashats, since Dr. Pac-Man nyooms on in, and nabs all five from them in one go.

The black Ex-Aid shows up, and Dr. Pac-Man backs off as he takes the Ganbarizing gashat for a finisher.

Said finisher summons holograms of the previous Heisei Riders, in their pre-asskicking poses, before Genm leaps into the air, taking all of them along, and oh look that’s a whole lot of Rider Kicks aimed right at our heroes.

Fortunately, they aren’t hit by all 18 of them. Unfortunately, that’s because the holograms merge into a giant icon of the Ganbarizing logo, which Genm drops down through to kick all three heroes at once.

Nobody manages to keep their transformation once they hit the ground, and Genm just walks away.

Emu sums it up best. “What just happened?”

––

Back in his lair, Kuroto sets the Ganbarizing gashat next to the rest of the Legen Rider ones, saying that he finally has them all. I think the Showa Riders would beg to differ, but regardless.

Dr. Pac-Man comes in through the door. He has to duck a little to get through the frame, because of the helmet.

Kuroto turns around. “Take off that stupid helmet, already!”

Setting the helmet on the table, Parad smirks. “Come on, I was just having a little fun! You took off and got started without me, after all.” He sets three of the Namco gashats down on the table – the first three. Taiko no Tatsujin is nowhere to be seen.

As Parad calls dibs on Kuroto’s chair, Kuroto saunters over to where Parad left the mask. And. Uh. Starts… stroking it. While saying that everything is going according to plan.

Why. Why are you caressing it?! That’s… that’s like, a whole different level of creepy than the one you usually operate on!

Man. Now I’m going to be stuck on that for a while.

––

Anyway, that’s the Tricks: Genm special done! Not much to say about it that I haven’t already said in the liveblog, so I’ll just leave with one last comment.

The Dr. Pac-Man disguise is literally the only other outfit we see Parad in throughout the entire show, and it’s not even his. At least Graphite got that hoodie outfit when he faked having stolen the level three gashats.

Give Parad a wardrobe 2Kforever!

[yodawgiherd]

Resolution

>>>Read on AO3<<<

Rating: M

Hey guys, back here with the (slow as fuck) update, but hey, it's here! Also filling the prompt on some JxH action, if you know what I mean. So yea. Enjoy!

“We can find him.“

She said.

“I’ll help you.“

She said.

How hard can it be to find a single guy, in 2k19, the age of the internet, huh? Welp, as it turned out, pretty fucking hard indeed. There are about two and a half boatloads of Marcos in the states and finding the right one among them was basically like finding the proverbial needle in a haystack. Hah. There is a certain thing called protection of personal data and online privacy, and no matter how nicely they asked, the internet just refused to breach laws for them. The bitch. It surely didn’t help that neither Hitch nor Jean was any kind of hacker-men,  so skirting alongside IPs and whatnot to find their goal was out of the question, unfortunately. All these things combined, they were in quite a bind, and Hitch for all her initial bravado was slowly but surely losing steam.

“You know what?”, leaning back, she rubbed her tired eyes, groaning as every muscle in her body protested against the sudden movement, “Fuck this.”

Jean, who wasn’t faring much better, looked up from the laptop with a weak smile.

“We giving up?”

“Nah. Just a change of pace. We’ve been going at it from the wrong angle.”

“Oh? You got a different one then?”

“Sure do.”, leaning back forward, Hitch fixed him with an intense stare, one that used to be much more intense when she wasn’t this dog-tired, “We have to start at the source, as our online methods have apparently failed us.”

“What’s the source then.”

“That’s obvious, isn’t it?”, she pointed at him, “You.”

Jean stared at her for a minute, then scratched the back of his head. Awkwardly.

“Yea… I’m lost.”

“Look, we can’t find shit in these files, so, all have left is tracing back the physical source. You.”

“….. okay?”

Jean might have been completely dumbfounded by what Hitch was saying, and not really following, at all that was, but hey, as long as she seemed to have an idea what she was doing, he was more than okay to just sit back and let her take the lead.

“What are we doing then?”

“You said that you don’t remember where he ended up, right?”

“Correct.”

“But if you were a good friend of him as a teenager, then I’d say that your mother was in the least acquainted with his mom. Parents tend to do that.”, Hitch snapped her fingers, smug, as if she had just cracked the case, “You have to call your mom.”

Oof.

“Hey, mom… Yeah it’s me… I’m okay, okay… Listen, I just need to ask you something.”, Jean shot a look at Hitch, who gave him a supportive thumbs-up, “You remember Marco? The kid I used to hang out with? Yea, that one. Yes…. Okay, and do you recall what happened to the family, after his brother… you know… Oh?”, Jean blinked a few times, “Really? Okay, thanks. Yea, love you too, talk soon!”

With that, he hung up, finally turning to Hitch who was quite literally sitting at the edge of her seat.

“So? What did she say?”

“They moved.”

“Where?”

“Not that far away actually,” turning back towards the laptop, Jean clicked his tongue, “a few hours drive, seems like.”

Unlike Jean, who seemed to be brooding more and more with every passing second, Hitch couldn’t help but feel excited as their goal finally seemed to draw near. Well, near-er, at least.

“Time for a road trip then.”, she exclaimed, grinning, already planning how to clear her schedule for about two days, that should give them enough time.

“Road trip..”, Jean repeated mindlessly after her, a part of him dreading the now apparently unavoidable meeting.

The drive was a bit more than a few hours, and when they reached their destination the day has steadily progressed into an evening already. Finding a city was nice and all, but still, if it was a big one, their search was just about as dead as it was before. Okay, maybe a bit rejuvenated, but far from being happily finished. Yet, as fate willed it, they finally hit a tiny vein of gold in their series of unfortunate events, and the town where Marco was living in now, if the information was accurate, was a small one, making the good old strategy of going door to door, like a pair of carolers, a viable one. A bit of searching later, with Hitch growing progressively more excited and Jean more stiff by the second, they found it. A house, plain-looking one, with the Bott family name innocently sitting on the mailbox, making Jean feel like he was young again, going to ask Marco’s mother if her son can go and play outside. Hitch all but dragged him to the door, knocking while almost bouncing on the spot with excitement.

“Maybe they aren’t home..”, he suggested weakly, when no one opened for a few seconds, but Hitch wouldn’t be so easily rebutted, and shaking her head, she knocked again, louder.

The door opened.

Marco’s mother, miss Bott, has grown old over the years, as human beings tend to do. Her welcoming smile turned into a surprised expression when she saw Jean standing there awkwardly, the years apparently not proving enough of a distraction to make her not recognize him.

“Jean?”, she asked, voice shaky, “Is that you?”

He wanted to answer, he really did, but somehow his throat was insanely dry all of a sudden, and he couldn’t get a word out. Luckily, Hitch was there, ready for a rescue mission.

“Hi!”, she got the attention of the elderly woman, “I’m so sorry that we are intruding, but we’ve been wondering, could we talk to Marco? We’ve been told that he lives here.”

“Marco? Marco…”, she took a shuddering breath, the years weighing on her shoulders hard, just from that single word. She looked up, over Hitch’s shoulder, on the taller person behind her, eyes shimmering. “Jean, I thought you knew…”

He could get words out if he tried hard enough.

“Knew what?”, he croaked.

“Marco… Marco is gone… Dead. A car accident, years ago…”

And they say that God has no sense of humor.

Miss Bott must have sensed the dramatic shift In his mood, because she took a step back inside the house, giving space.

“Why don’t you come in, and we can…”

“No.”

Jean surprised himself with how cold his voice sounded, but now that he said it, he was adamant about the decision.

“I’m sorry that we barged in like this, but we really have to go now.”, robotic, machine-like words sprouting from between his lips, like a prepared speech, but the thought of getting away, right now, was the only thing that he could focus himself on. No more memories. No more painful surprises.

With an awkward half-bow, his body even stiffer than it was before, Jean made his way back to the car, only half-mindedly hearing the quick-worded apology Hitch was saying to the old lady. Sitting into the driver’s seat, heavily, he reached out to start the car, only to be stopped by the gentle and surprisingly firm grip of Hitch’s hand.

“You’re in no condition to drive.”, she whispered, “Let me.”

Not seeing her point, but in no mood to argue, he obeyed, changing seats and handing the keys over. Then he was left to stare out of the window, into the falling darkness, wondering what the hell was this whole grand tour for. Nothing, that was the logical conclusion. Just a waste of time.

He didn’t even notice that they stopped at some motel, or when the hell Hitch even got the room for them, but now he was sitting on a bed, staring at a wall, with rain thundering outside the windows. When did that happen?

“Looks like a small storm.”, Hitch said, entering, shaking the raindrops from her hair, “I thought it would be better to just spend the night here, and go back in the morning. What do you think?”

“Whatever.”, Jean muttered, honestly not giving a fuck right now.

“So… Uh..”, taking off her wet coat, she sat down on the other bed, facing the brooding man.

“Want to talk about what happened?”

“No.”

“Jean you should…”

“No.”

“It’s really better to…”

“No.”

“Just listen to me!”, a bit pissed off with how he was cutting her off, Hitch raised her voice, but all that she got from Jean in response was an arched eyebrow, “I’m a professional, I’ve been dealing with things like these on daily basis! Just let me…”

“No.”

Other people would just probably say fuck it, and leave him to sulk, wouldn’t probe anymore, as Jean didn’t want any help. Hitch was not like other people.

The slap was hard, stinging, setting his cheek aflame. Jean’s eyes immediately lit up, his body ready for the fight or flight response, and he was not in the mood for flight. Yet as quickly as he tensed up, he relaxed, when he realized who was the one that hit him.

“Now are you going to listen?”, she asked, nonchalantly, ignoring the way he stared at her.

Jean worked his jaw, snorted, and shook his head.

“No.”

She slapped him again, even harder, making Jean wonder where the strength was coming from.

“Now?”, again, such a calm voice, a sharp counter to the heated actions. But he wouldn’t budge.

“No.”

When Hitch tried slapping him for the third time, he caught her hand, restraining her effortlessly.

“No more…”, he began, but Hitch was resourceful, enough to hit him with her other hand, forcing him to restrain it too.

“No more unnecessary violence.”, he said, cheeks burning.

“Unnecessary? I disagree, it is necessary, as it is the only thing you seem to react to at all.”

He shook his head.

“I don’t need your council or your help. I’m fine.”

“I never said anything about helping you. Maybe it’s me that needs to talk.”, she countered, “But if you’re putting yourself so readily in the victim position, maybe you do need my help, huh?”

“No.”, again retreating to that word, as it was the only thing that seemed solid right now, Jean did his best to push back against her offers, to handle it on his own, but Hitch wouldn’t back down.

“I don’t want to talk.”, he whispered.

“Then don’t.”, she offered, and pushed forward, using the last possible assault, now that he was holding her hands.

She kissed him.

Jean was surprised by her attack, taken aback enough to allow himself to be pushed on his back, the hold he had on her hands dissolving and suddenly Hitch was the one holding his considerably larger arms hostage, pressing them into the cheap motel mattress above his head.

“Is this a part of your normal therapy?”, he managed to breathe in-between the kisses.

“Nah,”, she grinned against his lips, “You’re getting special treatment.”

The room was getting hotter, so Hitch sat back to remove her shirt, a feat which Jean gladly assisted her with. She could clearly feel that for all his apathy and cold attitude, he was certainly getting excited now, the unmistakable pressure against her thighs obvious.

“I still want to talk.”, she hissed, making Jean stop in his efforts to weasel out of his own shirt.

“Now?”, he asked, quite uncertain of what to do in his situation.

He looked so funny, with his handsome face all twisted in surprise, frozen with his shirt open and half-out of it, so much that Hitch couldn’t hold it back and began to laugh, shaking her head.

“No, not now. After.”, but to show that she’s serious, she poked him in the middle of his chiseled chest, “But I won’t forget about it.”

“Oh?”, expression darkening, Jean reached out to pull her closer, flipping their position so she was under him now, squirming beneath his broad-shouldered frame.

“We’ll see about that.”, the words were full of promise, and Jean quickly followed them up with a string of kisses down Hitch’s neck, the heat in her spiking above safe figures.

“Maybe I’ll just…”, his hands were now busy downstairs, unbuckling Hitch’s belt and helping her slide out of her jeans, with her avid assistance, and with their combined efforts she was soon bare to him, allowing Jean to slide a finger into her heat, “…fill your head with different thoughts.”

Desperate to get the situation back into her control, as much as she could, Hitch grabbed a fistful of Jean’s hair, yanking him back up, to face her, and when he did she felt a shudder running down her spine. His eyes were empty, save for a burning desire, dark orbs with the fire smoldering on the inside.

“I need you.”, he said, and there was not any question about what she should answer him.

“You have me.”

Spreading her legs in an invitation, Hitch tilted her hips up, allowing her lover to slide himself in, the sensation making her gasp. Jean was usually gentler, but the events of today seemed to burn it all away, and he didn’t hold back when his hips began moving, the dance they both knew so well. Whatever her dedication was before, it was being chipped away at, with every thrust, and all Hitch could do was hold onto Jean’s back for dear life, gasping for air. She couldn’t even see his face, as Jean had it hidden in the cook of her neck, his hot breath fanning over her sweaty skin. Yet it ended as quickly as it began, with him pulling out, much to Hitch’s disappointment.

“Need you to turn around.”, he grunted, his tone allowing no discussion right now, but then again, it wasn’t as if Hitch was looking for one. With his rough help, she turned, getting on her hands and knees. Thankfully, Jean didn’t let her hang for long, covering her body again and using the different position to push in even deeper than before, filling her completely. And again, same as before, he didn’t start up slow, but set a powerful pace, driven by some primal need that Hitch didn’t really understand, but was more than willing to help him to come to terms with it. The small room was full of her moans, and the sounds of skin meeting skin, but Jean remained quiet, muting whatever pleasure he was feeling himself. Fingers, intertwining with her hair, this time it was Jean who yanked her head back, exposing Hitch’s neck to his teeth, vulnerability he immediately took advantage of, marking her skin with fervor. Her pleasure peaking, Hitch reached back behind her, grasping blindly, until she found one of Jean’s hands, guiding it between her trembling thighs. He knew what she wanted him to do. Spreading her open and dipping two fingertips in, Jean began to attend to her clit, rubbing her until she was squirming underneath him, even harder than before, moaning loudly, not caring about the poor neighbors behind the paper-thin walls of the motel in the slightest. Seconds later, her orgasm wrecked Hitch’s body, much to Jean’s pleasure, enough to push him over his own edge. Soon, the room went quiet, with only two sets of breaths slowly calming back to normal.

“Ready to talk now?”, she wanted to know, when the rush of sex was done with, making her lover chuckle.

“You didn’t forget? Damn.”

“I never forget.”

“I’m not sure what you want me to talk about..”, Jean grunted, reaching over to rub a soothing circle over her hipbone, defined beneath the skin, marked with red where he gripped her during their earlier activities. “He’s gone, so any closure I could have gotten is gone with him.”

“It doesn’t have to be that way. I was thinking…”, intertwining her fingers with his, Hitch looked up, “what if we go to Marco’s grave? You could talk to him, say that you’re sorry, see if you don’t feel better afterward.”

Bringing their connected hands to his lips, Jean pressed a kiss to her knuckles.

“As we are staying the night anyway, I’d say it’s worth a shot.”

Wearing a huge satisfied grin, Hitch leaned over to kiss him properly, happy that Jean was properly out of his shell, and that while the initial plan didn’t really work out, there was still a chance to salvage the situation. And don’t even dare to say that she’s not the damn best therapist that there is, albeit her methods can be…. strange, at times.

[eene-fangirl]

Things Happen for an Ed Chapter 3 (An Ed, Edd n Eddy Fanfiction)

“Here is it, Ed!” An excited Eddy exclaimed racing through the small hallways of their apartment waving the newspaper in hand.

“Did you see if they put our article into the paper?” Ed sat up from the kitchen table.

“That’s what I’m going to find out!” Eddy flung off the elastic band shooting it across the room nearly hit the window. The landlord wouldn’t be happy about another broken window.

Skimming through the article the first thing Eddy noticed was the picture. That was his picture alright! A good sign. ‘Early Sunday morning an accident occurred on the highway close to exit 17 of...’ hey, they got rid of the sentence I wrote!”

“But that’s still what you wrote, Eddy,” Ed pointed out trying to assure his friend.

“What, they didn’t like the word ‘epic car accident?’ Come on, those bores down there need to flip on the excitement switch!”

Ed stole the paper starting to read. “‘Two truck drivers stopped along the side of the road. If it weren’t for their heroic actions it’s safe to say all hope would have been lost...’”

“That’s not what I wrote!” Eddy yelled, his voice echoing throughout the paper thin walls of the apartment. The new mother next door to them wasn’t going to be happy. What was she getting at? The baby cried all night keeping them awake!

“That’s so unfair! Editing over my masterpiece! Sheesh, least we got paid!” Eddy grumbled pouring himself a pot of coffee.

“I wonder who it was that got hurt,” Ed said aloud continuing to skim the article.

“Ugh, forget it, Ed! I don’t give a damn!”

“Holy Gravy!” Ed shouted standing up, hitting the table with his knee. The coffee pot just nearly went smashing to the floor.

“What is it?” Eddy asked, somewhat annoyed.

Ed looked at him with this expression of utter turmoil and guilt. His hands shook.

“What? What is it? Would you tell me already?!”

“Eddy,” Ed started in shaking voice. “That was Double D...”

The ticking of the clock never sounded so loud. Eddy’s heart pounded inside his chest flashing back to the events of the accident.

The black hair... it was Edd’s hat... the blood... Edd wore a red shirt... and when he caught a glimpse of the victim being placed into the ambulance, Eddy knew he recognized that familiar face.

“W-What?” Was all Eddy could say.

“‘Twenty two-year-old Eddward Vincent-Blake suffered multiple injuries when he lost control of his car yesterday,” Ed read.

“Double Dee...”

“‘According to witnesses the car broke through a barricade and rolled once, crushing the driver's side of the vehicle. If it weren’t for two quick-thinking truck drivers Vincent-Blake’s life would have been lost.”

Eddy grasped the neck of the chair. Part of him was hoping to wake up from his nightmare. It was Edd. Their third Ed who moved away six years ago.

“I-I thought... I didn’t know it was him!” Eddy exclaimed in a soft tone. “I thought it was just another person!”

Ed looked at him, tiny tears trickling in the edges of his eyes. “Nobody is just another person, Eddy. That’s what Double D said, remember?”

Guilt swarmed Eddy’s mind. How could he be so careless? This was his worst foul-up ever! There he was snapping away pictures of a car accident without a care in the world. And it was Edd. Why was he driving in that direction anyway?

“Oh Eddy, I’m sorry for leaving like this,” Edd said to him on the day he was leaving.

Eddy sat on his bed, obstructing Edd’s face from his view with a magazine. He wasn’t even reading it. “You already said that...”

“It’s just that this prep school will help me gain a better credit to get into colleges like Yale or...”

“There’s a prep school one town over,” Eddy interrupted.

He knew just from the way Edd sounded he was on the brink of tears. “I realize that but it's much too expensive.”

“So your parents say...”

“Eddy, all I want you to understand is...”

“That you’re breaking apart our band!” Eddy yelled finally putting the magazine down.

Edd was not up for this confrontation. “It’s not like that, Eddy!”

Eddy hid himself with the magazine. “Yeah, yeah, whatever. I don't care what you do. Now go off and be smarty pants!”

The room was silent. Eddy knew that Edd hadn’t left the room yet. But Edd wanted him to stay.

“Eddy?”

“Yes?”

Eddy lifted the magazine down only a centimeter to see Edd’s broken expression. It was enough to crack Eddy’s heart.

“Goodbye.”

And then he was gone.

Eddy sobbed against the kitchen table, painfully grasping his hair. How could he call himself a friend? How could he call himself a person? Losing touch with Edd was the worst decision ever. It was not Edd’s fault. He was the one who ignored the texts wondering if there was ever a time for a visit.

“What have we done, Ed?” Eddy still thought that this was a nightmare. Maybe the accident was all a part of the dream, too. No, the article of the newspaper which proudly noted him as the author stared up at him.

“Poor, Double Dee!” Ed cried.

Eddy picked up the paper, putting a hand on Ed’s back. “He’s lucky to even be alive.”

“I thought we’d never see him again, Eddy,” Ed said.

Eddy stood up and threw the paper into the trash. “Welp, how’s about we pay him a good old visit.”

[mrgrant9559-blog]

Witch Way Is Right? Part 8

AN: Ok, so this basically shows how the team is still a little bit split up after Civil War… Reader thought everything was fine but later finds out the horrible dark truth. I’m gonna change it up a little here. When I use Y/N, I won’t use parenthesis, so be on the lookout for that. Also, btw if you don’t know who Baron Mordo is, he’s this guy from Doctor Strange:

Summary: (Y/N) is a male witch and also comes from a family of witches. When (Y/N) is backed up in a corner by his brother, who chose the dark path, he is forced to choose his own fate, choosing the light path. This causes an Ecliptic War between Light and Dark Witches. During this war, an eclipse (both solar and lunar) is happening, and won’t end until one brother is left standing. With the help of the Avengers and other helpful heroes, will (Y/N) be able to defeat his brother, or will the world be forever secluded in darkness?

Subject: Avengers x Male!Reader/Steve Rogers x Male!Reader

Characters: Y/N, Avengers, Alex (Brother), Doctor Strange, Wong, Mom OC, Dad OC, Baron Mordo

Tags: @uselessace @avengersohyeah @lzzywinchester @thegreatficmaster @writeyouin

Word Count: 1.8k

Masterlist!

______________________________________________________

Later The Night:

Alex’s POV:

“Éna máti gia éna máti!” (An eye for an eye!) I say, as I conjour up a spell to spy on Y/N. Baron taught me this a few months ago and I have to admit this isn’t the first time I’ve used it on him, but it IS the first time I’ve done it against him. Usually, I’d use the spell just to check up on him and my parents. See how they were doing, if they needed any help, or if there was someone messing with Y/N that I had to privately take care of.

Even after I chose the dark path, I still wanted to be apart of the family, but I knew my parents wouldn’t want me to after Dad’s huge fight with Baron. I chose the dark path because Baron told me all the things I’d be able to do with it compared to if I chose the light path like my parents wanted me to. But now that I have, I don’t regret a single thing. Well, maybe a couple things.

“Alex, did you see anything while using that spell I told you about?” Baron asked, walking into our study to check up on me.

“Yeah.” I answered, “I guess Tony Stark is gonna be throwing a party for Y/N somewhere in the UK. I think that gives us the perfect opportunity to try out that true feelings spell, seeing as how Stark and Rogers are still on bad terms. What I just saw through Y/N’s eyes basically confirms it.”

“You’re right. All of them in the same room together. Something is bound to erupt.” Baron says. Although we do have some powerful dark witches on our side for the war, we still want to make sure that Y/N’s side will be easy to dominate. “I want you to cast that spell whenever you think it’s the right time, but make sure its during the party. If we play our cards right, we can cause the team disband again and Y/N won’t have the help he needs to win the war!”

All think planning, and I remember that Stark told Y/N that he was gonna have a mystery teacher to help him with his powers. I walk to the couch and sit down with an exasperated sigh that doesn’t go unnoticed by Baron, who takes a seat next to me. “What is it, my apprentice? Is something troubling you?” he asks.

“It’s just what Stark told my brother the other time I spied on him. He told him something about a mystery sorcerer coming to teach Y/N about his new advanced powers.” Baron nods at me to continue. “You wouldn’t happen to know who this mystery sorcerer is, would you?”

“I have an idea of who it might be. But if it is who I think it is, then we have to be careful about our next move.” He explains as I nod in understanding. “Let’s go. We need to prepare our selves for the spell.”

_________________________

Meanwhile:

Reader’s POV:

I look at the clock and it reads 3:25 p.m. I look in the mirror to check myself out. Never thought I’d be wearing a tux again after Homecoming except for prom. I have to admit though, I look pretty neat. My ‘Welcome to the Team’ party starts at tomorrow at 12 p.m. there (which is 4 a.m. here), so that means we’ll have time to relax and Tony will have time to get everything set up. At least, thats what he told me.

My thoughts were interrupted by the knock on my room door. “Who is it?” I ask, but didn’t hear anything. I go back to grooming myself until I hear another knock on the door. Annoyed, I start walking to the door and ask whl it is again but still no answer. I open the door and see none other than my parents!

“Surprise, kiddo!” My dad says to me and I jolt to them in a bone crushing embrace. I know its only been a day, but with whats been going on, I really needed to see them right now. The sound of my mom sobbing while hugging me is powerful enough to even cause me to shed tears of my own. I really want to tell them the things Alex put me through while I was gone, but I think the last thing they need is to know that. For now I just want to spend time with them as much as I can.

After what felt like half an hour of hugging and crying with my parents, we finally let go and I let them in my room to talk. They catch me up on almost everything, like how everyone back home is doing, and how people are reacting to the solar and lunar eclipses, saying that they’re lucky to experience such an astronomical phenomenon. I thought people would be freaked about the eclipses but according to my parents, everyone is loving it and saying they’re glad they’re alive to see something so beautiful. That makes me feel a little better.

Two hours pass and I finally get a text from Tony telling us to head to the airport to fly to London. We enter the vehicle thats waiting for my parents and I in front of the Avengers HQ building. Tony told me that our driver was happy but when I saw him, he didn’t look all that happy to me. On our way to the airport, I get another text this time from Steve.

________________________________________________________

Steve: Hey Y/N! It’s Steve.

Y/N: Oh hey Steve. How’d you get my number?? lol

Steve: Friday told me. Anyways, are you guys almost to the airport?

Y/N: Yea actually we should be there in like… 30 mins?

Steve: Awesome! Also, when we’re at the party, can you do me a favor?

Y/N: Uhh sure… What is it tho?

Steve: Don’t drink a DROP of alcohol… I know you’re 18 and you really wanna celebrate, but you can do that without drinking and I really wouldn’t feel comfortable with an 18 year old drinking… Just promise me you won’t 😕

Y/N: Ok. I won’t 😉

Steve: Great! I really appreciate it! See ya soon! 😇

Y/N: Yea see ya! 😈

________________________________________________________

Welp, I’m gonna get fucking hammered at this party. I mean who does Steve think he is trying to tell me what not to do just because he’s not comfortable with it? It’s not like he’s boyfriend or my dad or anything. My parents pick up on my frustration a few minutes after. “Hey, sweetie. Is everything alright?” my mom asks.

I turn to her and give her a half smile as an idea pops in my head. “I just need to know something.” I say as my parents nod for me to continue speaking. “Since I’m at the legal age to drink in the UK, how much am I allowed to drink exactly?”

They both share glances towards each other, a smile writen on their faces before my dad turns back to me. “Your mother and I were talking about this when we heard from Mr. Stark about the party. We think its a great idea that he’s decided to have the party in the UK so you can properly celebrate your recruitment to the Avengers.” He explains.

“And as an Avenger, we expect you to make your own decisions not just for yourself, but for your team as well.” My mom adds. “So, we’re allowing you to drink as much as you want. Just don’t get too drunk.”

My eyes widened as I’m surprised by my parents decision. Not only are they allowing me to drink, but they’re trusting me to be responsible on how much I drink too. I’m so excited now for this party, that I don’t think the smile on my face could get any bigger.

As we finally arrive at the plane, which is called Stark Airlines of course, I see Nat and Clint sitting together, Bucky and Sam sitting together across from them, and Steve sitting alone behind Bucky and Sam. I wonder if he caught on to that d evil emoji I sent him. I try walking past him, but he grabs my wrist gently enough for me to stop and glance at him.

“Hey, when we were texting earlier, I think you sent me the wrong emoji.” He says.

“No, it was the smiling devil emoji, right?” I say and he nods his head. “Yeah, I meant to send that.”

“Ok, but what do you mean by that? I’m a little new to the whole emoji thing, but I know that usually means something else.” He tells me.

A smirk is plastered on my face as I tell him, “Don’t worry about it. Just know that I’m an adult, and I can be responsible for my own actions.” And with that, I walk three seats behind him next to where my parent are sitting. I look towards them and they give me a reassuring smile as I give one back to them. This is gonna be fun! Later on Wanda, Vision, and Scott get on the jet and we’re ready for take-off.

__________________________________

House of M:

Third Person POV:

“Strange! Did you ever figure out whats causing these solar and lunar eclipses?” Wong asks, as he enters the study, finding Doctor Strange with his nose buried in a book like he’s been doing for the past couple of days. Strange knows that these eclipses aren’t “astronomical phenomenons” like the scientists want everyone to believe. He’s too smart to fall for something like that.

“Apparently, some idiot and his little brother started the Ecliptic War. Which explains the eclipses. An Ecliptic War can only be started when two witch born sibling choose two different paths, one light and the other dark.” Strange explains as he closes the book he was just reading and summons his cape to fly to him and wrap around his collar. “According to this book, if they don’t hurry up and have this war, then Earth could be at risk of going into complete darkness. That means no moon, no sun, nothing. Just darkness and chaos.”

Wong has a worried look on his face. He knows that they need to hurry up and do something before things get catastrophic. “How long do they have to start the war?” He asks in completely understanding of how serious this is.

Strange turns towards Wong, whose determined to make sure the Earth is back to normal. “Don’t worry. We have 3 months after the eclipse has started, which means we’re gonna have to start Y/N’s training a lot sooner than we thought. Get everything ready. We’re gonna have to pay Y/N a visit.”

__________________________________

Hey, so not really proud of this chapter that much, Could’ve made it longer but I want to leave the initial party for the next chapter, plus some extra stuff I’m planning. Anyways, I hope you guys enjoy and I’ll see you in the next chapter.

[their-destinys-writer]

Misadventures in Reporting - Christmas Special 2017

About the series: Misadventures in Reporting is a series of short stories about the adventures of a normal reporter living in an abnormal world.

Rating: PG-13 for mild cursing and one very drunk superhero

Word count: 1,782

I want to dedicate this to my best friend who’s been living in the United States for several years now (love you, bestie) and to every Puerto Rican living abroad. We miss you over here. Merry Christmas to you all.

Calling Home

It was the first day of snow. Normally, it wouldn’t fall until closer to Christmas, and sometimes not even then. But this year, Chicago was already filled with icy patches anywhere water had leaked days before Christmas Eve. That meant the citizens had to watch where they stepped. While the city’s maintenance employees had done their best to keep the sidewalks as safe as possible, there was only so much they could do. Everyone knew this. But Melinda was too focused on her phone to remember.

It was the third time she tried calling her family back home, but the call still wouldn’t get through. Each time it went straight to voicemail. She growled at her phone, her ungloved hand already hurting from the cold. Although she had been living in Illinois for several years already, she still couldn’t get used to the cold.

She switched her phone to her other hand, flexing the exposed one in hopes of unfreezing it. Once mobile enough, Melinda tried calling for the fourth time. This time, it rang twice. Her heart skipped a beat. Yet, once again, she was met with the familiar: “You have reached to voicemail box of; seven, eight, seven—”

“UGH!” she growled as she crossed the street. “Just work, you stupid, useless fu—ARGH!”

Melinda fell flat on her butt, but was not given the chance to properly register.

In a split second, a honk resounded in her ears, at the same time that a shooting pain invaded her shoulder. But the pain was not from the incoming headlights. Instead, Melinda had the time to look up to see someone had grabbed her arm, and was now flying her up to a nearby apartment building.

Ungracefully, what looked like a young man dropped her on the rooftop, making her fall face-first on the ground. She got up to her knees, groaning and looking for her clumsy savior. Only eight feet away from her, the man landed, staggering further away from her. He bent down and then…

Threw up.

That’s not what I expected, she thought, covering her nose and mouth.

“Ugh, I regret everything,” the young man slurred, holding himself up from a wall. He gagged again, like he was still nauseous.

That’s my savior? Melinda wondered, skeptical. She looked closer at the young man, who looked no taller than five feet and several inches. He was dressed in several layers of sweaters and jackets, the one over all colored black. He also wore a thick, red beanie that covered his ears, and large sunglasses, making it hard to make out his face. Yet, his very tanned skin was still visible.

“Are you okay?” she asked hesitantly.

“I feel like shit,” he mumbled, dragging his feet away from the bodily fluids he had just expelled. “I’m never—” He stopped on his tracks. He swallowed hard and deflated. “I’m never drinking again.”

“You’re drunk?” Melinda deadpanned. “First time I get rescued, and you’re drunk?”

“Sorry—hic—to disappoint, lady,” the young man snapped.

“Are you even old enough to drink?” she asked, mulling over his short stature.

“I’ll have you know that—hic—my height doesn’t define my age,” he complained. He then took a deep breath. “Whatever, you’re fine. I’ll leave.”

He waved dismissively at her, but just as quickly as he took flight again, he was back down on the rooftop.

“Nope,” he managed to get out, covering his mouth again. “Bad idea.”

Melinda frowned, staring at the imbalanced man. Flying wasn’t a common power superheroes had. Which was ironic, considering all the comic books she had read while growing up. In fact, there was only one super she knew of who had that ability. And one of the traits people mostly described of him was that he was shorter than you’d think.

“You’re Hermes,” she let out. “You’re one those heroes that travels around the world.”

The young man became still, hand still on his face.

“I’m not sober enough for this,” he breathed, slowly sitting on the floor.

Meanwhile, Melinda’s heart started beating erratically. These international heroes were not easy to catch. Most of them denied interviews, or didn’t speak the language of whatever country they were visiting at the time. Only once she had managed to see one, and it ended with her trapped in a cage of dirt.

This guy was drunk and unable to fly. He was easy prey.

Yet, she found herself struggling between her journalism instincts and her human ones. It wouldn’t be fair nor ethical to take advantage of someone who had saved many lives. Much less of someone who made his first public rescue back home, where her family resided.

“Do you need anything?” she found herself asking.

Hermes merely shrugged. As softly as possible, she moved closer to him, until the tips of her feet almost touched his knee.

“Why are you drunk?” she couldn’t help but ask. “You sound like a kid.”

“Where I’m from, I’m old enough to drink,” he slurred.

“But we’re not in wherever you’re from,” she deadpanned, crossing her arms.

Hermes shrugged again. “Debatable.”

Melinda frowned. What was that even supposed to mean? This guy wasn’t making much sense. She could just leave. She wasn’t her babysitter or designated driver; she didn’t have to stay. But what if someone came out into the rooftop and found him like this? Not everyone was a kind soul. They could end up taking advantage of his state to find out his real identity, or worse.

With an exasperated sigh, she collapsed next to him, crossing her legs for warmth. At least the rooftop was kept as clear of snow as possible.

“Why aren’t you in costume?” she asked.

“Wasn’t working,” he whispered. “Didn’t have time to change. Much less in my state.”

The journalist hummed. “And why risk your identity, if you were not—”

“Are we playing twenty questions?” Hermes interrupted. “I may be—hic—drunk, but I can still keep my secrets.”

“No, I wasn’t—” But she stopped abruptly, sighing instead. “Sorry. I ask questions for a living. It’s like second nature sometimes.”

Hermes grunted. They remained quiet for several minutes. In that time, Melinda stole several glimpses his way, still processing the fact that she was sitting next to a very famous superhero outside of work. In those glances, she noticed a pin attached to his jacket. It was a flag, with a blue triangle and five stripes. Three stripes were red, while the other two were white. And inside the triangle, there was a lone, white star.

It was the flag of her home.

“What’s with the pin?” she couldn’t help but ask, despite her previous apology.

For a moment, Hermes hesitated. Yet, eventually, he responded.

“My mom gave it to me,” he said. When Melinda opened her mouth to ask further, he continued. “She wanted me to have a piece of home with me always. To remind myself from where I come from. Like I could ever forget it.”

Melinda could almost feel herself vibrate with excitement. Who would have thought one of those famous superheroes was Boricua, like her? She wanted to jump up and scream, or start talking in Spanish. However, the melancholy in his features held her down, feeling it was not the time to freak out about it. Instead, she went another route.

“I miss home, too,” she said quietly. “I was trying to call my mom when I fell on the street. Cellphone service had been kinda bad in Puerto Rico lately, so I wasn’t paying attention to where I was stepping. Thank God there was a fellow Boricua to save me, huh?”

This time, Melinda turned her head to look fully at Hermes. As for him, he was already staring at her, lips parted. Slowly, a grin replaced his surprise.

“My cousin thought—hic—it would be funny to give the coquito and extra kick,” he responded at last, basking in the fact that he could talk about the Puerto Rican eggnog without having to explain himself.

“And, what, you just kept drinking?”

“It was so good!” Hermes defended.

Melinda snorted, trying to hold back laughter. They then proceeded to talk about Christmas food and drinks, arguing about which was the best part of their traditions, and other things. After a while, they fell into silence.

“I miss the stars the most,” Melinda said suddenly, looking up at the sky. “I could see so many of them from home. Here, it’s lucky I can see at least one.”

“Me too,” Hermes sighed, starting to sober up. “But did you know you can see a lot more stars out in the sea?”

“Wouldn’t know,” Melinda shrugged. “I’ve never been sailing or on a cruise.”

“You should someday,” he said. “It’s one of the coolest things you’ll ever see.”

“Maybe someday.”

There was another pause, finally broken by Hermes starting to rise from his sitting position.

“Welp, I’m feeling much better,” he announced. “I should get going before my cousin freaks out.”

“Right,” Melinda agreed, standing up too.

Hermes was starting to climb the low wall, when he suddenly stopped and turned back to her.

“By the way, could you not tell anyone about the stuff I told you? Keeping my identity secret is very important to keep my loved ones’ safe. I’m sure you understand.”

The journalist waved a hand over her mouth in a zipping gesture.

“My lips are sealed,” she assured. “Not everything needs to be reported on.”

“Reported on?” Hermes whispered to himself. “What’s your name again?”

“I’m Melinda Martínez,” she responded, as if stating her name for an interview. “I’m a journalist, so you’ve probably read my name on a byline of the Chicago Metro Times. But don’t worry,” she added hastily when she noticed him become still. “I’m not the paparazzi type of reporter. I can keep a secret. Besides, you never consented to an interview, and I take my journalism ethics very seriously.”

“Oh,” Hermes breathed. “That’s nice of you. Well, see you around, Melinda.”

With a stiff wave of his hand, he bid goodbye to her and jumped into the air. Melinda took a step closer to where he had been, watching the fading figure in wonder, imagining how it felt like to fly. She gave a wistful sigh, right before looking at her phone again. She took a deep breath and tapped at the contact that said ��Mami’. She waited several anxious seconds, until, at last, the phone on the other side rang.

After only two rings, a woman responded: “Hello?”

“Mami!” Melinda sighed, with the widest smile she’d had all day, despite the freezing Christmas cold.