#which means their offense problem still isn’t fixed

[the-physicality]

South Carolina is up 35-9 at the half and they only have 4 assists on 12 field goals?

[vexcraft]

i present you: grub species swap! avian cub and vex grian with some vex scar trying to eat everyone on the side (so warning for cannibalism mentions but like in a funny way). can also be read on ao3 here!

backwards

“What did you do?!” Grian basically screams as he lunges at Cub with almost inhumane speed. Cub steps to the side, avoiding Grian more easily than he should have been able to.

Right.  

Grian is considerably smaller and easier to dodge without his big bright wings that easily triple the amount of space the man needs around him even when they are neatly folded against his back. The wings that are currently not on Grian’s, but Cub’s back.

Which brings them to their current problem, which isn’t even Grian’s confused anger. At least that isn’t the main problem and Cub is fairly certain he can hopefully deal with it, though he’s no Grian-whisperer.

“Man, I didn’t do anything!” he replies, raising his hands in surrender. It was true – for once. He had nothing to do with this. The wings on his back shift as he moves, feeling unfamiliar and weird. “Not my fault, I swear!” 

“You have my wings!” Grian stares at Cub like he has grown a second head instead of wings, his deep black eyes even more ominous than usual. 

“Not by choice,” Cub argues. “Not everything is always someone else’s fault, y’know.”

Grian glares at him and Cub shrugs. The weight of the wings seems to put pressure on muscles Cub didn’t even know existed – hell, maybe they didn’t exist before this, who knows what the extent of these changes to his body really was? Whatever it was, it was certainly making him uncomfortable. 

“I’m having kind of a hard time believing that you here, Mr. Vex Magician, don’t have anything to do with you mysteriously having my wings, ouch-” Grian flinches suddenly and pauses, sticking out his tongue. “Bit my tongue, dude, that hurt .” Cub watches the blood bleed on his lips blue. His eyes widen in realization and Grian looks at him questioningly. “What? Stop staring, you’re being weird.”

Cub sucks in a breath and ignores the feeling of feathers puffing up behind him. “You’re a vex,” he says. 

Grian’s face twists from confusion to some sort of furious disbelief. “I’m what!? ” he shrieks. “Cub, what did you just say!?”

“You’re a vex,” he repeats. Suddenly things make more sense – still not enough sense, but more nonetheless. Something is very wrong, that much Cub can tell. “I’m a bird, you’re a vex.”

“An avian,” Grian corrects sourly as if that was the biggest of his concerns right now. “What do you mean? How can you even tell?”

“You’re bleeding blue,” Cub points out and Grian instantly wipes his mouth on his sleeve, staring at the stain left behind, dumbfounded. He opens his mouth to say something and Cub notes the row of pointy teeth clearly visible. “Also your teeth are sharp, like vex.” He watches Grian run his tongue over his teeth and does the same himself, noticing his own teeth are no longer like little daggers lined up but instead flat like humans and hybrids that didn’t have special diets tended to have.

“What does this mean?” Grian asks, sounding alarmed by the new discovery. “Being a vex, what does it mean for me?”

Cub thinks – what does it mean? He’s so used to his own nature and all the big and small quirks that come with it that it’s not as simple of a question as one might think. Now that he knows to look, he can tell Grian’s nails are sharper too and there’s a light blue tint to his face where normally he’d be flushing red. 

“Hopefully not much,” he ends up shrugging. “If we get this fixed quickly.” 

“That’s a pretty big if, considering neither of us seem to have any idea what happened!” Grian huffs. “What if we can’t get it fixed quickly, what then? Cub, vexes are weird creatures! I don’t know how any of this works!” 

Cub snorts, not taking offense. “Can you hear them?” Grian shakes his head, visibly confused. “Good, good. Are you hungry?” 

“I don’t think so?” he replies, taking a moment to focus on his now rather foreign-feeling body. “I feel like I could eat something but not hungry, I don’t think? Wait, what do you mean by hearing them? Can you hear them?” 

“That’s normal, if you’re not feeling hungry then there’s nothing to worry about,” Cub hums. There might, most likely will, be something to worry about in the future if they can’t get this solved, but right now he’d prefer to… avoid going into certain details unless he absolutely has to. “I can usually hear the vex, but not right now though.”

He’s grown so used to the little yells and screams in the back of his head that he hadn’t even realized they weren’t there anymore. The silence is odd now that he pays attention to it, but he’s relieved to know the cacophony hasn’t moved into Grian’s head instead. 

“What do you mean you can usually hear them?” Grian asks, sounding so horrified Cub is even more glad Grian apparently can’t hear them. “That’s awful, can Scar hear them too?” 

“Yep,” Cub replies. He would have assumed Scar would have told Grian, considering the two were good friends, but then again, it really wasn’t that much of a big deal. “It’s kinda annoying but we’re used to it by now. It’s not too bad.”

“Doesn’t sound like something ‘not too bad’ to me,” Grian insists. “Does Xisuma know?” 

“If he knows anything about vexes, then probably yeah. Seriously, it’s no big deal, I’m sure there are some bird things you don’t think are odd but others do,” Cub says, rolling his shoulders. The wings are starting to feel uncomfortable like things aren’t in the right places. “Like for example how itchy these wings are,” he mumbles, trying to reach for the itchy spot before realizing that one, he can’t reach it, and two, the wings aren’t moving in the ways he thinks they should be. “How do you even deal with this, mine are never like this-”

“You can preen them,” Grian points out with a shrug. “I’m kinda lazy with that though, so I’ve just gotten used to the discomfort. Hold on, what do you mean by your wings?” 

“My vex wings. You do know that vexes have wings, right?” 

Grian gapes at him and Cub pinches the bridge of his nose. 

“I know the little creatures have wings!” Grian defends himself as Cub sighs in fake disappointment. “Don’t act disappointed, I’ve never seen yours or Scar’s wings, how was I supposed to know?!” 

It was true neither of them really kept them visible, as they weren’t really all that useful and it was often easier to keep them hidden than to have them be on the way all the time, but still. Did this guy really know nothing about vexes at all?

“I don’t know, maybe like, look behind you or something?” 

Cub watches Grian turn around a full circle, only to realize he’s trying to see something on his own back, and then trying to look over his shoulder. The wings are transparent and nearly invisible, but still very much there, just like Cub had thought they would most likely be, considering Grian would not know how to hide them with magic. Grian gawks at the wings with his mouth open, looking quite stupid in Cub’s honest opinion.

“Shut up!” Grian yells before Cub can even open his mouth to say anything. Instead, he raises an eyebrow. “Maybe I don’t know anything about vexes but that just means we really need to fix this even faster. I don’t want to like, start hearing them, or whatever that was about.” 

Cub decides to not argue that he can usually hear the vexes because of his connection to the vex, which despite apparently having his species swapped with Grian, should not transfer over like that. 

“Right,” he says instead. “We should probably go find Xisuma once he comes back online.” 

Grian plucks his communicator out of his pocket and Cub watches his face drop in real time as he realizes they’re the only ones online. “Dude, this sucks. What if it’s a bug and the others will come back wrong too?” 

The communicator in Grian’s hand pings. “We’ll see, I guess?” Cub says, recognizing the sound of a player logging on to the server. 

“Scar!” Grian shouts. He makes a weird attempt to jump and it takes a second for Cub to realize he’s trying to fly. Before he can say anything, Grian has already noticed his mistake and taken off on foot, running towards the location of Scar’s base. Cub hurries behind him clumsily, weighed down by the wings against his back.

-

“So what exactly happened?” Scar asks curiously, unable to keep the amusement out of his voice as he watches Grian pace around the room. Cub had sat down as soon as he could once they made it to Scar’s base, tired from the running. “Cub is a bird and you’re vex? Like you got swapped somehow?”

“Cub is an avian,” Grian grumbles, stuffing his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “And we don’t know what happened, but whatever it is, I don’t like it.”

“You’re feeling fully normal?” Cub asks Scar, who certainly looks normal. No weird wings, none of his usual visible traits missing. Cub can’t sense him like he usually can through his vex magic, but that seems like a given considering the current situation.

“Yep!” Scar grins and Cub can see the row of sharp vex teeth in his mouth glimmer in the light. Yeah, everything seems normal. “Never been better in my life!”

“Can you hear the vexes?” Grian asks and Cub rolls his eyes.

“Why, of course I can!” Scar replies cheerfully. “I’d be worried if I couldn’t. They’re a little irritated that they can’t reach Cub right now, but it’s probably fine.”

“Probably,” Grian repeats, not nearly as convinced as Scar seems to be. “We need to fix this, I don’t want to end up on the vexes’ bad side because of this or something.” 

Cub snorts and Scar bursts into laughter. 

“Don’t laugh!” Grian hisses. “Dude, this is what people mean when they say vexes are vicious little creatures, I’m losing my marbles over here and you two are laughing!” 

“You’re not going to make an enemy out of the vex because of something like this,” Cub assures, though he feels like his tone probably wasn’t as comforting as needed, considering the glare Grian sends his way.

“Cub is right! It’s very unlikely,” Scar chimes in to add. “It would be really funny though.”

“It would not!” Grian argues exasperatedly, dragging his hands down his face. “This is impossible. How is today the one day when barely anyone is online?” 

“Don’t be such a downer! You both should try to get all the fun out of this while it lasts!” Scar says with an excited smile. There’s a glint in his eyes Cub can recognize as the one that never means anything good. Grian looks suspicious of Scar’s suggestion. “Cub, can I eat you? I’ve always wondered if avians taste like chicken-”

“Scar!” Grian screeches, horrified. 

“Fine, can me and Grian eat you?” Scar corrects himself. 

Grian stares at Scar in horror. “No one is eating anyone!” 

Cub shrugs – it wasn’t the wildest thing Scar could have suggested. If he had some clue what had happened and how to fix it, he would probably be taking the opportunity to do some experimenting too. “It’s probably better we don’t die and respawn before we can figure out what went wrong,” he says. “So we don’t mess things up even more.” 

“Boring,” Scar laments.

“Wait, you said you’ve been wondering what avians taste like?” Grian stares at Scar. “Have you been wanting to eat me ?” 

“Well, not necessarily you,” Scar says thoughtfully. “I don’t think you would agree so it would be kinda pointless.”

“And Cub would?” he questions further. 

“Usually!” Scar says happily at the same time as Cub replies, “Yes.”

The expression on Grian’s face twists from suspicious disbelief back to looking absolutely horrified as his gaze flicks between Scar and Cub like the two weren’t known cannibals due to their vex nature. Grian hadn’t witnessed it firsthand, but with how things seemed to be going, he should probably start getting used to the thought.

“We really need to fix this,” he says, looking a little pale. Scar chuckles and Grian glares at him. 

“Yeah,” Cub agrees, again trying to reach for the colorful wings on his back to ease his discomfort. “I need to get these itchy wings off my back.”

“I told you that you can preen them if they feel uncomfortable,” Grian points out, taking a step towards Cub. Scar watches them curiously, tilting his head a little. It’s a habit he has that Cub is certain he subconsciously copied from Jellie.

“You do realize that I don’t usually have feathers and barely know what that means, right?” 

“Well, you could have said that!” Grian exclaims, throwing his hands in the air dramatically. “You can ask for help, y’know? I’ll help you sort them out.”

Cub moves back a little, noticing the wings folding even closer to his back as he shies away when Grian tries to approach him. “I don’t want you touching me,” he says, and Grian stops to stare at him. 

“So you’d rather suffer with uncomfortable wings,” he phrases his question as a statement. Cub nods and Grian rolls his eyes.

“I can help!” Scar offers, perking up a little. 

“It’s true,” Grian confirms. “He knows how to preen. Kinda.”

Cub blinks – he was not aware of Scar having such skill. “Really?” Scar nods enthusiastically, always eager to help. “Okay, sure, you can help. It’s just this one spot I can’t reach that’s bothering me.”

Scar stands up and makes his way behind Cub and the chair he’s sitting on with a few swift steps, seeming to easily find the feathers that had been bothering Cub. It’s a weird feeling as Scar touches the feathers, the discomfort becoming more obvious before disappearing as he seems to rearrange the feathers.

“Why does Scar get to do that but I don’t?” Grian asks, sounding more curious than offended. Cub suspects he wasn’t all that excited to help out of the kindness of his heart, but rather feeling obliged to do so considering Cub did have his wings.

“Vex privilege,” Scar hums easily as he straightens out a few more feathers and Cub feels the bad feeling slowly disappear and some tension he hadn’t even noticed melt away from his body. 

“I’m a vex now though,” Grian remarks.

“You don’t count,” Scar says cheerfully, stepping away once he deems he’s fixed the feathers. “Doesn’t work like that. You gotta sell your soul to the vex first and then you get the vex privilege.”

Cub chuckles at Scar’s explanation that isn’t really all that far-fetched despite being told like a joke. Grian doesn’t seem particularly amused by it, nor does he seem to have taken it too seriously, which is ideal considering Cub doesn’t feel like explaining the details of the vex bond between him and Scar to anyone today if he doesn’t have to.

“That hardly sounds worth it,” Grian retorts, crossing his arms. 

“It’s not too bad, it’s not too bad,” Cub shrugs.

“You guys have to eat people.”

“Like Cub said, it’s not too bad!” Scar adds cheerfully. “If you’re that disturbed by it, we better get this solved before you get hungry or we’ll have to eat Cub!”

“I’m not eating anyone!” Grian argues.

“Correction, we better get this solved before you get hungry or I’m going to have to force-feed you Cub before you go insane and cause irreparable damage to yourself and others.”

Grian gawks at Scar and this time Cub has to admit that was a pretty wild thing to say, even if Scar wasn’t exactly wrong. Vexes did not like being hungry. The horrified silence that had fallen is broken by a ping from Grian’s communicator. 

“Xisuma is back!” 

-

“Oh my goodness.” Xisuma looks rather caught off guard as he stares at Cub and Grian before him, confusion visible even through his helmet that hides most of his face. “You two certainly look… a little wrong.” 

“Isn’t that a little rude?” Scar comments from the side. “I don’t think they look that bad.”

“You know that’s not what I meant,” X sighs and Cub sees Scar’s trademark little smirk appear on his face as he tries to act all innocent. “What happened? Is it just you two? Scar seems fine.”

Scar smiles proudly and Grian rolls his eyes.

“Just me and Grian, so far at least,” Cub explains. “I just logged on after testing some redstone stuff in a private world and suddenly things just kinda were like this. We might have logged on at the same time or something.”

“I see… Something must have gone wrong during the materialization process. Code problems happen but I haven’t seen them like this,” the admin mumbles mostly himself. “And you’ve both been feeling alright? No sickness or glitching?”

Cub shakes his head. 

“I’m starting to grow a little sick of Scar but nothing aside from that,” Grian snickers. 

“Hey!” Scar exclaims, pretending to be offended.

“You threatened to force-feed Cub to me!” 

Xisuma looks a little helpless as he looks between the two in confusion, eyes occasionally flicking to Cub who is mostly just enjoying the show, already more than used to Scar and Grian’s shenanigans. He shrugs and Xisuma sighs. “Alright, alright, let’s calm down now,” he says, pulling up the admin panel in his communicator. “I’ll see if I can find something in your code.”

Scar and Grian stop, freezing into an odd position that looks like Grian is trying to tackle Scar to the ground, and Scar is trying to bite Grian’s arm, before standing up straight as if nothing happened. Cub gives them an unimpressed look.

The three of them not-so-subtly inch closer to their admin to see what he's doing on his communicator as he scrolls through the lines of code none of them aside from him are familiar with. Grian yelps a little when Cub accidentally hits him with the wings, still not used to needing more space than usual. 

“I’m looking at the arrival logs,” Xisuma says thoughtfully. “Cub is right, it seems you both joined at the exact same time, down to milliseconds. The server must have gotten confused trying to materialize both of you at the same time.”

“And?” Grian inquires impatiently. “Can you fix it?” 

“I can correct the species you’re both assigned right now to your actual species and then hopefully a relog should do the rest.” The three of them watch Xisuma type something in the admin panel. “Alright, there we go. That should do it, hopefully.”

Grian looks a bit suspicious but nods. It’s not like they really have other options, Cub supposes. At least if something goes wrong again, Xisuma is here to help them right away this time.

“Should we just relog then?” Cub asks, quite frankly rather excited to have his own traits back.

“Yes, I think that should fix things,” Xisuma replies, looking at Cub and then Grian. “As long as you don’t log back in on the same exact second again,” he adds, amused. 

“Good luck!” Scar chimes.

Grian and Cub share a look before nodding in unison. Cub watches Grian dematerialize next to him before disconnecting from the server as well.

He waits a moment before logging back on to make sure Grian has a chance to log on first.

Cub instantly feels more comfortable as the familiar world appears before his eyes. He blinks a few times, his gaze focusing on his friends standing where they had been when he left – his eyes are automatically drawn to the large and colorful wings behind Grian and a relieved sigh leaves him. 

“It worked!” Grian cheers, his wings opening behind him as he does something that looks like a big stretch. Now that he knows what the wings feel like, Cub can imagine how nice that must feel. Grian flaps them a few times, gathering air under them before jumping into the air. “Oh man, how I missed flying!”

There are happy little high-pitched giggles in Cub’s head, joyous and gleeful. He smiles a little – everything feels normal again. His teeth and nails are sharp, he can tell his wings are there even if he can’t see them. He can feel his connection to Scar, and from the man’s grin, Cub can tell he can feel Cub again too.

“That was pretty wild, that was pretty wild,” Cub laughs. It feels good to be fully himself again. “Thanks, Xisuma.”

“No problem,” the admin replies as he watches Grian soar through the air. Cub can hear his smile even if he can’t see it. “I’m glad it was a simple fix, though I’ll have to look into the server code to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

Cub hums in agreement.

“Grian!” Scar shouts, trying to get the avian’s attention. His hat nearly falls off his head as Grian flies past him. “Now that you’re a bird again, how do you feel about the whole eating thing?”

“Scar! ” Grian screams in horror. Cub and Xisuma laugh. 

Everything’s back to normal. 

[mgnifiqueyoo]

Book: "Vessel." Pairing: Oh Junseok (ATBO) x Reader 1.17 - "ΤΟ ΦΩΣ." Word Count: 2,226

(prev. | next.)

───── ❝ the light. ❞ ─────

Sadly, there came Monday – and I had to be as sly as I could be.

Junseok locked himself inside the bathroom, keeping himself as quiet as possible while I waited for Hyunjun to arrive, leaving my door unlocked as the rest of my body was covered in blankets – except for my head, of course. Just as I forced my eyes to look exhausted, the door creaked open as the cloudy-looking boy came in with a bottle of water and the medicine in his hands. 

“Ah, this isn’t looking good on you, Y/N.” He shared his concerns, sitting at the edge of my bed as he placed the bottle of water and the medicine on top of my desk, later caressing my forehead with his soft palm. “I can’t believe you got sick after that night! Can you promise me that you’ll be okay soon?” Hyunjun asked with the saddest gaze ever, trying to find some hope in my eyes as I only nodded once, later smiling at him. 

Of course, I’ll be fine.

And obviously, I couldn’t tell him anything about that. “Don’t worry,” I said back, faking a hoarse voice as the boy stared back at me, still having a doubtful look on his face. “I’ll be fine.” I continued, still smiling at him weakly as he nodded in response, letting out a sigh. I knew that Hyunjun was the type to endure every problem until it affected anyone around him. 

That night, he took me away from that thief even if he was the first to give up all his belongings. 

That’s courageous, you know? Not a lot of people are like that.

“Also, how’s Junseok, by the way? I haven’t seen him yet since earlier and usually, he’s pretty early,” Hyunjun suddenly questioned, which made me widen my eyes for a short second as I started to think of an excuse. 

“... Why are you asking me about him? We’re not friends, you know?” I denied sternly, letting out a weak scoff as the boy gave me a disapproving look. 

I guess he’s being genuine about him.

Oh, right. He isn’t Seunghwan.

“Seriously, I have no idea. We’re not friends, duh?”

He laughed at how I reacted with a lighthearted – maybe a bit offensive – joke as he checked the time on his wristwatch, his bright smile fading away when he realized that it was time for him to go. “I’ll tell Seunghwan to check on you after school… You take care of yourself, okay?” He reminded me as I hummed, watching him walk away from me as he turned around once more before leaving the room. Hyunjun waved his hand at me, slowly closing the door as I lay down flatly on the soft mattress of the bed.

For a while, it was quiet as the other one was probably trying to sense if there was still a person coming. 

And the bathroom door was opened widely, freeing Junseok from having to be trapped there for a few moments. “Out of all the places I could’ve hidden, I really had to choose the bathroom.” He complained, not at me but towards his own thoughts as he breathed deeply in regret.

Ever since we came up with the “fake-sickness” plan, Junseok had to be in that bathroom. I didn’t know why that was his first choice but I definitely get why he regretted picking that choice in the first place. “Well, you chose to be there so…” I later shrugged, playing around with him as I took off the blankets that surrounded the rest of me.

God, it was so hot to be under those.

“Oh, come on. It was still a quick and clever choice.” He smirked, standing still as he watched me fix the rest of my blankets and a few of the pillows into an odd shape – one that looked like a person was sleeping. To be honest, I’ve never lied that much in my entire life unless I prefer to not say anything about what I feel. 

Personally, I just think that it’ll be a worry for someone and I don’t want to bother anyone else anymore. “... You didn’t mean to say any of those words, right?” He suddenly asked, which caused me to slowly turn around, hesitating yet also intrigued by the question. 

Huh? Didn’t he treat me the same way?

“I’m just doing what you do best,” I snarkily replied.

“Oh, you’re good.” He snickered, amused rather than disappointed.

Taking my backpack from the back rails of the chair, I took out all of the books, folders, and binders inside, stacking them on my desk while Junseok stared at the board, probably trying to think of a plan. “So, how do we start?” I asked, making my way to the cabinets to prepare my backpack. 

First-aid kit? Check. That bottle of water and the medicine from Hyunjun? That wasn’t planned but it would help either way.

“First, let’s head to the latest crime scene… Well, I know robbery’s not as serious as murder but it’s still the Vanguard’s doing.” He discussed, later pulling his phone out of his pocket as he began to type something into it. Then, the boy showed me what he found on the internet. 

It was the alleyway near the mall.

God, I just hope I won’t come across Seunghwan or Hyunjun because that’d look bad.

“One thing to take note of the Vanguard? He’s all about chaos no matter how big or small the effect it has on anyone.” Junseok gave another piece of description about him as he later placed his phone into my backpack. 

What are we supposed to do today? Figure out the Vanguard’s patterns.

I guess he works in unpredictable patterns but that night, if the Vanguard purposely caused chaos, then that meant he also avoided Junseok. I mean, what else could be the reason? Junseok even told me that he only faced the pawns, who were getting more powerful rather than the Vanguard himself. 

But of course, I can keep my own assumptions to myself instead. “For today, we have to search the areas and take note of anything suspicious. If we feel the need to talk to someone about this weird radiance, I think we should do it.” He suggested, which caused me to make an unmotivated face from behind as I continued to shove clothes into the backpack.

Obviously, he could do it better because he’s extroverted.

“If he ever shows himself, stay back… I can’t let him hurt you.” Junseok’s voice gradually gets louder as I only zipped up the backpack shut, later taking a deep breath before nodding in response. 

The way he combed his hair up, scratching the side of his head made me realize that he was anxious too.

Well, who wouldn’t feel anxious over this? He’s literally facing a non-human entity that he couldn’t catch. If I was him, I would’ve backed out. “Don’t worry, I will,” I said, giving him a smile as I wanted him to know that he’d find no trouble with my cooperation. “I’ll stay back,” I repeated myself, making sure that he understood it clearly as the overly worried look on his face faded away. 

More tender as if he felt comforted by what I told him.

“... Thank you.”

It was the first time he ever said those words to me and it didn’t seem like a small matter to him. 

To be honest, even if he was more outgoing than I was, I could tell that he was struggling with showing the gentler version of himself. Yet I knew that he wasn’t complete himself. I mean, how could you show who you are when you can’t remember anything?

To break the silence between us, Junseok looked down at his wristwatch, raising an eyebrow at the time. “It’s already nine… I think we should get going,” he suggested as I wore the straps of the backpack over my shoulders, later tightening it as I gave him a thumbs-up. 

But then, the Night Walker took me into his arms, dragging the two of us into the shadowed corners of the room as I let out an embarrassing squeal, completely overwhelmed. 

He didn’t even warn me about what he was about to do. My hair was right in front of my face as both of my arms grasped onto something so tightly…

Or should I say someone?

“... You okay, Y/N?” Junseok asked, carefully brushing my hair off of my face. 

“What do you think?” Later on, I realized that I was still all over Junseok – literally – as I lightly pushed him away, resulting in me stumbling down for a bit as I patted off the dust over my shoulders. 

So, we’re here again and I have no idea how we should start “searching.” I looked around the dusted walls of the alleyway as I listened to how my shoes squelched disgustingly on the puddle of water that came in from pipes.

I didn’t know this was the back of a warehouse as most people would focus on the mall instead. “This is where it happened, right?” Junseok asked for clarification, causing me to hum in response as I turned around to see his eyes glowing in the dark. 

Honestly, it scares me when he does that. “... What are the eyes for?”

From how his focused gaze turned into a blank one, he seemed confused over what I asked. “Pardon?”

“Your eyes… They’re glowing.” I hesitated to point it out but I didn’t know the reason behind the use of it, whatever that was and it was chilling to see something like that during the day. 

“Oh, this? It’s like a blue light to find any traces of the offenders in the Light Realm,” He answered, both of his fingers pointing toward his darkened yet glimmering set of eyes.

Haunting, to be honest.

And despite clearing my confusion up, it only made me shudder even more. “There.” Junseok later pointed towards the wall behind me as I turned around to see nothing over it, which made me scratch the back of my head. 

“What is it for?” I questioned, clueless over what he’d seen as he walked towards that wall, placing his palm on the dusty bricks flatly as darkness surrounded the maroon surface.

In the middle of that darkness, there was silver-like dust splattered over messily as I furrowed my brows, understanding that this must be the mark of the Vanguard. “I knew it. He did attract that thief,” Junseok grumbled, rolling his eyes as the black flame faded from his glare, turning normal. 

“Looking for me?”

My entire body stood still as if time had stopped, chills running down my spine as Junseok widened his eyes in realization. 

The distorted voice was behind him as I looked behind me, seeing how the traffic lights began to blink as the cafe barista from the other side of the street spilled hot brewed coffee over the customer. 

There was chaos. 

So much chaos.

I turned to look back at Junseok who was now standing in jet-black flames, eyes glowing yet one with the dark. “Stay back,” he whispered as there was light from behind, which was the signal for me to run for my life just like how he asked me to. 

I ran across the street, not caring if the rest of the drivers were pissed off at me for disrupting their pace as once I ended up at the other side, I looked back at the alleyway.

There was a cloaked creature, floating over the grounds as he faced the light… that seemed more like a man.

“Mama, what is that?” I heard a little kid ask his mother as I watched closely to see what was happening. 

The other man, who was exceptionally bright, had laughed menacingly, blending within the clouds of the skies. “... Let’s go back to the shop, Monkey.” The mother was concerned, afraid of what was going on above as she dragged her child back into the cafe.

And the bright man took hold of the dark one by his throat as light erupted from him, the radiance blazing over the roads. 

The light was so powerful that several windows from the coffee shop shattered, resulting in me crouching down on the ground, both of my arms covering my face as I felt the cemented sidewalk shake.

When the glass had fallen on the ground, I uncovered my head and I saw how the shadow boy had ended up lying next to me, his face bruised as I could hear the rest of the people run away, leaving only him, me, and the Vanguard. 

“I will always find you.”

A porcelain mask covered the face of the criminal as he made his way towards me, causing me to crawl backward as my breath hitched. The man raised his staff above the ground, planning to push it deep into my chest but the boy caught him from behind, who closed his eyes shut as he gripped over the menace’s bright, white cape.

Junseok pulled the criminal closer to him as he kicked him off of the sight, setting me free yet he dropped down on the floor, unconscious.

Not again.

[mostlikelythedevil]

Haunted. | [Chapter Three, Mid-Chapter]

Pairing(s): Kevin Owens x Fem!Zayn!Reader, Solo Sikoa x Fem!Zayn!Reader

Warning(s): Explicit Language, Angst

Word Count: 1,920

Chapter Summary: Roman Reigns opens up discourse about Sami Zayn’s sister in the safety of The Bloodline’s locker room while her match takes place.

Link(s): AO3, Masterlist

Note(s): My deepest apologies for the late post! Our dog, Sophie, had an emergency visit to the vet to address her eclampsia, so I’ve been putting most of my focus into her. For the next few weeks, chapters might be a bit inconsistent, but I hope you can all understand. That being said, this was a bit of an unconventional chapter, but I hope you like it nonetheless!

Tag(s): @crowleysqueenofhell @raeluvshammett

As Solo enters the locker room of The Bloodline, with his mind lingering on the absolute mess of a young woman just outside, his eyes land on Paul Heyman. Paul, who sits on the other side of the room on a stool behind Roman, quickly gestures for Solo to take a seat on one of the fine leather couches opposite of them; it is now that Solo notices his twin brothers sitting with their heads down, unnaturally quiet. Sami sits on the couch directly beside Roman — alone and visibly upset.

 Slow and cautious, Solo crosses the room, sitting down beside Sami. It means nothing to Solo, but Sami does seem to perk up a bit at the idea that someone might have his back — or, at least, the idea that someone doesn’t absolutely hate him after that entire situation with his sister.

 “I’d like to have an open discussion about Sami’s sister,” Roman’s voice fills the room after Solo sits down, not allowing anyone a moment longer to think. “As long as everyone stays respectful, you’re welcome to say anything that’s on your mind — nothing will upset me.”

 The twins share a look, though neither of them move to speak.

 Sami has his head in his hands, trying to make sense of his own emotions.

 Solo folds his arms, mouth closed.

 “I, for one, my Tribal Chief, think it was an excellent decision to isolate Sami’s sister from Kevin Owens,” Paul beams after a moment too long of silence. “I do, however, wonder why it is that no-one was consulted or given knowledge prior. Of course, I know you have your reasons, and that’s why you’re the Tribal Chief!”

 It takes everything for Roman to not roll his eyes — even he could grow tired of Paul’s constant ass-kissing. “As the Tribal Chief, it’s up to me to make the tough decisions. I’m sure we all saw that the gentle approach to Sami’s sister wasn’t working,” all of the heads in the room nod in agreement, “so, I figured we needed something more drastic — something none of you would have agreed with, which is why it was kept from you.”

 “Why talk to Owens, though? He’s enough of a problem as is.” Jey asks, sitting back against the leather couch.

 “No-one knows drastic better than Kevin Owens,” Roman smiles, teeth all showing. “With just a little push, he’s already started ruining his relationship with Sami’s sister. Isn’t it amazing just how mindless he can be when he’s not getting his way?”

 “That’s cold, Uce, but… I still don’t understand,” Jey replies, hands tangled together in his lap. “I mean, why do we even care about her? No offense, Sami, but your sister ain’t nothing special.”

 Sami does not look up, only murmuring something under his breath for a response. He cannot be bothered with meaningless conversation about his sister’s ability; he needs to figure out how to fix things — with her, with Roman for her blatant disrespect of him. The nausea bubbling in his stomach, though, makes it all the more difficult to focus.

 On the other hand, Solo’s eyes shoot over to his brother. “She got fire in her.” He seems almost offended by the idea that his brother could be so blind as to not see the burning passion buried in her.

 “Her being pissed about K.O ain’t fire,” Jey responds, eyebrow raised at his brother. He’s not quite sure what to make of Solo’s defensiveness, but it’s certainly out of character for him.

 “No, Solo’s right. Wise-man, turn on the T.V,” Roman interjects before Solo can continue. “I want all of you to watch Little Zayn in her match. See how different she is after that spat with Kevin.”

 In the corner of the room, audio buzzes from the on-going match between Sami’s younger sister and Liv Morgan. For the first time, his eyes leave the floor; he watches blankly as his sister nails Liv in the head with a vicious kick. Liv hits the mat with an awful thud, blood trickling lightly from her nose. Above her, Sami’s sister heaves, struggling to breathe. Her eyes, despite being red and puffy, hold nothing less than contempt in them; at the same time, though, she almost seems regretful of her brutality when she shrugs away.

 “It’s not enough,” Sami finally allows himself to speak, eyes falling back to the floor.

 Roman looks over at Sami, expression hard. “What?”

 “The argument with Kevin — it’s not enough to dissuade her from him. She blames us for that, and she’ll keep trying to fix things with him,” Sami explains with a sigh. “That’s just how she is. Her anger right now is only temporary; that fire you see in the ring, it won’t last beyond this match when she can cool herself down a bit.��

 “I didn’t expect you to be so… understanding of the situation,” Roman replies, largely ignoring the concerns Sami had expressed.

 Sami looks up at Roman, though his head stays down. “You know what’s best for this family.”

 “I appreciate your candor, Sami,” Roman’s expression is unreadable, not unlike Solo’s. “As for your sister, I have it on good authority that her anger will be focused solely on Kevin by the end of the night.”

 “I gotta say, Uce, she really is hitting hard tonight. Harder than I’ve ever seen her hit anyone,” Jey comments, eyes glued to the T.V.

 Solo rolls his eyes. “I know fire when I see fire.”

 “What do you— what do you mean?” Sami feels a panic rising in his stomach. “Is Kevin going to hurt my sister? He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t do that,” he begins to ramble, mostly to himself as he stands in a panic.

 “Sami—!” Roman tries, but the ginger does not hear him.

Sami starts pacing in the middle of the room, blocking off bits of the screen in the corner.

 “Sami— Uce, calm down,” Jey offers once he notices just how distressed Sami is.

 All eyes fall to Sami’s suddenly sickening pacing in the middle of the room. Roman stands, placing a hand on Sami’s shoulder — firm and demanding attention. Sami, with this sort of sour twist to his face, looks up at Roman; he’s pale and shaking, and he feels as if he’s going to faint if Roman tells him anything more, but he looks to him regardless.

 “We wouldn’t let Kevin lay a hand on your sister.” Roman states firmly, looking down at Sami with such a sternness in his eyes that Sami can only feel a bit more calm.

 Tears threaten to rise to Sami’s eyes, but he knows he cannot cry here. “Why would her anger focus in on him, then? I can’t— she can’t be hurt by him anymore.”

 Roman rolls his tongue over his teeth, patting Sami’s shoulder heavily. “Nothing you should worry yourself with; your sister is a strong woman, and she can handle it. Right now,” Roman throws a glance over at Paul, “you should go and wait for her. She should see you after her match.”

 Paul, as Roman speaks to Sami, gestures aggressively for Solo to stand and butt into the conversation. Solo, though confused, stands. “I’ll go with him,” he states, not before sending Paul a weird glance.

 “Good. If something happens with Kevin, you’ll both be there for it,” Roman replies, eyes focusing in on his cousin. Solo nods, though he still does not seem to completely understand the need for him to accompany Sami.

 Sami, though concerned about Kevin’s supposed plan for his little sister, nods. “You’re right. She should see me first,” he mutters the last bit, turning to leave the room without another word.

 After a moment, Solo begins after Sami — face expressionless, though it’s obvious by his gait that he’s a bit annoyed to be going with Sami. After all, he would be the one to face Kevin in a match later in the night; it made little sense for him to be a bodyguard rather than preparing for said match.

 As Solo passes by, Roman grabs him lightly by the shoulder. “Keep an eye on him,” his voice is quiet and demanding, “don’t let him interrupt anything, you got me?”

 It’s a strange request, but Solo does not question it. “I got you.”

 “Go.”

 Obedient, Solo finds himself out of The Bloodline’s locker room; he can see Sami meandering down the corridor, shoulders slumped and his head down. He rolls his eyes before trailing behind him, watching his movement carefully. Something about his incompetence about the situation irritates Solo very deeply, though he knows well that he cannot show such anger; Roman would never approve a hit on their ‘honorary’ brother — not anytime soon.

 Admittedly, Sami is only still around because of his use against Kevin — and, for reasons largely unknown to Solo, his sister, too. Sure, she has a fire buried inside of her that could make her a monster in the ring; and sure, she’s quite pretty, especially with that fire in her eyes, but that isn’t enough for Roman to be interested to the point of delaying plans with Sami’s exit. No, Roman must be hiding something from everyone — which really isn’t that difficult to believe, all things considered. But, then, Solo also does not know Roman as well as his brothers. He’d need to talk to them about it later.

 In the distance, Sami comes to a stop at one of the monitors near guerrilla.

 “Either of them win yet?” Solo calls out, still working on catching up with the ginger.

 Sami shakes his head. “No, but it looks like she’s got the upper hand still.”

 “Good,” Solo replies as he comes closer, “she needs that tonight.”

 “She does,” and Sami smiles — a big, bright, toothy smile. It’s almost touching to see how excited he is for his sister despite all of the things she said before.

 The smile, though, falls to wide-eyes and an open jaw.

 Solo, also taken aback and slack jawed, throws himself into a sprint toward Sami.

 Everything turns to a blur as Sami takes off toward the ring, forcing himself forward with every ounce of muscle in his legs. He has to stop this; he has to stop this; he has to stop this! Something plows into his side, sending him painfully to the concrete of the guerrilla; his legs flail into some technology, and he finds himself tangled in wires.

 “She has to do this on her own, Uce,” Solo pants out, doubled over to help catch his breath.

 Sami tries frantically to untangle the wires around his legs, ignoring the burning sensation in his side and the pain in his knees. “She can’t,” he rasps, pulling desperately at wires.

 The backstage crew located at the guerrilla stare at the two in bewilderment.

 “Man, she’s gotta do it alone,” Solo insists, yanking wires off of Sami without care for what they might be connected with. “She’s gonna hate you if you go out there and fuck things up.”

 As Sami scrambles to his feet, and he actually hears Solo for what he’s saying, an unsettling calm settles over him. He laughs — a breathless, tired sound. Solo looks at him, chest still heaving, waiting for him to try to run out to the ring once again. He doesn’t, though. Instead, Sami finds himself back to the monitor he had been at.

 This —  is apart of the plan.

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: Hi, I’m an INFP dating an ISTP in a long-distance relationship. We’re both 21 and have been dating for about 3 years. But I have a problem with our relationship that I don’t know how to fix. We’re really attached to each other and spend as much time as possible together, although I am definitely the clingier one most of the time (he has his moments too).

I find myself getting really defensive and on guard whenever he acts more “neutral” to me or makes “logical” observations… I know it’s stupid, but I start taking everything offensively when he’s not overtly affectionate or lovey-dovey with me, which I know rationally isn’t proper, but in the moment I can’t help but get emotional over nothing, and I kind of feel myself being destructive but struggle to resolve it anyways. I’m surprised he tolerates me, I’m sure it’s incredibly annoying, and sometimes even his reassurance isn’t enough for me because it feels shallow or like he’s just saying what I want to say since he usually isn’t very elaborate about his feelings or moods.

I guess it kind of scares me that I can’t read him, even though he’ll say there’s nothing to read… I can’t help but assume he’s against me or doesn’t like me or something in the moment if he’s not flirty or affectionate, when he’s probably just being his normal self. I also get stupidly jealous when he hangs out with his friends, although he usually tells me he misses me when we can’t spend time together or talk and that he’d rather be with me.

I think it’s because compared to him I lack a social life… most of my friends aren’t close to me anymore and don’t really care about me in my opinion, so I rarely see them. All I do is go to college, and I don’t have any real friends there either, and I still live with my parents who can be toxic and overbearing. So I really only have him, and it’s just hard. But I don’t like the direction my mentality is going, and I don’t want to get worse, so I guess I’m asking for some advice or steps I can take to improve myself and feel more secure in my relationship.

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

The more dependent you are on something, the more you will fear losing it, which often leads to desperate or overbearing behavior. As a general rule, you shouldn't depend on only one person to fulfill all of your emotional needs. By doing this, you turn love into a burden for your romantic partner. While they may be willing to shoulder the burden, it isn't fair to them, and it sucks all the fun out of the relationship. How can dominant Fi be healthy and feel at peace when you're behaving in a way that is exploitative?

You've already pointed out a major aspect of the problem: you don't have any other social and emotional supports in your life. If you're in college, it means you're an adult, but you aren't properly nurturing adult independence. Independence doesn't mean you have to do everything alone, rather, it means you have to take the initiative to get the things you need and want in life. Independent people take matters into their own hands and don't waste time with waiting around, self-pity, or wishful thinking.

For example, you could put more effort into building yourself a social support network as well as engaging in activities outside of your romantic relationship. Many introverts struggle with this. You don't have to be the life of the party or a social butterfly to build a social support network. A small handful of carefully chosen friends should suffice. Join clubs or group activities. Observe some good friend candidates and take the initiative to strike up a relationship with them. If it works out, great. If it doesn't work out as expected, oh well, simply move on to the next person.

Remember that once you leave school and enter the workforce, it becomes much more difficult to make new friends. College is an ideal time to make friends because there's much more opportunity to meet like-minded people. Knowing more people in college can open more doors for you personally and professionally. Don't waste the opportunities right in front of you. This will require you to develop auxiliary Ne and entertain a wider range of possibility in your life (see the Type Development Guide). Ne development is also necessary for changing repetitive patterns of behavior, through choosing new and different paths for opening yourself up to the world.

[anthonybialy]

Halting Drives with the Buffalo Bills

Don’t let the Buffalo Bills coach you into thinking they got close.  Nothing else the staff tried Sunday worked, and their efforts at public relations should lead to the same result.  Turning an uninspired potential blowout into an aggravating loss as time expired does not count as progress.  The team can convince fans they’re capable of fixing myriad issues after proving they know how clocks work.

The visitors would’ve won with only about eight more Texans taunting penalties.  I remember the Bills scoring like Houston did.  Strive to appreciate what seems to be disappearing.  A Metropolitan fan's ceaseless amusement with a punter named Tom Townsend only offers so much consolation.  I’d watch a Whit Stillman football movie, as the ending would be infinitely more satisfying than what the Bills directed.

I finished the Stefon Diggs sauce.  It’s time to move on.  Expecting the breakup to keep affecting behavior would’ve meant letting past trauma harm the present.

Diggs gained 82 yards on six receptions, which is most notable in its unremarkable adequacy.  Robert Woods arguably did more damage to his former team with his punt return that helped make a winning field goal feasible.  The Bills didn’t shut down their erstwhile BFF any more than he set a Guinness World Record for catches.  He didn’t have to be the sole source of gains, which is a troubling realization for Houston in a win.  They won’t be the first team to learn about who needs to be the attention’s center.  Leading the Texans in receiving yards for the game with a mere four may lead to future resentment.  But Diggs is surely renowned for valuing team success, no? 

Relying on injury to incorporate the obvious still didn’t work.  It shouldn’t have taken Khalil Shakir’s absence to incorporate Curtis Samuel.  And it still didn’t.  The only thing worse than Samuel catching one pass is that he gained zero yards.  By my calculations, that means he will never ever gain ground.  

Samuel is a Bill, but the way.  He has been so irrelevant that you may have forgotten about his offseason signing.  Was he cut?  The Mandela effect makes it possible to think he didn’t make the opening day roster.  His unbelievably light usage encourages false memories.

Buffalo should’ve traded for Davante Adams at halftime.  His price is only increasing.  Brandon Beane is playing Blackmail and losing.  This season is going too absurdly for Monty Python.  The troupe would stop the offensive coordinating sketch for implausibility.

Replacing Diggs with Marquez Valdes-Scantling may not have constituted an upgrade.  Josh Allen spent too long playing like a second-year quarterback while the second-year quarterback played like Josh Allen.  Naturally, Buffalo fans will continue to defend him.  But making his case isn’t a test for how far blind loyalty can be stretched: the franchise is seemingly daring their savior to win on his own.  Allen can miss on 21 of his 30 throws and still deserve to have the case made for his rightful frustration.

Allen will pump fake 10 yards downfield for as long as defenders buy it.  The jazzman’s improvisations are necessary with such glaring lack of planning by his label.  Buffalo’s offense is either intentionally or unwittingly based on their quarterback playing heroically.  I don’t care how much Allen makes: his offensive linemen should sign over their game checks.

I tackle my problems like the Bills do ball carriers.  Please accept a penalty request in lieu of a stop.  Rasul Douglas can bicker with Cole Bishop about who’s less helpful.  The argument’s loser is Buffalo.

Management can pretend the wide receiver committee leads to contributions from all.  But the group project inspires deadbeats to rely on the work of others.  Grades plunge for all as a result.  Take a notable first-possession drop which set the tone.  An elite receiver would’ve made an amazing catch.  The Bills went with Mack Hollins.

It’s too early in a career to be trying to rectify past mistakes.  An impressive touchdown is the exception for a player who after five career games is already establishing a reputation for at best playing erratically.  Keon Coleman gets less hilarious by the game.  The joke of a pick isn’t funny, either.

I hope you enjoyed Coleman’s catch, because he didn’t have another.  His only contribution of the afternoon should’ve been taken as a bonus and not a sign to keep going.  Throwing to him from potential safety territory in an attempt to take the lead in the last minutes was a kamikaze mission.  His glaring end zone drop during the preseason was excused away based on the game’s meaninglessness.  But it turns out his unwillingness to reach revealed a personality tendency.

  Receivers catch like Sean McDermott coaches. Every other awful drive competes for second place for Buffalo’s incomprehensible Dadaist assault on the sport.  Coaching makes a difference.  That only sounds positive if your team employs a qualified one.  By contrast, Buffalo is chained to an anvil who doesn’t know how to handle a tie with handful of seconds left.  McDermott supervised the slapstick like they were playing baseball.  And even that has timers now.

An aggravating finale was merely the culmination.  The only thing worse than officials calling Dalton Kincaid’s obvious and amazing catch an incompletion is McDermott not challenging it.  A timid leader unsurprisingly creates baffling results like a late-game plan.  If he was trying to lose a game somehow made competitive after a mortifying early effort, McDermott wouldn’t have done anything differently.  We know he didn’t throw the game because it’d be unadvisable to make it that obvious.

Gaining lessons from a loss is a not an excuse to keep coming up short, especially for those who don’t bother.  Allen claimed the letdown against the Ravens blessedly came early.  But the Bills only established the limits of gaining from bad experiences.

The Sabres on turf are losing their balance.  Buffalo fans can’t even presently count on one half-decent team distracting from the other.  The first two games of the NHL season showed the continuation of an alarming consistency over the drought.  Even Lindy Ruff yelling hasn’t motivated the hockey works, which means they’re a hopeless case.  Meanwhile, the football division looked okay aside from personnel, coaching, and playing.

Every Bills loss prompts concerns that Allen’s career is getting squandered.  With the thorough lack of help, the next fear is if they’ll decline enough to alienate their Obi-Wan.  If the rest of the squad keeps trending downward, Allen’s going to consider asking about joining one that provides him with a legitimate top receiver as long as it’s not Diggs.

[autobots-and-their-crazy-kids]

Unpopular Transformers Opinion, but I think that despite TFA’s flaws... It handled most its characters better then TFP did! 

TFA Optimus, Bumblebee and Bulkhead have actual personalities, unlike their TFP Counterparts. 

TFA Optimus and Bee both have strengths and flaws, thus making them more interesting characters! 

TFP Optimus is seen as this stoic, perfect bot that is always right (even when he’s wrong) and TFP Bee’s whole thing is that he the ‘rookie’ of the team, he likes Raf (for understanding his beeps for some reason) and is sad that he can’t talk anymore. (Even though the other Autobots can understand his beeps.) 

I know that TFP Bee can only beep and it’s not his fault that we don’t know his true personality, but TFA Bee still wins. 

TFA Bulkhead was tired of being seen as a big, clumsy idiot that destroys things, so he becomes an artist and a repair bot to create/fix things instead.  

TFP Bulkhead has similar insecurities, but nothing is ever done about it and this problem is forgotten later. 

You couldn’t have given him a different hobby? 

You couldn’t have made him an architect or nature lover, like TFA Prowl was? 

Also, TFP Bulkhead’s main traits are being a pushover and being hesitant to rescue people that are jerky (even if they aren’t evil)... which aren’t great traits to remember a heroic character.  

TFA Ratchet and TFP Ratchet are similar (also TFP Ratchet is my fav of the TFP Autobots), but I like TFA Ratchet a little bit more, cause TFP Ratchet was a bit racist against humans/organics... 

TFA Ratchet was grumpy with everyone including the humans, but he’s more angry that the human fans won’t leave him alone sometimes, instead of just being angry with their existence in general like in TFP (Ratchet actually has more reasons to hate humans in TFA, then in TFP! XD)... 

TFA Arcee is basically more like a plot device then an actual character, but I still like her more then in TFP... Why?... Well, TFA Arcee’s personality is more like in G1; meaning that she’s kind and has an almost motherly personality. Also, despite being a damsel-in-distress in Ratchet’s flashback, she’s very brave and intelligent (she was a teacher once); she stays calm despite losing her leg during a battle and getting captured by Lockdown and she’s willing to give up all her memories, so the Decepticons wouldn’t get the knowledge in her mind and the Autobots would win the war. She’s also probably very trustworthy and badass, considering that she was trusted with this knowledge in the first place and she wasn’t shown with any bodyguards near her...so she was probably battling Decepticons and delivering the info all by herself, until she lost her leg... And she managed to find a hiding place away from the Decepticons with only one leg, until Ratchet found her, which is still pretty impressive... 

No offense to TFP Arcee, but she basically acts like a female version of Ratchet sometimes. She can be quite grumpy and strict. There’s nothing wrong with female characters like that, but Ratchet is already the grumpy bot and he does it better... Why couldn’t they make Arcee a stoic nature-lover, like TFA Prowl? The TFP Creators already copied the TFA Bots and gave Prowl’s motorcycle mode to Arcee, so they might as well go all the way! 

Or why couldn’t they give TFP Arcee a motherly personality, like the other Arcees? A female character can be motherly and still be badass! It would’ve been a great way to balance out the ‘dark’ parts of the TFP Series! Also, Arcee and June would get along instantly and probably become BFFs! 

Sari Sumdac isn’t perfect and I have conflicted feelings over her future techno-organic stuff as well as her overpowered Allspark Key (because on one hand it’s awesome, but on the other hand it feels like the TFA Creators are trying too hard to make Sari better than the other human allies, also her being a cyborg somewhat ruins the specialness of her friendship with the Autobots... because she’s one of them, instead of a complete human)... 

But Sari is still one of the better main human characters, despite her being a walking dues-ex-machina or plot device sometimes (both Sari and her father Prof. Sumdac have been done dirty in TFA, for different reasons)... 

Like TFA Optimus and the other characters, she has strengths, flaws and an actual personality... 

And Sari is definitely better than all the main humans in TFP combined:

Both Sari and Raf are dues-ex-machinas sometimes... but again Sari has a proper personality to balance herself out, while Raf is just the quiet and genius stereotype that loves being helpful. 

Both Sari and Miko are adventurous and energetic girls, but can also be immature and childish brats... But the difference between them is that Sari is only a brat sometimes and it usually involves her overpowered key and Sari gets cut some slack because she’s a little kid, however Miko is a 15-year old teenager and yet is somehow even more bratty then 7-year old Sari and Miko can’t even use an overpowered key as an excuse. (Sari also has fashion sense.)

Both Sari and Jack are considered the ‘Chosen Ones’... but again, Sari has a proper personality and fashion sense... Jack was supposed to be the ‘leader’ of the human team, but he rarely feels like a leader (Cody from Rescue Bots was a better leader then him and Cody is younger than Jack)... He’s also supposed to be the ‘Sane One’ that doesn’t want to be part of the Cybertron War’s craziness, which is interesting to see, but only lasts for like a day... 

TFA Megatron is an intelligent and surprisingly civilized Decepticon as well as one of the saner Megatrons (which results in almost every Decepticon being crazy and making him silently suffer for it)... 

TFP Megatron was trying too hard to become the ‘evilest’ Megatron, that he ends up looking like an idiot half the time! TFP Megatron is probably one of the dumbest Megatrons (in my opinion)... Dude thought that stabbing a shard of frozen evil god blood in his spark was a great idea! And he almost destroyed himself, without Starscream’s help! (Starscream only needed to cut off his life support!)  

TFA Starscream rivals G1 Starscream in feral craziness (but TFA was a bit smarter at first, with his Megatron betraying plans)! 

TFP Starscream, I have conflicted feelings for... On one hand he was such a badass during the starter episodes, but then TFP makes him more and more wimpy/cowardly over time, on the other hand I feel kinda bad for him because he was actually a decent leader (he helped the Decepticons harvest energon, without the Autobots or humans seeing them for 3 years) and he actually cares about the Decepticons’ survival at first... He probably wouldn’t have tried to betray/end Megatron if Megatron (or anyone) had showed him a little respect/gratitude or Megatron didn’t attack/yell at Starscream over every little thing! 

The first time TFP Megatron beats up Starscream, Starscream was actually trying to help the Decepticons by attempting to get information on the Autobots (and he almost got it)! 

Then Megatron pretends that he’s gonna destroy Starscream to scare the poor flier, just because Starscream missed mining out some energon (or was hiding it for himself)... 

Why does Starscream deserve to be attacked for those things? 

As for Soundwave... Okay, I’ll let TFP have that one. 

TFA Soundwave is okay and I like the concept of him being a kid’s toy... But I feel like they could’ve done more with him! And I feel like Bumblebee should’ve been his rival instead of Bulkhead, since Bumblebee is actually the jealous-type... or maybe Bee and Bulkhead share the Soundwave Rivalry! (Also, the TFA episode ‘Human Error’ was a mistake...) 

Meanwhile, TFP Soundwave is the most badass and competent villain in all of TFP! 

It literally took banishing him to another dimension to defeat him! 

Plus, he actually looks like a demon! 

[fortuositywritings]

Tattoo Heart

Summary: Tony and you make a dumb drunk decision. He gives you a tattoo.

“Um, what the hell, Tony! You said it wasn’t that bad.”

“It’s not! It’s well-proportioned. Really it’s the best heart I’ve ever drawn. I don’t know why you’re so upset. It could have been worse.”

“The heart isn’t the problem. You tattooed Wanda’s name on it!”

“Yeah, I can see why you’re mad.”

You poked your sore arm. Out of all places, he had to tattoo it on your arm above your elbow where everyone could see. Talk about bad placement.

You pout, “How am I supposed to hide this?”

“Baseball tee’s could make a comeback. You’ll be a trendsetter,” he suggests, not helping at all. 

You glare at him. “You’re paying for it to be removed.”

“I expected no less,” he concedes. You’re still touching the tender spot, frowning. He stops you. “Poking it is not going to make it go away.”

“Fuck! I’m never getting drunk with you again,” you vow. 

“You say that now, but come Friday night, whiteclaw in hand, you’ll have no recollection of this ever happening.”

“Getting a tattoo with your crush’s name on it is kind of hard to forget, Tony,” you spit out. He wears a sheepish smile. Speaking of the party on Friday, “Shit!”

“What?” Tony asks, clearly not processing the situation you’re in as fast as you are.

“Wanda’s gonna be there,” you remember.

“Well, yeah. It’s Pietro’s birthday party and they’re twins so,” he comments sarcastically.

“It’s a pool party. How am I supposed to hide this?”

“Just don’t get in the pool. Or you know what, just don’t go. Say you got sick,” Tony suggests.

“I can’t do that. She expects me to be there and I don’t want to let her down on her birthday,” you explain. Wanda had personally invited you to her party, saying you were going to be her partner for beer pong. 

“Fine. Don’t worry about it too much. We have all week to figure something out,” he reasons. You guess he’s right. No use in stressing too much.

Friday afternoon comes too fast.

You’re stressing as you look at yourself in the mirror. You look ridiculous. 

“You’re literally a genius and this was the best you could come up with?” you complain. You already feel yourself sweating. You hadn’t thought of what to wear. You only had your one piece bathing suit. Tony told you he had something and you trusted him. What he brought you, a long sleeve rashguard to wear over your bathing suit.

“Makeup was just going to wash off. We couldn’t chance it. This way, you can get in the pool,” he says. 

“I look like I’m going surfing, not a pool party,” you huff. 

“You look fine. If anyone asks, you burn easily. Now let’s go. Your girlfriend is waiting on you,” he rushes you along, grabbing your stuff for you. You throw on some shorts and slip on some sandals.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” you mumble, blushing as he pushes you out the door.

“Oh, I know. This wouldn’t be such a big deal if she was.” He closes the door.

Pietro opens the door for you and Tony. You both hug him and congratulate him on another year of being on this earth or as Tony puts it, “Congrats on being one year closer to death!”

Technically, their birthday is tomorrow but they always have a birthday dinner with their parents, so they celebrate with their friends either the day before or after. You and Tony hand Pietro your present for him. 

“Just don’t open it in front of your parents,” you warn. He decides to unwrap it right then. You roll your eyes at his impatience to wait until tomorrow. To his satisfaction it’s running shoes with a bottle of alcohol in each shoe. He laughs, thanking you for his present. He notices you looking around, searching for a certain somebody. He already knows who you’re looking for. 

“She’s in the kitchen,” he tells you, a smirk appearing on his face when you blush at being so obvious. You thank him and go find Wanda.

As Pietro said, she is in the kitchen fixing some appetizers to bring outside. What you weren’t prepared for was her already in her bikini, like she’s ready to jump into the pool. Her two piece bathing suit doesn’t leave much to the imagination but you’re quite the daydreamer it seems. You’re snapped out of your trance by Wanda clearing her throat.

She wears a smirk much like her brother’s and you splutter an embarrassed, “H-hi! Happy Birthday. You, uh, you look good. Great! You look ready for the pool.”

She smiles, amused by your awkwardness. “Thank you. You look ready for the beach.”

You blush. “Yeah, I burn easily,” you lie and quickly move on, handing her the present you got her. “Here.”

“You didn’t have to get me anything,” she says, but you shake your head. “Of course I did. It’s your birthday tomorrow. You can open it now if you want. Your brother did.”

“Unlike my brother, I can wait. Let me go put it in my room. I’ll be right back. Wait here,” she requests. You nod and she leaves with her present. You respectfully turn your gaze to the appetizers, not wanting to ogle her backside. 

“Cowabunga, dude! What the hell are you wearing?”

“No way. I almost wore the same thing. Good thing I didn’t or that would be embarrassing.”

You roll your eyes, turning around to see Sam and Rhodey, both clearly amused by their own jokes. You give them an unimpressed look and they laugh harder. 

“Haha. So very funny,” you deadpan.

“Seriously, Y/N, why are you wearing that? It’s like a thousand degrees,” Rhodey asks. 

“Maybe I’m insecure and you guys laughing just makes me feel worse? Maybe thought of that?” you retort, but neither buy it. They look at each other and start laughing. 

“Insecure, my ass. You almost give Tony Stark a run for his money in the size of ego,” Sam says between laughs. You just roll your eyes.

Wanda returns to find the guys pressing you about the long sleeves. 

“Hey, Wanda. I think you might have given Johnny Kapahala the wrong address. She’s gonna be late for the competition,” Sam jokes and you hate that you get the joke. Wanda doesn’t and looks adorably confused. All she knows is they’re referring to you so she looks at you for an explanation but you ignore her in order to throw your own remark.

“At least Johnny wasn’t afraid to swim at the beach,” you bite, making Rhodey and Wanda laugh and Sam take offense.

“There are sharks!” Sam defends himself, making you all laugh. 

The three of you help Wanda bring out the appetizers to the backyard. They’ve got a table and a bunch of chairs laid around. Wanda asks if you’d like a drink and goes to fetch one for the two of you while you greet other friends. 

“You didn’t want one?” You ask her when she returns with only one drink. “If we’re going to be beer pong partners, you can’t leave me drinking alone.”

She giggles and takes a swig from your drink. “Happy?” She asks when she returns the drink to you and smirks upon seeing the slight blush on your cheeks. 

You get a few more remarks about the rashguard but with a few drinks in everyone’s system, the pool is more enticing than poking fun at you. You didn’t plan to get in the pool but with a simple “come on” from Wanda, you’re cannonball jumping into the deep end. 

Once it’s dark, you all begin to vacate the pool in order to play games. You and Wanda play two games of beer pong seeing as neither of you are very good and you think you’ll surely be sick if you play another round. 

You eat, you dance, you sit around and talk to your friends, and Wanda is with you the whole time. It’s midnight and you’re right beside her as everyone sings for her and Pietro. She hands you the first slice of cake, which you eat standing up just to stay next to her as she cuts a piece for everyone. 

It’s nearing 2am as people begin to leave. Wanda and Pietro make sure everyone is getting home safely, either taking a LIFT or having a designated driver. You and Tony stay later to help the twins clean up, which they greatly appreciate.

Almost an hour later, the house looks as if there hadn’t been a party. You and Tony wish them happy birthday once more before he pulls out his phone to call an Uber. The twins insist you two stay, that it is way too late and they’d feel better if you do.

Tony wiggles his eyebrows discreetly at you when Wanda invites you to sleep in her room. You spare him a warning glance before following Wanda to her room. She offers you some pajamas and hands you a long sleeved tshirt like you ask. You excuse her questioning glance saying you get cold at night. 

You change in the bathroom. When you return, you find Wanda also in her pajamas sitting on her bed with the present you gave her earlier in her hand. 

“You want to open that now?” You ask, amused at her eagerness to open it.

“I mean it is my birthday now,” she reasons. You nod, closing the door and going to sit next to her. “Or is this one of those ‘open when you’re alone’ presents?”

You quirk an eyebrow. “What kind of presents are those?”

“One of those romantic ones like in the movies that show that you’ve always loved me or something,” she replies. Your palms feel sweaty all of a sudden with the way she stares at you. She reads the nervousness on your face and takes pity, continuing, “Or a vibrator.”

You burst in giggles. “Damn it. How’d you know?” you joke. 

It’s not a vibrator, obviously. You got her two necklaces, one gold with her name and the other sterling silver with her initials.

“I was going to just get you the gold one but then I thought maybe you wanted one to match all those rings you wear so, that’s why there are two,” you explain.

She puts the box aside and throws her arms around you, pulling you flush into her. “Thank you. I love them.”

“Are you sure? ‘Cause I could totally return those and get you a vibrator if that's what you want,” you laugh. She pulls back immediately, a frown on her face. 

“No, they already have my name,” she protests, pulling a chuckle from you. She hands you the golden one that says ‘Wanda’ and asks, “Will you put this one on me?”

At your nod, she twists around, turning her back to you and sweeping her hair up. You struggle with the clasp a little due to your nervousness, but you get it. Had you paid closer attention, you would have noticed how Wanda shivered at your touch. 

She turns back around and you admire her with your gift around her neck. “It looks great on you.” 

She leans toward you again and you assume it’s to give you another hug, which you wouldn’t mind one bit, but she doesn’t move her head to the side the way one does to hug someone. Her nose bumps into yours and you realize she’s going to kiss you. 

For some damn reason you pull away before her lips reach yours. She looks embarrassed and begins to apologize, “Sorry, I misread that. I thought with the present and the way you’ve been looking at me all day, shit.”

“No, you didn’t misread anything,” you reassure her. She relaxes. “Can we try that again? I was just nervous, but I’m ready now.”

“Are you sure?” 

“Wait.” You get up and make a show of shaking off the nerves and pumping yourself up before you sit back down. “Okay, now I’m ready.”

She giggles, grabbing your face and pulling you into her, kissing the life out of you. She moves to lie back on the bed and you follow her lead. You’re kissing and it’s getting hot and she tugs on your shirt. You remove it without a second thought. You begin kissing down her neck pulling sweet noises when you leave a love bite. She gasps and grips your arm, right above your elbow. 

You flinch in pain. The sudden intake of breath tips her off and she pulls her hand away. She asks worriedly, “Are you okay?”

You remember the tattoo and the fact that it’s not so hidden right now. You start to panic. “Yep, why? Are you okay?”

She narrows her eyes in suspicion, but you kiss her with the intention to make her forget. A minute later, she does it again, grabbing right on that spot. You try not to, but she hears the small groan and she pulls away. “Okay, what’s wrong?”

“Wrong? Nothing’s wrong,” you lie. 

“Then why do you flinch every time I grab your arm?” She moves to grab your arm again to prove a point but you move it away.

“Nothing’s wrong with my arm,” you deny. She sits up and reaches for your arm. Once more you pull out of reach. 

“Y/N, let me see your arm,” she demands. 

“Okay.” You try to save yourself from some of the embarrassment by explaining, “But before you look, just know I did it on a drunken dare and I didn’t know until the day after what Tony actually wrote.”

That piques her curiosity and she shuffled around you to take a look at your arm. You can’t watch, so you hide your face behind the palm of your other hand. You expect her to either laugh at you or get upset, but moments pass and you don’t hear anything. 

You get the nerve to look over your shoulder at Wanda. She looks indecisive about what she wants to say, but she doesn’t look mad. Finally, she says, “I guess I don’t have to ask if you like me or not.”

You groan in embarrassment, hiding your face again. She laughs and pulls you into her as she lies back down. “Don’t laugh. It’s embarrassing enough getting your crush’s name tattooed on you. I don’t need her to actually make fun of me.”

“Aww, you have a crush on me?” she coos. 

You pull away, giving her a deadpan look. “No, I get girls’ names tattooed on me all the time.”

“Having your crush’s name tattooed is embarrassing,” she agrees.

You narrow your eyes, thinking she's just making fun of you now and that was the last thing you need but she continues, “So how about we say it’s your girlfriend’s name?”

Your eyes widen. Wanda bites her lip nervously, waiting for your answer, and that’s how you know she’s serious. You blush, “That would be less embarrassing.”

“I think so too. So what do you say?” She asks, wanting a clear answer.

“I would love to be your girlfriend,” you answer.

She smiles and kisses you. You can’t help the giddy laughter that comes after. 

“You know, he didn't do too bad. It’s pretty well-proportioned.”

[fuck-customers]

retail has given me arcane yelling powers that may devour my soul

I'm over the anti-mask bullcrap. Seriously...is it normal to just be extremely angry at some of these people?

I work in a convenience store/gas station. Our retail model just does not give us much power over customers -- I used to work at a grocery store, where you could call a succession of higher authorities, and ultimately ALWAYS had two huge security dudes in back ready to physically intervene. Where I'm at now, it'll be me on the till, someone behind the deli counter, and a backup who floats, fetches, and gives breaks to everyone. In other words it's an environment where every time I ask someone to put on a mask, no one in the room typically has the time to argue with the customer if they really wanna fight you on it or expect you to have a free or super-cheap solution for them. We just don't end up enforcing it fully because it's goddamn impossible at the speed we work. We have remote security watching cameras because we're often just too rushed to look at the floor closely. All this gets exponentially worse the busier the store is.

So Halloween night around 8pm, my backup has left early due to medical problems. There are 9 customers in the store and a line down the middle aisle. Two of them are this pair of youngish white dudes, looked under 25 but still kinda scruffy, both utterly unmasked, who I missed while ringing up the first part of the rush. In the middle of a transaction, with them a few spaces back in line, I go "Either of you fellas got a mask on you?"

Nothing. I fix my eyes on one of them and he's making a point of looking away from me. I keep playing along sorta timidly going "Sir.." to get his attention...  until I see his mouth start kicking up into a smirk. I'm on one at this point so I'm like "If you don't have em y'all are wasting your time cause I won't serve you." They proceed to start getting out the masks they HAD IN THEIR POCKETS, but keep on complaining and say something along the lines of "Don't you care that he's a veteran?" I'm just done at this point. I fire back "No honestly right now I don't give a damn." They're like "This guy's anti-American!" [I'm a trans woman but I do not try to pass at work so I don't think they were intentionally misgendering me]. But they're saying all this, mind you, as though it's just hilarious to them. So I check, "Get the fuck out of my store!" And no I am not exaggerating or adding flavor, I swore directly and loudly at them. We're an independently owned franchise, the owner doesn't care if we swear at people and generally trusts us to know who needs shouting at. There are half a dozen other people in line and I'm ringing someone else up. I'm past caring.

I will admit I quasi blacked out for a second. I know I didn't say anything inappropriate but I basically told them they were helping kill people. Which naturally they took offense to but I stand by it. They start leaving their stuff on the counter and end up getting so exercised they throw their stuff on the floor and the second guy, who wasn't even talking to me, punts his Bang can into the floor and dents it. They leave with me saying the same shit after them out the door, ending with a "Don't come back!" Everyone else is visibly shaken but I get a couple thank yous from the line - the lady I'm helping next works at an Elmer's diner nearby and she takes a moment to comfort me and express gratitude for me being that assertive, and even picks up some of the stuff they threw. I low-key fell in love with her for that, but rushed it along to get the remaining customers on their way.

I don't like being mean to people. I'm normally super friendly. It hurts working this job. The neighborhood isn't good, and I'm the one charging homeless people for water during the heat waves, telling people we don't have public restrooms or a microwave because both have been broken 3 times in less than a year, I'm the one looking in people's bags with our insufferable remote security people talking at us over a loudspeaker. I stay here because it's in my neighborhood, and I would rather be in that position where I can meet my neighbors and at least bring in my own money to buy people water. I don't regret being mean to those young men either. It was true and it did the job of running them off. But it does bug me how I'm acquiring this part of my personality that I can unleash that way. I went immediately back to happy customer service. I wasn't even pretending to be OK I'm just able to do that now. After over a year of meditation training and off-and-on therapy, I feel like I honestly CAN go verbally thermonuclear and at least ride the stress well enough to process it later. I'm just a little scared of myself is all.

Ps. I AM anti-American. Thanks for noticing.

[robininthelabyrinth]

I'd like to see more of the Jiang Cheng has spider venom fic. Mostly because I want to see him bite someone else. How about a Jin?

Normal For the Spider - Extra: 5 People Jiang Cheng Bit, Some of Whom Deserved It

ao3

1 – Wei Wuxian

“So I’ve been exchanging letters with shijie on account of the whole theoretically banished business,” Wei Wuxian said as they strolled down the Qiongqi Path together, Wen Ning behind them making shy stuttering friends with the handful of Jiang sect disciples Jiang Cheng had brought along with him – he’d deliberately picked the friendliest and most social of the lot, the ones that acted like overgrown puppies and wanted to adopt everyone they met, and sure enough they’d mobbed Wen Ning like a bunch of crows intent on raising the poor little sparrow they found into a proper bird. It was no more than Wen Ning deserved, in Jiang Cheng’s opinion. Someone needed to socialize him, and clearly neither his sister nor Wei Wuxian were doing crap about it.

“That’s nice,” Jiang Cheng said. “If by nice you mean extremely suspicious. What about in particular?”

“Your family inheritance.”

“Is this about the summer house we have near that mountain lake? I told you, it’s been deserted for years and may possibly be haunted by something resistant to the usual liberation techniques, but if you really want to go there, you’re of course allowed…”

“That’s not the inheritance I meant and you know it.”

Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes. He did know it. “What questions do you have now?” he asked. “More medical stuff from Wen Qing?”

She’d recovered from the venom very well and immediately started wanting to know everything. Recovered a little too well, in Jiang Cheng’s opinion.

“No, this one’s for me,” Wei Wuxian said. “We’re going to Lanling City in order to let Jin Ling bite me as a way to establish familial ties and let him ‘absorb’ good aspects from my personality, right?”

Jiang Cheng nodded.

“So in some cases, biting is an act of affection?”

Jiang Cheng nodded, a little more warily.

“Then how come you’ve never bitten me?”

“It’s only affectionate when you’re a baby,” Jiang Cheng said. “Once you grow into your childhood venom, it starts being dangerous, even to family; you don’t do affection-bites after that point. And when you’re an adult…well, you saw Wen Qing!”

“Eh, she’s fine now,” Wei Wuxian said cheerfully. “I feel like I missed out! It’s not fair, Jiang Cheng. I deserve a bite! I’m practically your brother! We share essential bodily organs!”

“Wei Wuxian! Don’t talk about that!”

“Bite me and I’ll stop.”

“I’m not biting you just to make you stop being annoying –”

2 – Jin Zixun

“What are you doing here?!” Jiang Cheng demanded. “This is an ambush! Is the Jin sect considering waging an act of war against the Jiang sect?”

Jin Zixun scowled at him. “Not against the Jiang sect,” he said haughtily. “Against the Yiling Patriarch.”

“He’s my head disciple!”

That got a confused sort of frown. “But you banished him…?”

“Rumor,” Jiang Cheng said, with dignity, the way they’d always planned. “Baseless rumor, that’s all.”

Rumor he’d never denied, and had instead implicitly encouraged so that people would leave his Jiang sect alone for a little while as he gathered up strength and resources to tell them to fuck off.

“But…” Jin Zixun hesitated. “You just – attacked him?”

Jiang Cheng glared at Wei Wuxian, still lying prone on the ground with his head in Wen Ning’s lap to elevate it and his neck bandaged but still a little red – surely the paralytic had worn off by now?

Wei Wuxian noticed him staring and gave a jaunty little wave, grinning and very clearly regretting nothing, which meant that the paralytic had worn off and he was just lying there to be comfortable while watching the fun.

Typical.

“A friendly exchange,” he said, trying to maintain his dignity. “Also? Not the Jin sect’s business. What about you? What did you want with him?”

“I want him to remove the curse he cast on me,” Jin Zixun said, and he strode forward before Jiang Cheng could stop him and kicked Wei Wuxian in the side. “You hear me, you bastard?! I want the damn thing gone this instant or else –”

3 – Wen Ning

“So this is going to be a little awkward to explain,” Jin Zixuan said, rubbing his face. He looked tired, but that was possibly a side-effect of having Jin Zixun as a cousin. “Tell me, why are my cousin’s flunkies – er, I mean, my cousin’s friends convinced that it was Wen Ning that poisoned him?”

Jiang Cheng scowled.

“No offense meant,” Jin Zixuan added, nodding politely to Wen Ning. “It’s just, you know, you’re very much not a Yu, or even a Jiang.”

“No offense taken,” Wen Ning mumbled, though to Jiang Cheng’s eyes he looked a little pleased, even if his stiff wooden face still didn’t do emotions all that well. “It’s nice not to be automatically feared.”

“It’s because Wen Ning punched Jin Zixun in the face at the same moment that I bit him,” Jiang Cheng interjected, because someone needed to answer the actual question. “And then Jin Zixun fell over and someone started shouting about corpse poison – even though he’s obviously turned purple! Purple venom, purple spider, purple lightning…what part of this thematic color scheme is not obvious?!”

“Technically, the livor mortis spots generated by corpse poison are also purple,” Wei Wuxian said, completely unhelpfully. “According to Wen Qing, it’s the lack of oxygen in the blood pooling under the skin or something, which is the same thing your mom’s poison does.”

“Do you think you’re helping?” Jiang Cheng demanded.

“No, not at all. Did I sound like I was helping? I didn’t mean to.”

“I’m going to bite you again, you little…”

“My father isn’t going to want to let Wen Ning through the door if he’s considered a possible threat,” Jin Zixuan said, wisely deciding to carry on with the conversation despite their bickering. “You know he’s been saying all those things about how dangerous the Yiling Patriarch is – this’ll just feed into that.”

“I’m not going to Lanling City without Wen Ning!” Wei Wuxian exclaimed. “Wen Qing made me promise! It’s his first time visiting such a big place, too!”

“I’m pretty sure Wen Qing made you promise not to leave him behind because she was worried about your well-being, not Wen Ning’s ability to be a tourist,” Jiang Cheng said.

“Doesn’t matter! I’m not leaving him, and I’m definitely not going to not attend the party, so you have to fix this!”

“I don’t know how to fix this –”

Wen Ning coughed lightly. “Uh,” he said. “Jin-gongzi…would your father let me in if I wasn’t a threat? Say, if I was unconscious?”

A moment of silence.

“…does venom work even on fierce corpses?”

“Of course it does,” Jiang Cheng said irritably. “It wouldn’t be much of a defense mechanism for a cultivator if it didn’t.”

4 – Jin Guangshan

“I didn’t mean to!” Jiang Cheng said, his hands over his mouth. “I really didn’t mean to! It’s Wei Wuxian’s fault!”

“How is this my fault?!” Wei Wuxian asked. He looked amused, which was never a good sign, and even less so given the extreme crisis of the situation. “I wasn’t even in the room.”

“You encouraged me to keep biting people as a solution to everything!” Jiang Cheng hissed. “It got me in the mood. I wasn’t thinking!”

He looked down at the unconscious (and swiftly purpling) Jin Guangshan and grimaced. There was no convenient Wen Ning to put the blame on this time: it had been just the two of them, Jin Guangshan and Jiang Cheng, alone in a room together. Jin Guangshan had wanted to have words with him, sect leader to sect leader, which mostly meant that he wanted to throw his weight and seniority around to try to brow-beat Jiang Cheng into doing what he wanted, except that wasn’t going to work because Jiang Cheng was prepared, okay, he’d worked so long and so hard to try to build up the Jiang sect until it could resist Jin sect pressure.

And he’d probably just ruined everything.

“He has legitimate grounds to declare war against us now,” Jiang Cheng said miserably. “Or maybe to demand that we hand over that stupid Tiger Seal he keeps bugging you about as reparations, or in order to keep him from declaring war…”

“We can’t let him have it,” Wei Wuxian said at once. “It’s far too dangerous. I’d destroy it, first.”

“But then he’d still have a reason to strike against us…”

There was the soft sound of someone clearing their throat, and at first Jiang Cheng thought it was Wen Ning but when he looked up it was Jin Guangyao, instead. He looked the same as always, gentle and personable and smiling, which struck Jiang Cheng as being unaccountably weird for some reason that he couldn’t figure out until he remembered that the man’s father was currently lying on the ground being poisoned and maybe Jin Guangyao shouldn’t be smiling so much.

“If you don’t mind,” Jin Guangyao said, “I might have a suggestion that would get rid of that problem…”

5 – Wen Qing

“…and long story short, Jin Guangyao is going to run Lanling Jin until Jin Zixuan is done having kids, which may be never based on the soppy looks he and my shijie keep exchanging, and we all have the Jin sect’s blessing to move back into the Lotus Pier,” Wei Wuxian concluded. “All’s well that ends well, right, Jiang Cheng?”

Jiang Cheng crossed his arms and glared, admitting nothing.

“I’ll be happy to move anywhere that has decent food,” Wen Qing remarked. “This damn place won’t even grow radishes properly, and it’s Yiling; the radishes should be practically growing themselves.”

“I’ve arranged for some farmland for your people,” Jiang Cheng said, because practicalities he could do. “There’s still lots left over from before the war, lying fallow, and some of the places are medicinal herb fields – we need people with cultivation to tend to those, so I figured that might work for you. You’d have half regular farmland, to make sure you can grow whatever food you feel you need to be comfortable, and the other half, the herbs, can be sold to the Jiang sect at profit.”

“That sounds good,” Wen Qing said.

“Especially since they’re medicinal herb plants,” Wei Wuxian chimed in. “You could stock up on medicines you need!”

“A lot of medicines have to be obtained through trade, you utter nincompoop! I can’t make medicine just using what a single medicinal herb field will generate!”

Jiang Cheng nodded approvingly, thinking to himself that at least there was someone else in the world who understood exactly how aggravating it was to have to deal with Wei Wuxian’s unbridled and illogical optimism on a regular basis.

“And as for you,” Wen Qing said, turning to Jiang Cheng, who blinked owlishly at her. “Don’t think I missed the part of that story about how biting people is a sign of affection!”

“It’s – what?! No, you don’t – that’s when we’re children– it’s –”

Wei Wuxian started cackling.

[mochegato]

Even the Losers

Chapter 8

Chapter 1     Chapter 7

“Your father is Bruce Wayne and now he wants to reconnect,” Nino recapped as though anyone involved in the call was unaware. From the look Chloe gave him, he was particularly happy she was in New York not Paris and couldn’t actually smack him upside the head.

“Thank you for that waste of time and breath,” Chloe grumbled.

“I just… don’t see the problem.”  Nino did actually move away from Alya before she could swat him.  “What?  Your dad is Bruce freaking Wayne!  Even if you don’t connect with him, you can totally draw on that Wayne money.”

He wasn’t fast enough to move away from her smack that time.  “Ow!” he pouted at Alya.

“It’s not about the money!” Alya groaned, already exasperated by him.  “It’s about him not wanting to have a relationship until the press found out.  It’s about him cutting her out but taking in a gaggle of other kids.”  Nino lightly shoved Alya’s shoulder and motioned toward Marinette’s expression on the screen.  Alya grimaced and gave him a nod of understanding.

Marinette looked down and pursed her lips to keep from frowning.  It was bad enough thinking it in her own head constantly, but hearing it out loud, repeated back to her?  That made it so much worse.  That made her feelings real.  That legitimized her feelings.  She couldn’t pretend like she was just overreacting.  They were justified.  Which meant she couldn’t just freeze them out.  Or rather she shouldn’t.  She had to face them.

She focused her energy on not changing her body language so she didn’t worry Adrien any more than he was already.  Keeping her body relaxed instead of tensing up.  Adrien had gone into a frenzied panic when he and Max had returned from their apartment search to find her collapsed on the floor, blocking the door. She’d missed the worst of it according to what Tikki said, but she still remembered the terrified look in his eyes when she woke up.  He hadn’t left her side since, keeping constant physical contact.  

Max seemed to inherently understand the situation and was jumping up to get anything either of them might need so they didn’t have to abandon each other for even a few moments.  She was eternally grateful to him for it because she wasn’t sure who the physical proximity was having more of a calming effect on, her or Adrien, but regardless, they both needed it.  

Her attempt to not react didn’t seem to have been as effective as she thought it had been judging by the way Adrien hugged her closer to him.  Marinette lightly bonked her head into his chest and returned her attention to the laptop screen.  “It’s okay, Nino,” Marinette assured him weakly.

“No it isn’t,” Chloe said over her.  “Both of you need to stop talking.”  She flipped a page in her magazine and looked up at the screen.  “I mean, that’s true in general, but especially during this call.” Her eyes were sharp when she looked up but Marinette could see the concern she was trying to hide by focusing on her magazine.  She wasn’t sure what Adrien had told them about how he found her but she could tell it was enough to scare them too.

Marinette rolled her eyes at Chloe.  “Yes, it is.”

Chloe groaned.  “This is the way we work Dupain Cheng.  You and Adrien let people walk all over you, Nino keeps the peace, Alya starts trouble, and I tell people the truth and to back the fuck off when it’s warranted.”

“Which never starts trouble,” Alya snarked.

“I do not let people walk all over me!” Adrien objected, looking around for support. Marinette gave a curt nod of agreement, but Max was avoiding his eyes and Chloe was staring at him flatly.

“No, you don’t let people walk all over us,” she motioned toward the screen, trying to indicate the rest of them.  “But you let everyone walk all over you.”  Her eyes moved slightly and her eyes narrowed slightly.  “You both do.”

Marinette wrinkled her nose at the screen with a pout.  “I stood up to you,” she groused.

Chloe scoffed.  “And it only took you like ten years to do it.  So proud of you.”  She rolled her eyes so strongly, her entire head moved as she did it.

Marinette’s mouth dropped in offense.  “I’m better now.”

“Are you, though?  Really?” Chloe deadpanned.

Marinette pouted.  “Yes!”

“Statistically, she is accurate,” Max added.  “She does stand up for herself more now than when we were younger.”  Marinette pursed her lips at Max, unsure how to respond to his comment.  On one hand, it defended her.  On the other hand, she did not at all appreciate how he stressed the word ‘statistically’ and she was certain everyone else caught that as well.

Chloe opened her mouth to say something but was cut off by Nino. Marinette sighed in relief until she started processing his words.  “I get that it’s hard and it hurts, I guess I just thought you wouldn’t take it this hard. After Jagged with Luka and Juleka and your grandfather… you forgave all of them.  You helped Jagged with Luka and Juleka, making sure their relationship didn’t go bad.”  He motioned vaguely at nothing.  “You seemed to brush it off and take it as a challenge.  So why isn’t this?”

Alya dropped her head in her hands.  “Tact, Nino.  God.”

“No, he’s not wrong.”  Marinette frowned as she thought about his words.  “I went after Grand-père and convinced him to reconnect.  Papa never held it against him so I guess I didn’t either. Luka never held it against Jagged, just moved forward.  Maybe it’s just me.  Maybe…”

“No!” Adrien interrupted before she could follow that train of thought any further. He gently turned her toward him to focus her attention on him.  “There’s nothing wrong with you or how you’re reacting.  There’s no wrong way to react to news like this.  If you feel sad, that’s fine.  If you feel annoyed, that’s fine.  If you feel frustrated, that’s okay.  If you want to just move past it, there’s nothing wrong with that.  If you feel angry, that’s okay.  And if you feel like you need space, that’s okay too. There’s no wrong way to react to this,” he repeated.

“Except however Chloe would respond,” Alya added with a smirk.

“Hey!” Chloe objected loudly, glaring at the screen, but with no real heat behind it. “For the record, how I would respond to news like this is to spend all my new found father’s money, pressing my boundaries until he finally said something.  And if he didn’t say anything, I’d use those billions to do whatever the fuck I wanted and never see him in person.”

Marinette blinked at Chloe, as did the rest of the group.  That was certainly… an option.  Not one Marinette would ever choose, but it was…  Marinette started giggling at the idea.  Adrien joined her quickly while Max, Alya, and Nino watched them worriedly.  Chloe rolled her eyes and flipped the page in her magazine, but the corners of her lips quirked up.

“He is correct,” Max added, bringing them back to the original point.  “There are a variety of ways people will react to finding out they have a parent they didn’t know about.  Markov found hundreds of studies on psychological responses to similar news and responses are extremely varied.”

“Juleka had a harder time with accepting it and connecting to Jagged than Luka did, remember?” Adrien pointed out.  “And there’s nothing wrong with her.  She wasn’t wrong to react that way, right?”  Marinette shook her head reluctantly.  It wasn’t that she thought there was anything wrong with the way Juleka reacted, but in agreeing with Adrien’s observation, she would have to agree with his point that she was allowed to freak out about this instead of ignoring it like she wanted to.

“Marinette,” Alya raised her voice to bring attention back to her.  “You can do anything you want here and we’ll support you. You know that.  No matter how this ends we all love you.  No matter how you react, we’ll love you.  Nobody is going to judge you for any decision.”

Chloe scoffed.  She waited until everyone was looking, or in Alya and Adrien’s cases, glaring at her. “What?  You want me to lie to her?”  She looked incredulously at the other faces on the video call.  “We won’t judge.  Hell, I’m willing to scratch his eyes out in public for you.  But, your name was already getting out there and his name, now yours, is on the largest corporation in the world.  Every news and gossip organization is going to be talking about it forever if you guys don’t make a good show of it.”

“So?” Alya demanded incredulously.  “She should just do whatever is best for publicity?”

“Did I say that?” Chloe scoffed.  She finally put her magazine down to show how serious she was taking the conversation. “When have I ever let the threat of bad publicity stop me from doing something?  I just said it would be out there, not that she should care.  It’s a factor, a big one when she’s figuring out what she wants.”

“What do you want?” Adrien asked gently, turning his attention back to Marinette.

Marinette looked at Adrien for a few seconds while her brain whirred at high speed thinking through all the options.  What did she want?  None of this. That’s what she wanted.  After a few seconds she took a breath and let it out. “What I want is to not have to deal with any of this.  What I want is to not be his daughter.  What I want is to figure out where we want to live and work and start a company there like we planned.  What I want is to live a normal life now.”  She ignored Chloe’s scoff.  “What I want…” she sighed and looked away.  “What I want doesn’t matter.”

Chloe huffed almost loudly enough for it to echo.  “Of course it matters, it just doesn’t change the past or the current situation.  But, you control your next steps.  So Ladybug this bitch.  Some egomaniacal, rich, pampered megalomaniac has created an utterly ridiculous problem that you now have to fix.  This is your specialty.  Show this bastard who he walked out on.  Make him regret not dying with his parents.”

“Woah! What the Hell?” Nino exclaimed. “Too far.”

Chloe scoffed and looked back at her nails.  “If you think that was too far, you should have heard what I wanted to say.  I toned it way down for your sensitive ears,” she added condescendingly.  She just barely looked up when Marinette started giggling.  Chloe’s lips quirked up the more Marinette tried to stifle the slightly unhinged sounding giggles.

“Dude, that’s her grandparents…” Nino whisper shouted.  Marinette suddenly sobered and paled in realization.

“Or!” Adrien interjected with false excitement positioning himself between Marinette and the screen.  “Or, you could, you know, try to build a relationship with him.”  He looked decidedly away from the incredulous looks from Alya and Chloe and the doubtful look from Nino on screen, trying to pretend like they weren’t judging him.  He moved closer to Marinette and took her hands in his giving her a sincere, serious look.  “You have someone, your father, who wants to connect to you.”  

He ignored the loud scoff from the computer and continued as though Alya or Chloe, or both, hadn’t verbalized their opinion.  They clearly weren’t that opposed or they would have said it instead of making a noise.  He “accidentally” closed the video chat and gave Max a pointed look.  

Max nodded slowly.  “I’m just going to go to my room for a few minutes.  Let me know if you want to talk.”

Marinette and Adrien both shot him thankful smiles.  Adrien waited until his door was closed before looking back at Marinette with a concerned look.  “You got screwed in this deal.  Nobody can deny that, and however you feel, that’s real and valid.  It’s okay to be hurt.  It’s okay to be scared.  It’s okay to say this is too much for you right now, or ever.  But, do you really want to walk away?  Not connect to him?  Not try?”

“He didn’t want…” Marinette started weakly.

“Maybe he wasn’t ready,” he cut her off before she could spiral again.  “Maybe this is the universe’s way to saying it’s time. You got the embodiment of luck in your pocket.  Is it really so farfetched to think luck played a role?”

“Bad luck,” Marinette scoffed to the floor.  Adrien gently rapped her on the top of her head with his knuckle.  She looked back up and caught his unimpressed look. Marinette sighed and looked away before looking back up at him uncertainly.  “I don’t know…”

“Do you think you want to try?” Tikki asked floating out of her resting spot. “It’s your choice.  But I don’t think this is going away, so whichever decision you go with you’ll have to face the consequences.”

“Or I could just cataclysm him,” Plagg offered rubbing his paws together.  He darted away from Tikki before she could shut him up.

“No!” Marinette and Adrien chorused at the same time.

Adrien glared at Plagg but made sure to soften his eyes before looking back at Marinette.  “Okay, maybe things don’t work out with him.  But it sounds like you have siblings.  You already like Jason.  Maybe you’ll like them too.”  He gave her a small smile and rubbed her arms soothingly.  “You always wanted siblings.”

Marinette gave him a weak smile back.  “I don’t need siblings anymore.  I have you.  That’s more than enough.  I don’t think I could handle more of yous.”

Adrien scoffed good naturedly at her.  “If anything I’ve made having siblings more appealing.”

Marinette scoffed playfully.  “Keep telling yourself that,” she muttered.

He pulled her into a hug.  “You always wanted more.  And it sounds like you might have sisters.”

“More people he adopted after walking away,” Marinette groused into his shirt.

Adrien hugged her tighter.  “Maybe he had a reason?  Or maybe he just royally messed up.  Maybe he hates himself for the decision.  It’s something you won’t find out unless you stay.  And you can just talk once and see how you feel about it. If it doesn’t go well, you can walk away and we can find that bar Roy mentioned.  If it goes well, you can decide to stay or we can decide to move to New York or Metropolis, like we were thinking and you can still see him every so often.”

“Even if it doesn’t go perfectly,” Tikki added softly, “it’ll give you closure.  You deserve to have that.”

“And you’ll wonder what could have happened if you don’t,” Adrien nudged her gently.  “You know you’re going to regret not trying.”

“So is that an absolute no on the cataclysm idea,” Plagg popped up between them.  “Because I’m still willing.”

Marinette rolled her eyes at him but shot him a grateful smile.  It was as close as Plagg got to admitting he cared.  She scratched him on the forehead and looked back to Adrien with a frown.  “I don’t think I can handle this.”

“I’ll stay with you.  And Max will be here.  Tikki will be here for you.  Plagg will be here, but don’t let that deter you…”

“Hey!” Plagg pouted.

Adrien continued without acknowledging him.  “Chloe could be here in a few hours if we needed and she’d drop everything to get here, no matter what she says.  Alya and Nino will only be a phone call away.  We will support you no matter what you want to do. But we can’t make this decision for you, so, the question is what do you want to do?”

Marinette groaned and pouted at him.  “You sure you can’t do this for me?”

Adrien gave her a sympathetic look and shook his head. “Not this time, Bug.”  He waited a few minutes for her to think through her options.  When she looked just as lost after another few minutes after that, he spoke up gently. “Do you want to talk to Sabine and Tom first?  They might have some answers you need to make your decision.”

Marinette looked back up at him with a pathetic looking pout.  “Can’t I just sleep through this instead?”

Adrien chuckled and shook his head, relieved she was now in a light enough mood to make jokes.  “You could,” he nodded and put on a mock serious face, “but your problems will still be there when you woke up.”

“What bullshit,” she scoffed in a weak voice.

Adrien nodded.  “Yep, utter bullshit.”

Marinette kept eye contact with him for a few moments waiting for him to impart some kind of insightful wisdom upon her.  When he held silent and let her make her own decision, she whimpered and looked away.  “What if it isn’t him I cataclysm,” Plagg asked, flying between them.  “I could do it to his house instead… a few of his cars?  Rich people always have too many cars.”

Adrien grabbed him out of the air and shoved him in his pocket with an exasperated groan.  But Marinette giggled again.  When her laughter had settled, she took a deep breath and motioned toward her phone. Adrien smiled at her as he placed it in her hand.  She took a deep breath and pulled out the paper M. Wayne had given her.  She dialed one of the numbers before she could talk herself out of it, which knowing herself could happen if she was given more than a few seconds to think, and looked up to Adrien, letting his soft smile ground her.  “M. Wayne? It’s Marinette.  Would you be free for dinner tonight?”

Chapter 9

Tags:

@maribat-bdbwm @jayjayspixiepop @redscarlet95 @alice-hazelwood @deathssilentapproach-blog @unoriginalmess @alyssadeliv @emotionalsupportginger @frieddonutsweets @when-no-wings-do-broomsticks @toodaloo-kangaroo @colorfulmongerpsychicranch @iloontjeboontje @wolf-for-life @maribatserver @aespades @prettylittlebutterflie @imarivers8  @ certainmuffinbagelcalzone@ritacrow-blog @unoriginalmess @demonicbusiness @kking13 @lady-bee-fechin @blur-of-colours @kittenmywaythrulife @kashlyn @loysydark 

[sweetsbfreex]

my baby, my baby

brought to u by me watching IW for the millionth time

Summary: You ask Steve for one thing before the fight against Thanos (IW), but for the first time in however long he denies you of fulfilling this wish.

Warnings: language?

Pairing: Nomad, Bf!Steve x thanos daughter!reader

-

He was manning the quinjet, not all the way true. Sam was flying the jet to Wakanda, Steve slumped in his seat beside Sam, in deep thought. His chin is set into his palm, his arm sitting up on the armrest, and his palm covering half of his mouth. Looking further down his leg was jittering steadily.

What would happen next was a pretty big deal, none of you on the jet knew what could go wrong. So obviously tensions were at an all time high in this cooped up jet. 

You rise up from your seat between Wanda and Nat. Walking yourself behind Steve’s chair. Your pointer finger taps his embellished shoulder, separating him from his apprehensive thoughts. He looks up at you and the creases that were once prominent in his forehead evaporated. 

You don’t utter anything, only nudging your head behind you. 

Follow me to the back.

Is what’s reciprocated when he too gets up from his seat, letting Sam know he’ll be up front in a second. Once you turn, he follows you down the small aisle to the side “room” away from all the prying ears. 

Finally.

You step into the room first. You weren't going to lie, your heart was beating with so much force and it only grew as he walked past you into the room. You close the door behind you, turning, so you're facing Steve's attentive figure. 

You only smile at him to some extent, prompted to show there were no ill intentions to asking him back here. When you see how nervous he looks, as you take his hand seating the both of you to a bench against the wall.

Your knees tenderly touch. He clears his throat coercing you to go on, raising an eyebrow in confusion. 

“You alright doll?” he asks you, in a gentle manner. Taking the already linked palms shifting it from your lap to his. His other hand blanketing your combined hands. 

“I’m okay. Are you?” you ask the question hesitantly, raising your spare hand to move aside the hair that fell over and veiled his eyes. You desperately wanted to make sure you got a good look at his face. You loved his face.  

His cheeks go plump in a charming smile, and his hand squeezes yours back. 

His hair was long. Longer than you would’ve ever imagined Steve would let it be. Either way you loved every inch of the gold locks. Yet, everytime you told him how much you loved it, despite his insecurity and slight annoyance with it. He'd always fall into a rampage down memory lane. Telling you how his late mother would've hounded him about the upkeep of his hair.  

You adored that about him too. Loved, that he loved so hard and so full. He’d never forget the ones he loved no matter what. 

“I’m swell, you don’t need to worry about me” he tells you. 

You didn’t believe him one bit and you weren’t going to push him about it. You knew how he was...stubborn as ever. But, it was also ,by and large, your job to worry about him–– after loving him of course. Contrary to what he would say (Which was vice-versa.)

“We’re gonna be okay...okay? But I have something to ask you. And you can’t get mad.”

“I’m not promising that, but we won’t shout. We’ll talk it out–– whatever it is”

It was the best you were going to get from him and time was closing in on you guys being able to be like this, anway.  

“I know how you are, but this is a really critical thing we're fighting for here. So, unless I'm in some type of grave danger. I don’t want you worrying about me on the field. No matter what...Make sure he doesn’t get that stone.” Your voice lets you down towards the end, starting to get scratchy and low. 

He stands up in no time. His hands going to his belt, then to his hips, he finally raises one hand to run against his beard.

His facial hair, another thing in the endless things you loved about Steve Rogers. 

When the stubble he usually shaves away kept growing into a full beard, it surprised you both. You in a hot kind of way, he became more adoring by day when decided to stop shaving. 

You walked in on him one day. He was facing the scratched up mirror in a bathroom in a dingy hotel room. Running his fingers against his face, the other clutching onto the edge of the counter. Tilting his head back and to, eyes shifting as he looked over his face. It was another part of the effect of the serum he didn’t expect would happen. 

Telling you a story as he wandered down memory lane again. How he had problems growing stubble as a sickly kid–– so behind on puberty. He even watched Bucky grow his first “stache” at sixteen, but that came to an abrupt stop when Bucky’s mother made him shave it off. 

Steve thought It was weird to think that he could now also.

You were still sitting on the bench. Swiveling your body so you were facing your boyfriend, looking up at his fidgeting build with care. 

Feeling like a child waiting for their parents to dispute whatever impending punishment they would grant. 

“Why would you ask me that?” he finally, finally disrupts his silence. Scoffing at the offensive question. 

He doesn’t look at you with anything negative, only confusion.

“Because. I don’t want you jumping in front of whatever it is in front of me...I know him, he’s my dad. He’ll do anything to get what he wants, even if it means I die.”

When Steve told you that it was actually Bruce calling and told you what he said. He looked at you baffled when the shirt you were about to put on dropped from your grasp.

Once you told him you had knowledge of Thanos and how you knew him, there was a pregnant silence in the air.

If anything it filled the rage towards Thanos in Steve even more, by the time you finished. 

“Are you listening to yourself?” he questions you in disbelief, lips stuck in a sneer.

“Please. Just please, angel.” you maintain.  

You don’t answer either of his questions and he truly hates that. He stays silent for a bit watching your seated figure, looking up at him with the saddest eyes you’ve ever given him. His puzzled eyes shift down to your bobbing leg and your hands wringing together with so much speed and anguish.

He could probably throw up right now.  

And when he shifts his eyes up again, you keep that same look on your face waiting for him to say anything.

He sighs dejectedly, dropping his hands to his side, and walking himself back over to you. He sits closer to you than before. Extending a gloved hand to caress your cheek before fixing the flyaways from your sleek ponytail.  

“I can’t. You’ll always be my priority, and I won’t promise something like that sweetheart” he tells you this languidly. His thumb starts to rub circles against your cheekbone, to calm you down, when he catches the way your eyes widen at his admission.  

“Steve!” your voice breaks. So shocked, you can’t hold back the tears that build up and fall slowly over your face. 

You couldn’t believe this. He’s supposed to love you. Time and time again he’d always remind you how much he loves you and how he’d do anything for you–– too hard to say no to you, his words. Thinking this over you pull your face away from his hold, looking down at your taut hands. This wasn’t a silly death wish. You had to make sure your father didn’t get what he desired, no matter what. 

He hates having to watch you cry, but he doesn’t have much of a choice now. He needs to stand his ground, there was no way he would be arguing about this. And he does this, grabbing your face with a light hand,  so you were face to face again. 

"I love you so much. And if I have to choose between letting you die and Thanos losing. Or you living and watching the universe crumble, you know exactly what I'm gonna choose. I'm not losing you, not if I have anything to do with it"

Albeit how dumb it sounded, there is no notable instance in his life where’d let you perish over him. 

“You’re not thinking this through” you hiccup.

“It’s you, isn’t it? There’s not much to think about”  he smiles at you and as you look at him you can see his eyes glazing over. 

His statement only causes you to cry more. You feel nothing but the pain in your heart and the repositioning of your body. It takes you a moment to realize you’re settled on his thighs sideways. His well built arm warmly wraps around your shoulder, your temple rests against his shoulder, and his lips are placing light kisses to the crown of your head. 

You incline your head, “I love you too much” you say in an awed whisper, raising a hand to twirl in the strands at the back of his collar. Following that, you let your hand spread across the back of his neck pulling him down for a kiss.

“After this we’re done okay? We have our pardon and are going to buy whatever house you want to get. I’m gonna buy you the prettiest engagement ring money can buy, Gonna get whatever animals you want,” you chuckle at that part.

If there was one thing Steve learned while living incognito with you is that you’d save any animal if you were able to. Always stopping whenever you passed by any animal in need in the drary streets. Looking up at Steve, who’d always have to remind you that neither of you could give it the life it deserves right now. Opting to only go to the nearest convenience store to buy whatever safe animal food in sight. 

His hand immediately clutches your face to wipe away the tears that fell without pattern. His smile grows fonder when you do the same.  “‘Can paint the house whatever we decide...maybe even get a house big enough to fit the kids we’ll have?” he tells you the last part in such a timid manner, bearing one of his hands to clutch yours. His thumb running over your knuckles at full tilt. 

The only thing you were able to give him was a stunned look. So shocked you were unable to react like a normal person. 

You squeeze his hand tight only being able to stutter a “really?”

“Of course. I want to have a bunch of small Rogers with you, wreaking havoc around our house” he admits this to you, carrying out such strong eye contact. If his hand didn’t slither down your back, supporting you up and grounding you, you’d jump in glee. 

Fuck. Neither of you had talked about this, but you were glad that you both were on the same page about his. You felt terrified but in a good way, wanting to wholly get this over with and start this dream life with Steve. 

“And this is all gonna happen, because everything is going to go well. We’re gonna win, I don’t want you thinking like that or asking me something like that ever again. Thanos will never be on our list of priorities ever again.”

“I’m sorry, baby. I can’t wait to start that life with you” you respond, winding your arms around his neck, crashing your lips to his with force.

He pulls away without notice to place hasty kisses to your cheek, loving the giggles you emitted. Even so, the energy in the room shifts too soon when Sam knocks on the door. Steve allows him entrance. 

“Sorry to interrupt, but we’re about to land Cap”

Steve responds by nodding his head once, stiffly. Letting him know he’d be out in a second. 

You get off of his thighs, so the both of you were standing chest to chest. He claps your worried face. Pulling you into him with little force, so his lips could fall to your forehead, nose, and lips. 

“Remember what I said and be safe, I love you”

“I love you” you recite, bringing his hand down to kiss his covered palm.

With that he envelops you in his arm, his cheek resting against the top of your head. Both of you breathing each other in. Your shoulders relaxing at his loving touch. 

He’d do whatever needed to keep you safe and if it ended in his death, then so be it. You’d do the same for him in a heartbeat, there was no point in either of you arguing this one out. 

––––

Everyone was tired, it seemed like this fight only dragged on with the never-ending monsters. But, with the help of Thor (of course) it seemed like things were only getting positive from there. With the way he rendered lightning, destroying things into dust, you were ready to end this once and for all.  

And when a cloud of grey smoke appeared out of thin air, and a large titanian appeared. You knew this would either be the ending or the beginning of all these troubles. 

“That’s him” you falter, turning to Steve. You give him a quick once over, nothing the way he eyed your father. A menacing, scary look on his face and the furrow of his eyebrows only grow. 

“We have eyes on Thanos” he says into the intercom.

It’s like time stands still for a few seconds, no one moves a muscle. You haven't seen this man in years. You feel as if he doesn't recognize who you are as he glances over everyone, like they're roaches in his kitchen. 

Yet, in a blur, everyone takes their chance on Thanos. Trying their hardest to somehow, someway take this Titanian down. Bruce gets thrown with a shout, Branches entwine Nat, and Sam drops from the air smoothly. 

At some point you hear the grunt of Steve, who somehow gets some punches in, his hands clutching the gauntlet. He shouts from the hefty weight and in a swift motion is stock-still on the ground from the punch he endures. 

“Steve!”

Without a choice you run towards Thanos, your adrenaline kicking in. Kicking in punching only to use your hands to grasp around the metal. You knew towards the end; you were no match for him. 

“Please! Please don’t do this. Dad please I’m begging you” you plead profusely, but he only looks down at you emotionless. “Please, please, please” you cry, your head hangs low for a bit before you raise it up again. “This won’t fix anything! You–– you…JUST TAKE IT OFF” you scream, knuckles colliding with the gold.

You try so hard to think of anything to turn his mind, but he only looks at you like a stranger. Not the little girl he recruited and used to look at with some kind of affection. His type of affection, if you could even title it that, affection. 

Sure, he raised you to be a ruthless killer and thief, but you’d do anything in this key moment to change his crooked mind. 

“You don’t get to call me that again. You chose your path...I always knew you’d be the one to let me down the most” he says all this with so much venom. 

You cry as you're lifted in the air, by his gauntlet hand, and thrown against the bark of a tree. 

You're in a daze. The only things securing you back is the hand against your cheek and a booming, choked up "no". Hearing it a distance away.

You open your eyes to see Steve in front of you, your name on his lips almost incessantly. But when you open them, your eyes quickly move to Thor. Who’s a few feet away from the two of you, shocked and angry. The remnant of smoke in the air. You knew he did it.

“We lost?” you ask Steve, tears already forming in your eyes, as he carefully lifts you to his feet.

He doesn’t get the chance to answer you, though. 

“Steve…?” It’s Bucky, You both look towards him to see him fall slowly, disappearing into a brown dust. 

You both look on, shocked all while Steve tries to drag himself and your weak body to Bucky. But it’s already too late. 

“Buck?!” Steve calls out, but there’s no answer.

You watch on in disorder, stomach plummeting with every second that pasts.  Your eyes catch Wanda looking onto Vision's body in sorrow and as you do, she turns into brown dust.  It was frightening and you were speechless. So much happening around you, you weren’t sure where to look. You weren’t who was going away. 

The hand against your spine, holding you up, starts to feel faint and a headache you had suffered from earlier comes back, but ten times stronger. 

“My head hurts” you tell him, your words come out slowly as your mouth starts to feel numb. You drop your head to his shoulder. “Stevie...I can’t feel your hands” you blubber, chest heaving as your breathing picks up. Everything was happening so, so fast. 

He lifts your head, “Hey, you’re alright sweetheart, you took a hard hit. Just a bit banged up, gotta stay awake in case it’s a concussion” he reassures you.

You don’t believe him and when you look down at your right hand to see it crumbling away little by little. You lift your wrist up, hand gone. You look down to see the brown dust below your view. 

You didn’t want to go. You had merely planned your dream future with him. It wasn’t fair your father would be the one to rip that away from you.

“No. No, you’re alright, stop that” he condemns, bringing your other hand to his bruised lips imperatively. Watching as it climbs up and up, half of your shoulder  already gone. 

“I’m scared. I love you so much Steve”

“I love you so much doll, feel like we’ve been saying it all day” he tries to joke, eyes roaming all over your face. He had to make sure he had your face recognized to a t, even if it was in a manner of pain. 

And you do the same. You weren’t sure where you were going. Were you even dying?! You couldn’t tell, all you knew was Steve and some of your friends wouldn’t be where you were going.

You laugh despondently, low, and mirthlessly knowing how much he needed that laugh at the moment.

“No. I’m gonna––” you start, but never get to finish, because at that moment. In a flash, he’s left with the sight of the soot falling in a sway, like leaves tumbling to the ground. Staring at him gloved palms to see nothing of you there any longer. 

He does nothing but stand there for a few minutes, recollecting the exchange. Not only was his best friend gone, but so was his best girl.  

He had one fucking job. Keep you safe at all times. Not only did he let the whole universe down, he let you down. You were gone. He can only think about the moment you both had on the jet, telling you, you had nothing to worry about. Because you guys were going to win and now she is gone.  He let you down in the worst possible way imaginable. You were gone…

He repeats this to himself, losing hope each time that you would be back in just a second. 

He turns around to see his friends observing him and once he notices that Sam is no longer among the group it only increases his agony. 

“Cap?” Nat mumbles.

“FUCK!” he breaks. Ripping the gloves off his hand before he sets himself against the ground–– his body feeling heavy. His head is in his hand, body heaving roughly as he cries quietly.

Everyone is stunned and takes a step back to give his face, not remembering the last time they’ve seen him this broken or the last he’s had an outburst resulting in a curse word. 

He isn’t sure how he’s supposed to live with this guilt or without you by his side. In spite of that,  there was no way in hell he wasn’t going to try and find a way to bring you back.

– – – – 

realized while writing thing i am not creative...this (beginning) was literally a scene

if you enjoyed pls don’t forget to reblog or give feedback if ur up to it <3

[bitsandbobsofwriting]

The former God of Magic resents The Mother for sticking him on Earth, and plans on causing as much havoc as he can to punish Her;

Version 2, Dark!Merlin

INTRO

(Version 1, Good!Merlin)

TW: A lot of emotional manipulation, a little violence, a lot of angst.

~

“You’re late.”

The woman’s well practiced blank mask falls into a scowl as she stares at Merlin with mistrust:

“Well, perhaps I was putting off coming to see you, no matter how necessary it is.”

The gang can see the bob of Merlin’s head as he lets out a low chuckle, and they have to stop themselves from recoiling; they’d never heard a noise like that from their young friend before, it sounded almost... cruel.

He lifts a hand to cover his heart as he says in faux offense:

“You wound me, sister. You didn’t want to see your favourite sibling?”

Everyone frowns in confusion, Merlin doesn’t have... siblings. That’s not even mentioning the fact that this woman barely seems human.

The woman doesn’t hide her slight disgust, taking a step back from Merlin and letting out a harsh breath:

“I came here to tell you that you need to hurry up. Time is running out.”

Merlin chuckles again, turning to the side and taking a few short paces, his hands held leisurely behind his back. The amusement on his face is disturbing, and Arthur gulps, not noticing the way Mordred is growing paler and paler by the second. Merlin doesn’t turn to look at the woman as he speaks, and his smirk stretches wider:

“But I’m having so much fun, Ava!”

The woman, Ava, huffs again, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms over her chest. If the gang weren’t so semi-sure that Merlin wasn’t dangerous, they’d think she looked scared:

“Mother sent you here to complete a task. Get it done, and you can come home. Isn’t that what you want? To come home?”

Merlin’s smirk falls, and the snarl that the gang briefly see on his face before he whips around to face Ava takes their breath away. They barely notice the thunder, snapping in the distance in time with Merlin’s anger:

“Mother’s the one keeping me here in the first place. She could accept me back any time.”

Ava takes another step back, and Merlin tilts his head ever so slightly at the movement, but waits for her to speak:

“As punishment for your cruelty. She isn’t happy, you’re making a mess of things.”

Merlin chuckles again, tilting his head even further, and his words have an immediate chilling effect on the group hiding in the bushes:

“Well, if she insists on sending the God of Chaos to fix a problem, perhaps she should expect a little mess. Plus, I’m having more fun here than I’ve had in centuries. These humans... so gullible.-”

Ava shakes her head mournfully, but before she can say anything, Merlin continues, now pacing calmly around the clearing, waving his hands and grinning in his excitement:

“-I mean, they’re just so... easy. To play with, to manipulate. You know they all trust me? They all come running to naïve, innocent, loving little Merlin, spilling all their secrets as they go. Did you know, the drunkard is the son of a noble? “Fuck nobility” my arse, he is nobility.-”

Gwaine clenches his jaw and looks to the floor, ignoring the stares of Arthur and Leon, but before anything can be muttered, Merlin continues, listing their greatest secrets off on his fingers:

“-The gentle giant is terrified that someone’s going to find out that his preferences lie with men, which is ridiculous considering the way he stares at the aforementioned drunkard when he thinks no one but little old me is watching. The blacksmith, even years on, is terrified that his whore sister will never forgive him for... something or other, I wasn’t really paying attention. Camelot’s first, The King’s most trusted, has a debilitating fear of heights, and oh if it isn’t just hilarious to watch when he has to patrol the city walls. And then, there’s the-”

Ava rolls her mournful eyes and interrupts him:

“Your point, Em?”

Merlin laughs, fully and from the belly, but the sound doesn’t bring the gang joy like it normally does:

“My point, is that I’ve got these idiots wrapped around my finger. Mortals: the universe’s most fun toy. I haven’t even gotten to half of them yet. There’s the noble one, who thinks he holds my trust, the Druid boy, whose only redeeming feature is that he’s destined to kill the King Prat one day; believe me, if it weren’t for that I’d have killed the annoying little twerp years ago. Then there’s the King Prat’s magical sister, who is full of such terror. I play with her dreams some nights, force visions of pyres and hatred and destruction to play over and over in her mind. It’s rather amusing, watching her thrash and sweat and whimper in her sleep.-”

Arthur’s head had whipped around to Morgana when Merlin had mentioned her, but the tears streaming down her face and the way her hand was clamped tightly over her mouth stripped his anger from him. Which left him with no distraction, no way to ignore the simple fact of what was happening right now. Merlin was... not what they thought. He was powerful, he was using them. He was playing with them like puppets and pulling their strings this way and that, watching as they could do nothing but follow. Arthur didn’t know what to think, and he definitely didn’t notice the tears on his own cheeks.

Mordred was pale to the point of looking like he was about to faint and Lancelot had a deep frown on his face, tears in his eyes but not quite falling, not yet. This was... a misunderstanding. He... he knows Merlin, this is a trick, or a trap, he’ll explain later and everything will be just fine. He just has to... to trust him. Everything will be fine.

Gwaine keeps his gaze on the floor. A small part of him was feeling a little prideful that Percival liked him back, but the rest of him... had no room for anything but grief. He had suspected that Merlin had magic, but this was something else, this was... a whole new person. Did he ever really know Merlin? Did any of them? 

Elyan and Gwen sat pressed together tightly, though Gwen had one hand on Morgana’s shaking back, and her other was reaching around Elyan, gripping Leon’s shoulder tightly. Leon was just staring blankly at the scene in front of him, though anyone that knew him well enough would be able to see the tight clench of his jaw and the anger (and grief) in his eyes.

Ava interrupted Merlin’s gleeful ranting, the tears in her eyes a little more prominent as she took on a slightly more desperate tone:

“Please, Em, just... stop. They’re important, they have destinies, you can not destroy them or push them too far; this is cruel, even for you. This... you never used to be like this.”

Merlin turns around, facing away from his sister and giving the hidden group full view of his rage-filled face. His voice is quiet and clipped and angry as he asks:

“Oh?”

Another roll of thunder echoes through the clearing, closer this time, and fat droplets of rain fall harshly from the sky, mixing with the tears on everyone’s face. Ava sighs, tears overflowing as she gulps before answering, her voice shaking slightly as she takes a step towards Merlin:

“You’re meant to be the God of Magic, not Chaos. You were so... beautiful, balanced. You saw wonder in everything, every little spark of magic and every single prayer put a smile on your face. You loved humanity even more than Mother did. Now look at you, you’re tormenting them, torturing them. This isn’t you, Em, please. Help them, and things can go back to the way they were, help them and you can come home.”

The anger on Merlin’s face had only grown as she spoke, and each individual hidden in the bushes had to make a concerted effort to stop themselves from bolting. None of them had felt terror like it, and the fact that it was Merlin they were all so scared of... well, it didn’t help.

Lightening streaks across the sky and wind howls violently through the forest, calming only when Merlin shuts his eyes and takes a deep breath, straightening his back and smirking slightly before he replies, still not turning around to face his sister:

“You’re right. I loved humanity, I was desperate to see them succeed. And then they butchered me. I gave them this universe to frolic in, and in return they call me a monster, a beast, they call me evil, they make nightmares out of me. I still listen to every little prayer, and do you know what I hear? I hear my people, my wonderful little creations, my creatures of magic, begging for mercy, begging for the pain to stop. The humanity I so used to love turned on them, began to burn them, out of spite and fear and hatred. I will not show them any more grace than they have showed me, I will give them exactly what they deserve, and that blonde idiot is at the top of my list of people who have to fucking pay. I won’t destroy him entirely, because ultimately I want my creatures to stop suffering, but I will break him. I will rip him apart piece by piece for what he has done to me.-”

The absolute fury in Merlin’s words, the hatred, translates to thunder in the sky and agony in Arthur’s chest. The King can barely breathe, muffling the sobs tearing from his mouth with both hands, both terrified of being discovered, and desperate to... to let Merlin punish him for the pain he has caused.

Leon settles a shaking hand on his shoulder, but Arthur doesn’t look his way, his blurry gaze focused on Merlin, now finally turning back to his sister:

“-You know, I’m this close to getting that big blonde idiot to fall in love with me. How pathetic is that?? All it took was a few touches here, a few lingering stares there, saving his life occasionally. The man is so pathetically starved for attention I imagine he’d fall for anyone who showed him the barest amount of affection. That is how I will break him.-”

The only thing stopping Arthur from sobbing aloud is Leon collapsing behind him, pulling the young King back into his chest and wrapping a tight arm around his torso, one hand clamped over his mouth as he mutters desperate reassurances into his ear. Morgana pulls Gwen close in a similar way when the servant’s cries grow harsher, her brother burying his face in her shoulder.

Lancelot barely notices Gwaine gripping his arm hard enough to leave bruises for weeks, or Percival pushing his forehead into Lance’s shoulder blade. All he can do is sit and stare at the ground, his breathing slow but shaky, tears streaming silently down his face as he rethinks everything he’s ever known.

Mordred sits on his own, rocking back and forth rhythmically as he tightens the clutch he has around his knees. Tears drip from his young cheeks, poisoning the ground beneath him as he struggles to consider his faith. His faith in magic, in Emrys, who was meant to be balanced and beautiful and giving. Emrys, who he now knew was twisted and angry and desperate for revenge.

All of their hearts are splitting, cracking down the middle.

“-It won’t be physical pain, no, that’ll be down to the Druid boy. He doesn’t want to kill Arthur now, but he will, one day, when I give him one final push. He’ll fall so far into the darkness there’ll be nothing of him left to save, and when he plunges his sword into The Pendragon’s chest, I’ll sit back and watch with a smile on my face, and Arthur will realise that the man he loves, the man who claimed to love him in return, hated him all along. Tricked him. I will watch the life drain from his eyes, and he will spend his last few moments on this world in every kind of agony imaginable, lost in the knowledge that I wanted him to suffer, that he is being punished for his sins.”

Ava shakes her head, silver tears dripping from her emerald eyes as she stares at the floor:

“Are Sir Mordred and the Lady Morgana not your creatures? Do you not wish to save at least them?”

Merlin chuckles darkly:

“I had faith in them once, but they made their decisions. They sided with a Pendragon over me. Mother may be fond of her precious Once and Future King, but to be fair, she’s fond of anything with a pulse, and I, for one, can not wait until she’s not quite so fond of him anymore.”

Ava gulps, taking a desperate step towards her amused brother, but before she can say anything, before she can make one last plea for mercy on humanity’s behalf, Merlin tilts his head, smirking dangerously:

“Do you think they’re scared?”

She halts in her tracks, blinking in confusion, and Merlin’s smile grows into a chuckle as he gestures behind him:

“The King and all his little friends, hidden in the bushes. Do you think they’re scared?” 

The gang barely have time to look up in shock before their bodies are moving, out of their control. They stand rigidly and walk single-file out from their hiding place, coming to stand in a line at the side of the clearing. Merlin hasn’t even looked at them, but his hand floats in the air, a sickly looking yellow mist swirling around his fingers as he tilts his head at his sister, staring in horror at The King, the knights, the Lady, and the servant.

Merlin drops his hand and they all fall to their knees, not even bothering to be brave as they sob. The angry God finally turns, and the serene smile on his face is chilling as he walks towards them, coming to stand in front of Lance and Mordred first. The two of them are the calmest, though calm in the way that they don’t really look... present. They stare blankly ahead, breathing shallow and tears still falling as Merlin crouches in front of them, gripping a chin in each hand and shaking their heads roughly. His voice comes out a whisper, the frown on his face looking more disappointed than anything:

“So much faith, so much trust. It’s a little pitiful, if I’m being honest.”

They don’t react to his words and he smirks before letting them go and standing, moving on to Elyan and Gwen, gripping the knight’s shoulder and saying with mocking sympathy in his voice:

“You were right, by the way,-”

He glances at a fully sobbing Gwen with disgust:

“-she’ll never forgive you, but she’ll never tell you that. You’ll just spend the rest of your life wondering why your relationship was never the same.”

Next, he shuffles over to Gwaine, not even bothering to see the siblings’ reactions as he passes Leon and Percival with a look of disinterest on his face. He leans down in front of the knight, running a soft hand through his hair, waiting for the man to relax slightly before gripping his hair harshly and yanking back, so he has to look up at him. Merlin gives him a blindingly cruel smile:

“You're grateful that Percival is just as in love with you as you are with him, but don’t think yourself too lucky. You’re a hypocrite and a drunk, and my dear old Percy has too much self respect to put himself through that. I’d go for a good tumble in the hay and give up while you’re ahead.”

Once again, he moves back, his sister having to look away in her grief, her empathy drowning her. The God comes to stand in front of Morgana, who is desperately trying to look brave but failing miserably:

“And you. You’re meant to be The Darkness, but I couldn’t very well have you outdo me, could I? Try your hardest, I’ll still be the end of you, and I wait with baited breath for the day you fall, and the day soon after that, when I get to kill you.”

She break down in tears again at that, horrified with the idea that she might one day be on the same end of morality and cruelty as this monster in front of her.

Merlin smirks before rolling his eyes and finally coming to stand in front of Arthur. The King calms his breathing just enough to look up at a smirking Merlin, his voice cracking and barely-there as he mutters:

“Please... Merlin, please...”

The smirk drops from Merlin’s face as he brings his hand up, the sickly yellow mist back again. Arthur rises from the floor, hands clutching at his throat as the air is drawn from his lungs. Merlin steps closer to his with a snarl, his free hand gripping Arthur’s chin like a vice, though his voice eerily calm as he murmurs:

“You. You and Uther were so desperate for a scape-goat, for a villain, for a monster. And you picked magic, you picked me. So stop being so fucking pathetic, I’m just playing the part you gave me to perfection. You picked the premise, I’m writing the ending.”

Ava finally speaks up, her voice loud, despite the waver:

“Brother please, this is... this is beyond cruelty, please just stop.”

Arthur is dropped, and The King can barely find it in himself to choke for air as Merlin turns back to his sister, the amused smirk back on his face:

“Why? None of them are going to remember in the morning anyway. I’ve had my fun, this has been cathartic, but I can’t have them ruining my plans. So run along now sister, tell Mother that her precious task is being completed, I’m just taking the scenic route.” 

She shakes her head in defeat, staring at the floor. She lifts her head, opening her mouth to make one last attempt, but she closes it, realising that there’s nothing she could possibly say to persuade him to suddenly have mercy, mercy that no one had ever shown him. She gulps, letting out a deep breath before shaking her head again and turning around, walking back into the trees, the way she came.

The God looks back to his puppets, shivering in time with their knotted strings, smirking once more before he clicks his fingers and everything goes dark.

~

Arthur wakes the next morning feeling oddly refreshed and surprisingly unannoyed at his idiot manservant’s lateness. He rolls his eyes at the bright sunshine glaring through his curtains, the sun certainly a lot higher in the sky than it should be at the time The King wakes, but oh well. Merlin has been chipper lately, and the warmth that Arthur feels in his chest at the younger man’s happiness makes him more likely to forgive him his tardiness.

As if thinking of him had summoned him (wishful thinking on Arthur’s part), Merlin bursts through the doors, not bothering to knock as per usual, a breakfast-laden tray in his arms and a cheeky grin on his face. Arthur rolls his eyes again, chucking a pillow at Merlin half-heartedly as he grumbles, also half-heartedly:

“You’re late.”

Merlin chuckles, setting the tray down on the table before jogging endearingly over to Arthur’s bedside, grabbing his hand and pulling him to stand upright:

“Something tells me you don’t mind all that much, Your Pratness.”

Arthur huffs, but only to stop himself from smiling, and resolutely ignores the way Merlin’s hand is still in his. The servant squeezes his palm softly, and Arthur gulps, pulling away and walking towards his meal, hoping the food would squash the butterflies in his stomach.

He rubs the sleep from his eyes, smiling to himself softly at a whole range of things: the good night’s rest he’d had, the bright sunshine, Merlin’s good mood, the sensation of Merlin’s hand in his own, Merlin’s dazzling smile, Merlin, Merlin, Merlin...

Merlin stares at his back as he goes, noting with a dangerously satisfied smirk the red blush of his ears.

The scenic route indeed.

~

THE END!!

Oops I made myself sad. Sorry to say but I hope this makes you sad too.

This was SUPER fun to write and I’m so glad I decided to do two versions😅

Link to the Good!Merlin version (much MUCH fluffier, I promise) at the top!!

[golbrocklovely]

remember me // colby brock (pt 2)

A/N: as i mentioned before in a different post, this took me FOREVER to write. i loved writing this story but something about it just made me drag it out for so long. nonetheless, i love this and i'm excited to see what you all think. please lmk what you thought about this. thank you to everyone that has supported me and sent me kind messages. yall are the best ! hope you enjoy :) also lmk if you want another part...

prompt: she's the only one that remembers colby, or so they both thought.

trigger warning: ANGST, heartbreak, AU mention, friendship problems, cursing, happy-ish ending (but not the end...?), kissing

word count: 5526

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Colby was relieved that the waitress, the only one that remembered him, decided to help. The moment she agreed, Colby gave her his number and left. She texted him not too long after, and he realized for a moment she never said her name. He planned to ask her the next day when they decided to meet up at his place.

It was weird to come back to his apartment, knowing that down the hall his best friend, his brother, lived there and didn't know who he was. Usually when Colby felt lonely, he would walk down the hall to Sam's and hang out for a bit. It was always nice to talk to Sam about anything and everything.

But now... he couldn't do that.

Colby tried to sleep during the night, but barely any rest came from it. He tossed and turned, hoping that when he would wake up, this would all just be some weird-ass nightmare.

When his cell phone rang the next morning at 9:34 A.M., it was an unfamiliar ringtone. As he rubbed his eyes awake, he glanced at the caller, the name 'Waitress' appearing on his screen.

I guess this wasn’t a dream after all.

"Yeah?" Colby groaned, squinting his eyes at the sunlight.

Her voice came through cheery, the tone too loud in Colby’s ears. “Let me up to your apartment. I'm here.”

He cleared his throat. “This early?”

“I figured you would want your normal life back as soon as possible, yeah?” She sassed.

He rolled his eyes. “Alright, give me a second. I'll come down and get you.”

Colby stumbled out of bed, running his fingers through his hair as he threw on a random shirt and jeans, slowly trudging down to the lobby of his apartment. She sat on a couch, tapping her foot against the carpeted floors. Her eyes were staring out the door, almost like she was looking at someone. When she heard Colby’s footsteps, her gaze pulled away from outside.

“Did I wake you?” She frowned, grabbing her bag next to her and standing up.

He shook his head. “You can't really be woken up if you barely slept.”

“I'm sorry to hear that.” She lightly bit her lip, following Colby to the elevator.

He shrugged tiredly. “It's okay.”

They both slowly got into the elevator, climbing up to Colby's floor. The loud 'ding' of the elevator broke their silence moments later. They walked to Colby's apartment, and he unlocked his door quickly.

She whistled quietly. “Woah, nice place.”

A half smile spread across Colby’s face. “Thanks.”

“No offense, but how do you pay for this place if you're not a social media person?” She questioned, stepping into the kitchen.

He raised an eyebrow. “That's... a good question. From what my mom told me over the phone yesterday, I worked all throughout high school and college, so maybe it's from that?”

“You only worked at Dairy Queen while you were in high school. You must have gotten a better job in college because there is no way you can afford this place.” She disagreed.

Colby smirked. “How'd you know I worked at Dairy Queen?”

“Well, for starters, my friend told me. And also, I did some research about you. But I'll get to that in a second.” She continued, her voice falling to a serious tone, “So... would you like to hear my theories?”

“Theories?” He puzzled.

“As to why everyone forgot about you.” The waitress explained.

Colby sat down on his barstool, exhaling. “Let's hear it.”

“Okay. For argument sakes, you're gonna have to just go with me on this. Because otherwise, I literally have no way to help you.” She started, already pacing slightly.

He cautioned. “...okay?”

“So last night, I tried to think of a reason why everyone would collectively forget about you. And the only conclusion I could come up with is that you're in an alternative universe.” She hypothesized.

Colby’s eyes widened, bugging out of his head. “A what?”

“An alternative universe. Basically, everything is pretty much the same in your life, except a few minor details,” she revealed. “That’s why you still live in this apartment, but you didn’t get here the same way you did in your other life, your real life.”

“This... it's way too early for this.” He grumbled, astonished.

She sighed, her hands resting on her hips. “The only other option is that this is a very long-winded prank that your friends are still pulling on you. Have you tried talking to any of your other friends besides Sam?”

“No, everyone else’s number is gone in my phone, which I can only assume means they don’t know me either.” Colby retorted. Then he took a deep breath as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “But, this doesn't make sense. How did I end up here if this isn't my life?”

“I’m not sure how you got here, but I think you’re here for a specific reason. I think you’re here to right a wrong that this Colby Brock did. I’m just… not entirely sure what that wrong might be.” She answered, unsure.

He huffed. “Okay… what am I supposed to do then? Stay here and hope we figure that out soon? I don't even know who I am in this universe.”

“And that's where my research comes into play.” She pulled a laptop from her bag quickly, placing it down on the counter and opening it. She scrolled through her browsers until she came across Colby's Facebook, which surprisingly looked active for someone who hadn't been personally on it in years.

I use Facebook? Gross.

“First, I started by seeing if you and Sam were friends on here, but that didn’t amount to much since Sam doesn’t have a Facebook. However, what I found out is that you and Sam did live in the same town, go to the same high school, and played in the same marching band. Sam talked about his early years before he was ‘famous’ in one of the first videos he posted, and I crossed referenced that with your profile and it all matches up.” She informed.

“That's strange,” he mumbled. “What did we do after high school?”

She stated. “You went off to college and majored in Business Management with a minor in Philosophy. You graduated early too.”

Me? Graduating early? I couldn’t even get through math without Sam’s help.

“What did Sam do?” He asked.

The waitress scrolled to another tab, opening it to show a search of Sam. “Well, a very quick Google search shows that he actually went to the same college as you but dropped out once his Vine career started to pick up. Then he went on to Musical.ly when Vine died. He moved out to LA in 2017 and started a YouTube channel after he met Katrina, and slowly met all of his- your, friends that way. He got a bump of followers once he started dating Kat because of her following.”

Colby’s mouth gaped at her words. “That can't be true. He would have never wanted that. I mean, I had to convince him that we should be on social media so that we could spread our message. Plus, he hates those channels that use their relationship for views.”

“Not this version of Sam. Or at least, it doesn't seem like it.” She commented.

He covered his face, groaning into his hands. “What the hell am I here for? What wrong have I done in this universe?”

Her voice low, she replied. “I think it might have to do with Sam.”

“But... he doesn't know me.” He dissented, sitting up.

She nodded. “I thought so too. However, after scrolling through all of your public photos, I found this.”

Colby squinted at the screen, an old photo of him and Sam stared back. They looked super young, probably sophomores in high school. They were both smiling, laughing at something. He vaguely remembered this day.

“So, we did know each other.” He bit his lip softly.

She hummed. “Yeah. And weirdly, it’s the only photo of the two of you on your profile. But it’s not the only strange thing.”

Scrolling to a different tab, she pulled up an old tweet of Sam’s. It read ‘Never thought you would be the one to hurt me. But I guess everyone can be surprising.’

Colby noted the date. “That was back in high school.”

“Yeah, and there’s a bunch like them. He talks about being betrayed and someone hurting him deeply. He never mentions, of course. But his tweets line up with some that you were tweeting at the same time.” She confessed.

The waitress clicked on a different tab and another tweet showed up, one from Colby’s account. He gazed at it, reading the words ‘If you hate me… imagine how I feel about myself.’

Colby’s face dropped. “Wait, what?”

“You don’t tweet that often, but when you do, you talk about righting wrongs and fixing things you fucked up.” She added, “You also hate on yourself a lot.”

He doubted, crossing his arms. “You think they’re connected?”

“I do. I think in this universe you fucked up somehow and hurt Sam. And I think you are here now to fix what the other you did.” She explained.

He ranted. “This is all so fucked! When I saw him yesterday, he acted like he didn’t even know me. How am I supposed to even go about this? What, do I just go down the hall and apologize for something I don’t even remember doing?”

“No. Sam's not in his apartment anyway. I saw him leave while I was waiting for you.” She mentioned nonchalantly.

He grunted. “Great, he could be anywhere in LA right now.”

“I know exactly where he is.” She smirked.

“What? How?” He questioned.

The waitress divulged. “This version of Sam has a favorite restaurant he goes to all the time. A lot of his fans know about it, thus one look through any of his fan accounts and you'll see it. It's called ‘Paradise’.”

“Sounds like a strip club.” Colby deadpanned.

She pouted. “It's not. But he goes there all the time, and I got us a table there last minute.”

“What exactly are we gonna do when we get there?” He crossed his arms.

“I was planning on going up to his table and talking to him, maybe asking him about you, see how he reacts.” She described.

Colby furrowed his brow, confused. “And what about me?”

She slid her laptop into her bag, zipping it up hastily. “Well… I didn’t really think that far ahead. But hopefully, whatever you did is forgivable, and we can just fix it right there.”

He murmured. “That's a lot to hope for.”

“It's better than sitting here and wasting daylight.” She grabbed her stuff and headed for the door. Colby followed suit, grabbing his keys.

He spoke as he locked his door. “What if this doesn’t work?”

She turned back to him. “It will. It has to.”

~~~

Paradise was a themed restaurant, which Colby thought was strange because his Sam never really liked those types of restaurants. The theme was nice, however, tropical and Hawaiian. It felt like something he, Sam, and a few friends would have gone to after a fun, drunk night.

As Colby and the waitress were escorted to their table, they both kept an eye out for Sam, glancing around nervously for the blonde boy.

“I think the worst thing about this universe version of me is how messy my car is,” Colby joked. “It’s like I live out of it.”

She shrugged, smiling. “It wasn’t that bad.”

“You should see my real car. My honey wagon is spotless.” He expressed, waving his hand.

“Honey wagon?” She queried.

“Long story,” he chuckled. Then abruptly, he gasped. “Holy shit, I just realized I never got your name.”

She cocked her head. “What? I never told you?”

He blinked. “No.”

She started. “It's-”

“Hi, I'm Tony, I'll be your server for today. Can I get you something to drink to start you guys off?” Tony greeted, cutting her off.

“Yeah, sure. A water for me.” She blurted out.

Colby added. “Coke, please.”

Tony smiled. “Okay, coming right up.”

Once Tony left, the waitress started scoping out for Sam again, her eyes widening once she saw him.

Her body stiffened, turning back to Colby. “He's over there, three tables down to your left.”

Colby gazed over his shoulder at his friend. Sam looked lost in thought, staring at his phone as he ate his food.

“Why is he alone?” He muttered.

“From some of the blogs I read, he likes to go out and eat by himself. Also, apparently, him and Kat are on the rocks.” She admitted.

“They love each other so much, it's kinda gross to be around them sometimes,” He quipped, but shook his head. “So to hear that...”

“I'm gonna head over.” She announced quickly.

Before he could speak, she left the booth. Colby watched her walk over to Sam, listening closely to their conversation as he ducked his head down.

“Hey... sorry to bother you, but are you Sam Golbach?” She asked sweetly.

“Yeah I am. Did you want something?” Sam stared blankly at her.

“Um, yeah?” She almost scoffed at his tone. “I’m a huge fan and I know this might be a weird question, but do you know someone named Colby Brock?”

Sam’s face remained stoic, but his eyes intensified. “No, I've never heard of that name before.”

“Are you sure, because I'm pretty certain that you and him are best friends.” She insisted.

He raised an eyebrow. “What are you talking about?”

Colby watched nervously as she pulled out her phone and showed Sam the photo. Sam scrunched up his face, his eyes scanning the image. “Yeah, no. Still don’t know who he is. What was his name again?”

“Colby Brock.” She stated.

“...Sorry. I’ve never heard a name like that before.” He mumbled, almost inaudibly. “Sounds stupid anyway.”

She cocked her head. “Wait, what?”

Colby clenched his fist, unable to hear this conversation any longer. He needed to come face-to-face with Sam. He slid out of his seat, walking hastily over to Sam and the waitress. Sam’s eyes narrowed as he gaped at Colby.

“Sam…” Colby started.

Sam growled. “Are you fucking serious, Colby? Did you really have to get one of my fans involved?”

“What?” Colby puzzled.

Sam jumped out of his seat, grabbing Colby’s arm and pulling him out of the restaurant. The waitress followed behind them, confused just as much as Colby. Sam’s feet stopped behind the back door of the building, turning to Colby without warning.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Sam barked.

Colby stepped back, surprised by Sam’s anger. “...Uh, I don’t know what you mean by that.”

Sam scoffed. “Why the fuck are you here? After all this time?”

“So, you do remember me.” Colby remarked.

“Yeah, I do. When you showed up at my place yesterday, it took me a minute to realize it was you, since you decided to dress up like a Hot Topic employee, but yeah, I knew it was you. Are you really gonna pretend in front of her that we don’t know each other?” Sam teared his eyes away from Colby’s, staring at the waitress suddenly. “Let me guess, he hasn’t told you the whole story, right?”

“I guess not.” She shrugged uncomfortably.

Sam chuckled darkly. “Of course not. If he told the whole story, he would have to admit he was an asshole, and God knows he’s not gonna do that.”

“What are you talking about?” Colby panted.

“Do you not remember? Well, I’ll give you a refresher. You and I became friends freshman year of high school. You were my best friend and I was yours. I trusted you. I trusted you with a lot of shit that I’ve never told anyone. Senior year of high school, right before we were about to graduate, right as we were starting a social media career, suddenly you don’t want anything to do with me; which would have been bad enough, but then I go and find out you and my girlfriend were hooking up behind my back,” Sam snapped, catching his breath for a moment. “So yeah, I remember you, Colby.”

Colby’s mouth fell open, his breathing speeding up.

None of this sounds like me. I would never hurt Sam like that.

“And now, you have the fucking audacity to show up when everything in my life is going great and I’m succeeding. I have fans, friends, and a girlfriend that all love and care about me, and you’re here trying to what? Stir up drama? Get some clout from me?” He demanded.

“If your friends and girlfriend love you, why are you eating all alone?” The waitress jeered.

Sam glared at her, biting his tongue. “And you made one of my fans hate me. Dope, dude.”

“Sam, look; I’m sorry for what I did. But that was years ago. I’m not who I was back then.” Colby choked out.

“I don’t care. I don’t want you in my life. Do you not understand what you did to me?” Sam persisted.

“I know I was an asshole, and I apologize for ever hurting you like that. But I miss you, and I want to work things out. Let me prove to you that I’m better.” He trembled, getting closer to Sam.

Sam backed up, blocking Colby. “No. No! You don’t get to miss me. You don’t get to miss a relationship you fucked up. It took me years to trust again. Hell, I’m still going through it. You don’t get to decide whether or not you’re in my life. Not anymore.”

“Sam… please.” Colby whimpered.

“Don’t show up at my place again. Don’t talk to my fans about me. Don’t act like you care about me. Because I’m done,” Sam stared into Colby’s eyes before going back into the restaurant. “I don’t care about you. Fuck off forever and leave me alone.”

Sam’s words punched Colby hard, taking the breath out of him instantly. He caught himself against the wall, his legs turning to gelatin under his weight.

He stuttered. “I… gotta leave. I-I have to…”

“Colby, relax. It’s gonna be okay.” She grabbed his hand.

He shook off her embrace. “What? No it’s not! Did you not hear what he said? Why would he want to be friends with a piece of shit like me?!”

“You were eighteen when this all happened. Give yourself a break.” She argued.

“No. I’m fucking terrible. This version of me is terrible. Of course he doesn’t want to be friends with me! I don’t even want to be me.” His voice quivered with anger, his body racing away from her.

She furrowed her brows, trying to keep up with him. “Where are you going?”

“I just need to leave. I can’t be here right now!” He grunted, his pace picking up.

She called after him, but Colby didn’t care. His heart slammed against his chest over and over again. Tears weld up into his eyes, blurring his vision as he began to run. He wanted to keep running until his legs gave out, until he couldn’t remember all the words Sam had said to him.

It dawned to Colby how much worse this universe was.

He wasn’t just stuck in a universe where Sam didn’t know him.

He was stuck in a universe where Sam didn’t want to know him.

In a universe where Sam didn’t love him.

And he had no way of escaping.

Colby must have blacked out while he ran, somehow maintaining to stay upright, because once his thoughts started to subside, and his body basically gave out under him, he noticed he was in a part of LA he had never been before. Some random neighborhood that was unfamiliar.

He shoved his body up against a metal telephone pole, sliding down to the ground. He tried catching his breath, gulping back breaths as he forced down the nausea overwhelming his senses. He wiped his face with his sleeve, feeling more tears rush down his cheeks.

His throat and chest burned with each sharp inhale. He whimpered into his hands, covering his face from the slowly retreating sun.

He slid his phone out of his pocket once he caught his breath, calling the only number he knew.

“Hey honey. What’s up?” His mom’s voice rang back sweetly.

Colby’s voice was monotone, exhausted. “You know who Sam is, don’t you?”

The line went quiet for a moment, all Colby could hear was her light breath.

“You told me not to talk about him. After you two stopped being friends, you said you never wanted to hear his name again.” She exhaled deeply, “I was taken aback when you asked about him yesterday.”

“He’s out here… in LA.” He responded.

She gasped lightly. “Did you run into him?”

He laughed bitterly. “You could say that.”

“Oh, Colby. I’m so sorry.” His mother consoled.

“There’s nothing to be sorry about, mama. I just…” Colby trailed off, unable to explain.

“Why don’t you come home this weekend?” She offered. “I miss you, you know.”

“I would love to. But…” His chest heaved as hot tears drifted down his cheeks. “That’s not my home.”

“Nonsense. You will always have a home here.” She assured him, her voice almost trembling.

He wiped a fallen tear, a broken smile coming to his face. “That’s good to know. I love you.”

She hummed. “I love you too, baby. Call me again soon.”

“I will. Bye.” He uttered breathlessly.

The sky was getting darker and darker, and Colby remained against the phone pole. He didn’t know how much time had passed, but suddenly his phone vibrated, a new message from ‘Waitress’ asking where he was. He sent his location, and she arrived twenty minutes later in his car. He stood up, stumbling to his passenger door. His legs were weak from the sprinting he had just done. As he got in, the cool AC blasted the sweat and tears off his face.

They didn’t speak, a quiet radio station playing in the background the only sound. She drove through the hills of LA, eventually hitting a peak. She parked the car as it overlooked LA, the lights looking like stars on the horizon.

She got out a minute later, walking over to the hood and leaning against it. He could see something in her hand but didn’t recognize it. Colby sat in the car by himself, not able to physically move his body from how exhausted he felt. Eventually, he achingly stepped out of the car, sitting next to her on the hood.

“I’m fucked.” Colby breathed.

She started. “I don’t think-”

“Please don’t try to make me feel better. I know you mean well, but I am fucked,” he rebutted, his voice dark. “I’m stuck here, in this universe, where Sam hates me. And as if that weren’t bad enough, I did terrible things, things I know I would never do to him. How the fuck am I supposed to apologize for those mistakes? I wouldn’t take him back if the roles were reversed.”

“Read this.” The waitress stated, handing him a journal.

He glanced down at the leather-bound book, slightly faded from years of writing. He unclicked the lock and opened it, looking down at the pages. It was his, a journal full of writings he had done.

“Where did you get this?” He inquired.

“You were right about your car being messy. But you’d be surprised what you fine if you just look.” She teased.

Colby read over the words, the first entry catching his eye. It was dated a year after him and Sam had graduated high school.

Sam is succeeding without me. I knew he would. He was always so smart when it came to business decisions. He just hit 10k followers on Vine. That’s crazy!

“What the hell is this?” Colby questioned.

She answered quickly. “This whole journal was you keeping up with Sam without him knowing. This version of you always paid attention to what he was doing, even if you guys were no longer friends.”

“I’m obsessed with Sam? That’s great.” He deadpanned.

“You’re not obsessed with Sam. Read this entry.” She skipped a handful of pages, finally stopping on one and showing it to him.

I hate myself everyday for the hurt I caused Sam. I can’t believe what an idiot I was back when I was 18. We could have gone so far together… but I had to go and fuck it up.

He scowled. “Am I supposed to be sad for myself?”

“Keep reading.” She pushed.

The night I chose to never speak to Sam again, I knew I made the wrong decision. But I had to. Sam was ready to go on and do bigger and better things. I was just gonna hold him back. I was terrified of failing, not only myself, but him. He deserves success. That’s why I had to ignore him. I have never been as smart as him. I would have ruined our chances of doing something great. And I have been proven right by how far he has gone without me.

“You stopped being his friend because you were scared, not because you didn’t care anymore.” She repeated.

He slid off the car, scoffing. “So what if I was scared to fail? Sam didn’t deserve the hurt I caused just because of that. And what about me cheating with his girlfriend?”

She jumped off the car, striding up to Colby. She grabbed the journal from his hand. “You didn’t cheat, look.”

She pointed at the bottom of the page, his eyes following her finger.

“Me and Lexi were never together! I hate her for telling him that. One night, they had a really big fight and she came over to my house to ask what she should do. I told her to break up with him if she really didn’t care anymore. And then she tried to hit on me. I told her off and threatened to tell Sam, but she got to him first. She must have told him her and I were together.” The waitress read aloud.

“Wait, if I never hooked up with his girlfriend, why wouldn’t I tell him that?” Colby hissed.

“I think at that point, you wanted the friendship to be over, and I think this solidified it.” The waitress responded.

“All this time I could have been friends with Sam, but I ruined it because I was scared? What a fucking idiot.” He spat.

“You weren’t an idiot,” She interjected. “You just disliked yourself so much you didn’t think you deserved happiness. At least now you know that this version of you isn’t as terrible as you thought.”

“Even with that being the case, Sam’s never gonna accept my apology. Why should he?” Colby lamented, “I let him down the worst ways. I broke his trust and loyalty.”

She shook her head, stepping towards him. “Give him some time. You might be surprised."

Before Colby could speak, his phone rang. He took his phone out of his pocket and looked at the number. It looked familiar, but he couldn’t place it.

“Hello?” He answered.

“Did you really mean it when you said you were sorry?” Sam spoke, his tone hesitant, but dry.

His breath hitched at the sound of Sam’s voice. “Of course. I never meant to hurt you, Sam.”

Sam paused for a moment, before breathing out. “I’m giving you one more chance. Tomorrow. Come by my place. You apparently know where I live.”

“Yeah,” Colby laughed awkwardly. “I’ll come by. Thank you… Sam.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I’ll see you later.” Sam stated, hanging up.

Once the call ended, Colby’s eyes stared down at his phone widely. He almost couldn’t believe that happened.

He inhaled sharply. “Sam just called me. He wants to meet me tomorrow.”

“That’s great.” Her voice just above a whisper.

“He wants to hear me out… he wants to give me another chance.” His face dropped with confusion. “How did he get my number?”

It hit Colby like a brick as he gazed up at the waitress, who bit her lip hiding her smile. “You…?”

“You weren’t the first person I showed the journal to,” she explained. “When you ran off, I was gonna go after you. As I got in your car, I saw this journal sticking out from under your seat. I read through it and… I knew I had to show Sam. I went back in and talked to him for an hour, showing him how much you were actually sorry. How much you had beat yourself up over hurting him. And then I gave him your number. I wasn’t sure if he was gonna call but-”

“Oh my God, you’re amazing!” Colby ran up to her, grabbing her by the waist and spinning her around. She gripped his shoulders tightly as they spun, laughing loudly into his ear. As her feet touched the ground, he stared into her eyes, his smile the brightest she had ever seen it. His hands glided up her body to her face, cupping her cheeks quickly. He smashed his lips against hers, his heart pounding as he did. Her hands lowered to his chest, her grasp on his shirt tightened as she felt herself lose her footing and back up into the car.

As they stumbled, he realized what he was doing, pulling away quickly. “Shit… I’m sorry. I-I shouldn’t have-”

“No, it’s okay,” She giggled. “I’m just… surprised.”

He exhaled, letting his arms fall away from her body. “Me too.”

They leaned against the car, keeping a slight distance from each other. A light blush rested on both their faces; however, it was hard to see with the setting sun, something they were both grateful for.

The waitress sighed, breaking the moment of silence. “I think I know why this happened. Why I was the only one who remembered you…”

He raised an eyebrow, slightly side-eyeing her. “Really?”

“I lied to you when we first met. I wanted to seem a bit cooler than I am, but I don’t think I can hide that anymore.” She began, nervously.

Colby’s face relaxed a little, surprised at her words. “Okay.”

“My friend didn’t introduce me to you guys… I introduced her… to you.” She confessed.

A soft grin came to his face. “I had a feeling.”

She rolled her eyes. “No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did! I totally did,” he snickered. “Not every fan knows I worked at Dairy Queen. And… no average fan would have helped me get Sam back the way you did.”

“I think there’s a reason for all of this. I think in your universe, your life… you don’t know me.” Her voice dropped suddenly, making Colby turn to her.

“That’s true, I don’t.” He nodded.

Her eyes met his, a sad glint reflecting in the moonlight. “But I think the reason for that is because… you’re not supposed to.”

“What do you mean?” He replied, his face twisting in confusion.

“I think you and I are only supposed to have met here, in this universe. But not in yours.” She glared up at the sky, “Maybe in some weird way, I’m your guardian or guide or something.”

Colby’s thoughts raced. “So, what you’re saying is-“

“This might be the last time you’ll ever see me. You did what you had to do. You got Sam and you to talk again.” Her voice cracked as she held back tears, “You can go home.”

He grabbed her hands, holding them close to his body. “But… I don’t want to leave if it means I don’t know you.”

A hitched breath fell from her lips, a smile appearing from his words. “If we’re meant to be, we’ll see each other again.”

“That’s not fair.” He shook his head, a deep frown settling on his face.

“I know, but it’s how it has to be.” She whispered.

He rested his forehead against her, breathing deeply. “Can I… get one more kiss?”

She bit her lip softly. “I thought you’d never ask.”

They leaned in, his breath fanning across her lips for a split second before he pulled away.

“Wait…” He shuddered. “I never got your name.”

A soft smile came to her lips. “I’ll tell you after.”

His arms wrapped around her, pressing her body into his as their lips collided. He held onto her for dear life, terrified that the moment he pulled away, she would be gone.

He could feel things around him slow down, almost melting away, but he couldn’t tell if it was from the beauty of their kiss making him dizzy. A whirling silence overcame his senses. A burning sensation sliced through his abdomen; his breath ripped from his lungs.

A heavy darkness overtook his vision and for the briefest of moments, he felt absolutely nothing.

Except her lips.

<< |

[gh0st-patr0l]

ADHD in DSMP

So about a week back, I made a post about Karl Jacobs (a bit of a passive aggressive one, I’ll admit, but I think it was justified), complaining that a lot of the ‘criticism’ I see about Karl is actually rather insensitive towards his ADHD. I got a lot of responses to that post, and the most common sources of confusion I saw were:

People not understanding what I was saying they should avoid being judgmental of, or-

People who didn’t know that Karl had ADHD or didn’t understand which behaviors were caused by it.

First of all, Karl has confirmed that he has ADHD.

(NOTE: Yes, I know he said ADD. ADD and ADHD used to be categorized as separate disorders, but in the most recent edition of the DSM, it was decided that they are both simply subtypes of the same disorder- ADHD is the correct technical term. ADD is still sometimes used as shorthand by some practitioners to diagnose primarily-inattentive ADHD, but it's a bit outdated.)

Secondly, that original post made me realize that a lot of people who may be well-meaning may genuinely not fully understand ADHD and its symptoms as well as they want to or think they might. If you aren’t aware, Karl isn’t the only one in the DSMP with ADHD- to my understanding, both Technoblade and Dream have confirmed that they have it as well. So, I thought it would be helpful to put together a comprehensive crash-course on ADHD symptoms and how they effect people’s behavior!

Now, before we go further, I want to address something- as I said earlier, I saw some people unsure of whether certain behaviors are ADHD or “just his personality”. I feel the need to point this out above the read more so people will see it. To answer this question, as someone with ADHD;

A lot of times, it’s both. ADHD is a neurodevelopmental disorder, meaning that it’s caused by the way your brain developed from birth. A lot of the symptoms and effects of ADHD are extremely influential towards the way we think, act, and behave, to the point where “symptoms” and “normal behavior” really don’t have a clean differentiation. This is why it’s technically classified as a ‘disorder’, instead of an illness. While certain aspects of it can require treatment, the condition itself as a whole is not something to be mitigated or eliminated- it’s a part of who we are as a person. This is also why sometimes, even if you don’t have ADHD, you’ll look at certain specific behaviors or experiences and go “Oh, but I do that too!”. A lot of ADHD ‘symptoms’ are just a bunch of normal traits or behaviors, but in combination with each other and some actually problematic aspects, form the appearance of the disorder.

So, what are you allowed to nitpick about it? Well, there’s no real ‘authority’ on this, and even if there was it certainly wouldn’t be me. But if you want my opinion? Nothing.

See, here’s the thing- what I was trying to say when I made that post was not that you can’t be critical of Karl. If you want to say something about his Actions, his Ideals, or the content he creates- sure, go for it, that’s fair. I will agree that there are some very valid and constructive points to be made. But when you post ‘criticism’ about the way he speaks, his interests or preoccupations, his personal behaviors? That’s not criticism. That’s just judging someone.

And you’re allowed to think that stuff! Nobody can control what annoys or bothers them. It doesn’t necessarily make you a bad person. But you don’t need to be vocal about it. You can keep your mean thoughts to yourself. And if you do make posts or communities or whatever about judging someone for things they can’t change about themselves, don’t call it “criticism” or try to morally justify it. It’s not productive or righteous, it’s just rude. Nothing else.

Anyway. Back to Education!

The following will be a descriptive list of visible ADHD behaviors, using Karl’s behavior as examples.

I feel the need to add a disclaimer here- I am not a mental health professional. However! I have ADHD myself, I have taken some psychology courses and done a Lot of research into this stuff, and I’m the daughter of a therapist with access to a DSM. While I’m not an expert, I’d like to think I’m fairly well versed and knowledgeable on at least ADHD. (That being said, if by chance anyone who Is a professional sees this post and notices mistakes, by all means let me know and I’ll fix it!!)

WHAT IS ADHD?

You’re here for the behaviors more than the science, so I’ll keep this short and sweet. ADHD is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (Known in the past as Attention Deficit Disorder). Despite its name, the root problem of ADHD is not in the person’s ability to pay attention, but their brain’s capability to manage itself. In simple terms, people with ADHD have a lot less control over what their brain does and wants. This results in some behavioral differences along with some personal challenges, namely a difficulty with attentiveness and self-discipline.

Now, onto the symptoms!

ATTENTION

This is perhaps the most visible and pervasive of the ADHD symptoms, hence why it’s the namesake. Inattention is a lack of focus and an inability to stay present and occupied with certain tasks or thoughts.

Because ADHD impairs self-management of the brain, people with it have an extremely hard time directing themselves anywhere but where their brain instinctively wants to go. This results in inattentiveness and the easiness of distraction that is often mocked or stereotyped for people with ADHD.

Here are some examples of how Karl can sometimes display his inattentiveness;

When he has an idea that he seems passionate about, only to drop it or switch to something totally different without warning soon after (either forgetting or getting bored of his original idea).

When he sets out to do something like a build, works on it for a short amount of time, and then immediately gives up or gets someone else to do it.

When someone else is talking and he totally zones out. (NOTE: While I wont make a whole section for it because it’s not easily observable, maladaptive (constant and intrusive) daydreaming is a common ADHD symptom as well!)

It’s important to remember that the whole problem with ADHD is that we can’t control when or what we focus on. When someone with ADHD zones out during a conversation or activity, it doesn’t mean they’re doing it on purpose, and they likely don’t mean any offense! We often are trying our best to listen or participate, but our brain just wont cooperate.

However, inattention is not the only way ADHD effects our focus. There’s also what’s called hyperfocus or hyperfixation, which is when we are so absorbed into a single subject, task, or idea that it is extremely difficult to get us to think about or do anything else. This is usually because our brains have found something that is getting those satisfaction chemicals flowing, and it’s clinging to that with everything it’s got.

People with ADHD will often experience brief periods of hyperfocus. Think of how Karl talks about spending hours straight working on a build or project without eating or drinking, or how he’ll sit down to play a game with someone and end up going six hours without even noticing.

There are also hyperfixations, where someone with ADHD becomes extremely preoccupied with a certain subject, topic, etc. for a period of time. These can be short term- personally, my hyperfixation can sometimes change as quickly as a couple weeks at a time. However, it can also be long term. Karl has been obsessed with Survivor since the second grade- not to mention his memorabilia, rambling, and constant references to Kingdom Hearts.

HYPERACTIVITY/STIMMING

This is a BIG one for Karl. I should clarify; ‘stimming’ is not a technical term, and in professional situations these behaviors are just referred to as Hyperactivity. However, I personally like the term stimming much more and find it far more accurate to what the behaviors actually are, so I’ll be using that instead for this post.

If you’re not already familiar, ‘stimming’ (derived from ‘stimulation’) is an unofficial term used to describe consistent and abnormal patterns of physical and vocal behavior typically expressed by people with ADHD and ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder). This includes things that people usually call fidgets or tics.

(NOTE: There are differences in how people with those two disorders stim. This post will explain stimming specifically from an ADHD perspective! ASD stimming is caused by very different factors and presents itself in much different ways. Do your own research if you’re curious!) 

There are two major observable forms of stimming- physical and vocal. Karl expresses both VERY often! I’ll use examples for each type;

Physical Stims: Flapping his hands/arms, jumping up and down when he’s excited, twisting around into odd positions in his chair, throwing, hitting, or tapping things, standing up and pacing around when he’s hyped up or laughing, twisting his rings, etc.

Vocal Stims: When he gets excited and repeats a certain phrase incessantly (Think any variation of “I’m popping off”), making certain repetitive noises while he’s focused on something or bored (”la la la”, the meow-noises, the weird heart-beat noise, etc.), singing or humming, tongue clicking.

It should be noted here that it’s pretty common for people with ADHD to get “stuck” on certain phrases or noises, and be unable to stop repeating them (reminiscent of echolalia, a symptom of ASD, but not the same thing). Think of how Karl might sometimes keep making a weird noise for an extended period of time even though it’s not that funny, or that one time he was physically struggling to keep himself from singing the Bakugan theme. These repetitions are completely impulsive and trust me, we usually know how annoying it is while we’re doing it, but we physically cannot stop.

ADHD stims are caused by the fact that the barrier between our brain and body is much weaker than a normal person’s. Because of this, most ADHD stims are actually very positive expressions of joy, excitement, or enthusiasm! Y’know how when you get excited, you feel like you wanna jump or dance? The ‘hyperactivity’ of ADHD is basically just that, but we don’t have the self-control to Not do it.

Stims can be caused by negative feelings like overstimulation, but in ADHD this is not nearly as common. Usually, the most negative reason we’ll stim is when we’re bored- in that case, our brain isn’t getting the Constant Stimulation that it naturally wants, so stimming is a way to make our own.

Whatever the cause, stimming is natural and impulsive. While different people experience it to varying degrees, those who regularly stim typically have little to no control over it. Suppressing stims is very hard and very frustrating to do.

Besides that, like I said- ADHD stims are often an expression of joy, excitement, or enthusiasm. They’re a beautiful thing that shouldn’t be seen as shameful or annoying!

BEHAVIORAL DIFFICULTIES

ADHD is a disorder which causes a lack of self-control. Naturally, this means that people with ADHD are inherently reckless, impulsive, and struggle with a lack of self-discipline that they cannot fix.

Of course, people with ADHD do still have some level of self-control, and they are still responsible for conscious, long-term behavioral patterns and decisions. However, in regards to most things, they are much, much less capable of controlling themselves than an average neurotypical person is.

These are some examples of how this will often present itself in Karl;

Excessive rambling, dragging on a joke or conversation when it could and should probably have been dropped, etc.

Speaking over or interrupting other people (NOTE: As someone with ADHD- THIS IS ALMOST ALWAYS UNINTENTIONAL. I know it can seem rude or annoying but I promise, 90% of the time if someone with ADHD talks over you, they either didn’t realize or physically couldn’t help it. Please try to be patient!)

Lack of awareness towards social cues (NOTE: Unlike ASD, in which the person is incapable of/has problems fully understanding social cues, ADHD results in a lack of awareness. For whatever reason, we’re often just not paying close enough attention to pick up on things like body language, tone of speech, and facial expression as well as we would normally.)

Indecisiveness and overthinking

Bluntness, lack of subtlety

Unintentional dismissiveness, accidentally ignoring things/people (NOTE: Again, this behavior is purely accidental. In this case, it’s usually just the person genuinely not hearing or processing things.)

Making noises, speaking, joking, etc. at inappropriate times

There’s probably more, but I think you get the idea by now. A lot of the time, behavior which results from ADHD can be seen as rude, lazy, dismissive, or otherwise intentionally harmful. In reality, we just aren’t wired to navigate common social interaction with grace.

In Karl’s case, he’s clearly an incredibly sweet, empathetic, and kind-hearted person, if the various close friends who have talked about him are to be believed. Just because he talks over people or makes a poorly timed joke, that doesn’t mean he meant any harm. 

I think that’s about it for how much I wanted to point out! You can do more research if you’re curious, but I feel like this post should be enough to tell you what to keep in mind and be understanding about when talking about/making judgements on Karl, and other people with ADHD.

[five-rivers]

Danger First

Chapter 2

Heya @pocketramblr. I have no self-control.

.

Izuku expected his anxiety to subside, one way or another, once the exam was over.

As always, the universe set out to prove him wrong.

Home was more or less okay. But, for some reason, minor household repair issues started to bother him so much he spent the rest of weekend working on them

Then there was school, which was even more hellish than usual, despite being exactly the same as it had been since the sludge incident. Izuku was way too aware of how much of a threat everyone there was to him, specifically. Especially the teachers.

His hypervigilante state did keep him from getting poked (smacked) quite so much by the teachers, or cornered by 'fellow' students quite as much as usual, but it also led him to hide in the library storage room. He'd never be able to look at the librarian the same way again. Not knowing she kept multiple copies of books by anti-quirkless hate groups on hand.

And all through the week, he got nothing but silence from All Might.

But the end of the week came, and with it a letter from UA, which told him-

.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN, FIRST PLACE?"

.

"I don't know, Nana, Banjo makes a good point."

"Don't take his side just because he was your predecessor. You all know a One for All holder would never resort to such devious- Yoichi, why are you making that face?"

"In an unjust world, bribery can be a tool for justice. I'm sure Eighth didn't have to, though."

"That's it, I'm not talking to any of you anymore."

.

"Anyway," said All Might, wiping blood from his mouth and glancing nervously at the other beachgoers. "Congratulations, young Midoriya."

Izuku felt his lip wobble. "You're not mad that I couldn't use One for All?"

"Not at all! Actually, in some ways this might be better. We'll have some time to experiment privately. And if you're in school when it finally turns on... well, we'll just say you're a late bloomer, alright?"

"Okay," sniffed Izuku, rubbing his eyes. "I just... I couldn't use it. What if-"

"Hey, hey, it's alright, my boy. No need to cry. You passed the entrance exam without using a quirk at all! You should be proud. Even with a quirk, it's an incredible accomplishment. Also, just so you know, I had nothing to do with the selection process. Just in case you were worried about favoritism."

Izuku sniffed and nodded.

.

"What a strangely specific denial."

"Uh, Banjo, usually I'd be reveling in the chaos, but I think Nana is seriously considering ghost murder right now. Maybe you shouldn't insult her kid anymore?"

"You and Hikage would protect me, right?"

"Don't take this the wrong way, but I'd sell you to Satan for one corn chip."

"So would I; it's been way too long since I've eaten. As long as it is Satan and not All for One, you've got my blessing."

.

"You certainly proved this old man wrong."

"You aren't old," protested Izuku.

"We'll have to agree to disagree on that," said All Might. "Here, sit down with me," he said, settling on the sand.

Izuku hurried to follow suit, and for a while, they both just watched the ocean. It was nice, today.

"I owe you an apology, young Midoriya."

"H-huh?"

"For what I said on that roof," said All Might, "and for what I... implied later."

"You already apologized for the roof, though?" said Izuku, confused. "I mean, that day..."

"That's what I'm talking about," said All Might. "I shouldn't have- The way I apologized, when I offered you One for All... It was like saying that you couldn't do it without a quirk, that you needed a quirk to 'fix' yourself and... well, obviously I was wrong. Quirk or not, you're going to be an amazing hero."

.

"Oh," said Banjo, "I can already tell this is going to be a problem once he finds out about Danger Sense. Gonna blow a hole right through his confidence."

"Maybe he won't find out?" suggested Nana, who'd wrestled her murderous impulses into submission. Temporarily. "Danger Sense is pretty low key."

"I feel like I should be offended..." said Hikage. "But if I got offended, that would be offensive to people who don't have quirks..."

"I don't know," said En. "If someone insulted your legs by saying they were so skinny it was like they weren't even there, would you being offended be offensive to people who don't have legs? Or would the original statement be the offensive one?"

"Somehow, I feel more offended after that."

.

"Oh," said Izuku. He felt himself crying again. "Are you, um. You're not going to- Are you- Do you want it back?" he whispered. "One for All?"

"No, no, of course not. You... There's no one I'd rather have it. I'm just... even if you didn't, you could be a hero. But I'm hoping... I'm hoping you'll keep it."

Izuku swallowed and nodded. All Might awkwardly raised his arm.

"Do you mind if I...?"

"Sure?" said Izuku, not entirely sure what he was asking.

All Might put his arm around Izuku and gave him a sort of sideways hug. Izuku leaned into it. It was the safest he'd felt since the entrance exam.

Because, surprise, surprise, that anxiety hadn't gone away.

"What did you say?"

"Oh! Uh... it isn't important, it's nothing."

"It didn't sound like nothing," said All Might, concerned.

"I, well, I, ever since the entrance exam... maybe even a little bit before? I've been really... jumpy? About everything. I think it's just because I'm a wreck, but..."

"Huh. Well, you know, that could be a facet of One for All."

"R-really?"

"After I got One for All, it seemed like it was easier for me to tell when people were in danger and needed help," said All Might. "S- A friend who knew about One for All used to joke it was my original quirk. But it was subtle and intermittent, not constant."

"Huh," said Izuku. "So... it might have been One for All all along? Trying to get me to help people?" He picked at his lower lip. "Maybe... I noticed a bunch of stuff I usually don't... I'm not sure I would have seen all the people in trouble during the exam."

.

"So much for not noticing-"

"His confidence... let him have it for at least a little while..."

"He seems to be taking it alright," said Yoichi, hopefully.

.

"I'm sure you would have helped them if you did notice, regardless," said All Might, "and that's what was really being measured, so my earlier point still stands."

Izuku nodded. "It would be really strange for a quirk to have two completely different applications like that."

"Yes, but One for All is a rather strange quirk, and I've seen odder split quirks." He fell silent for a moment. "I can't think of a way to test for it, though. Speaking of which, we should find some time to try and work on One for All before the school year starts. How do you feel about coming to UA after school?"

.

"Th-thank you for helping us with this, Recovery Girl!"

"It's no trouble, dear," said Recovery Girl. "I'd be here at this time, anyway. You wouldn't believe the amount of paperwork I have to go through. Just try not to break too many bones."

Izuku nodded vigorously, still somewhat in awe of being in the presence of not one but two incredible pro heroes. And at UA.

It was like living in a dream.

Except for the highly suspicious mostly-hidden wall panels and the very intense feeling of being watched through camera by an incredibly threatening being. It was fine.

"Alright, young Midoriya! Are you ready?"

"Y-yeah!"

"Then come at me, you zygote!"

.

Nana stared at her (former) student in despair. "Toshi... why... out of all the people..."

"So, you admit he can make bad decisions-"

"Bad and immoral are two different things."

"I think calling people zygotes is pretty immoral, actually..."

Silently, Nana agreed.

.

Izuku blinked at All Might- not because of the zygote thing!

... Okay, partially because of the zygote thing.

But mostly because he was still in his skinny, prone-to-coughing-up-blood form.

"Are you sure?" Izuku asked. "What if I..." he trailed off, blushing. What he was about to say sounded so stupid, and more than a little conceited, but...

"Hey, even like this, I'm much tougher than I look, young Midori- Ahem, I mean, zygote!"

"Toshinori, don't you think role-playing as Gran Torino is a little much?" asked Recovery Girl.

"Ah, do you think so?"

Recovery Girl shot All Might a truly terrifying look, but Izuku's mind was on something completely different.

"Is- is Toshinori your name?" he asked, awed.

Blood drained out of All Might's face, making him look more skeletal than usual. Should Izuku not have asked? Was it supposed to be secret? Oh no...

"Please tell me you haven't been training this boy for most of a year without him even knowing your name."

"Oops?" said All Might, faintly.

.

"He did do that, didn't he?" asked Yoichi, his eyebrows almost touching his hairline. "Nana, your boy is a disaster."

"All of us were disasters. We're still disasters."

"I'm not."

"Hikage, you spent most of your adult life living in the woods, completely isolated from humanity."

"I know, it was great."

"Unbelievable."

.

"Back to what we were talking about before," said Mr. Yagi (Mr. Yagi! Izuku knew All Might's name! And had permission to use it!) after Recovery Girl was done scolding him. "Focus on actually hitting me before worrying about accidentally hurting me. Today, I just want to get a baseline. Next time, we can work on basic punches and throws."

"So, do I just-?"

"Yep, just come right at me!"

.

The next hour consisted mainly of Izuku being thrown bodily into various padded surfaces. Despits this, according to Mr. Yagi, he was much better at dodging than expected. As a bonus, although he certainly felt sore and bruised, he didn't break any bones.

He also didn't manage to activate One for All. Not even a little bit.

Nor did he on any of the other days leading up to his first day as a student at UA.

.

Aizawa Shouta, down two nights of sleep and dreading the new batch of bright eyed hero hopefuls he'd be teaching- and crushing the dreams of- next week, glared blearily at a computer screen. Currently, it displayed a student's name, a quirk name, and the single least helpful quirk description he'd ever seen. Which was saying something, because he'd seen Hizashi's original quirk description.

Midoriya Izuku

Quirk: undetermined

Description: None.

I am either too tired or too sober to deal with this, decided Shouta. However, sleep simply wasn't on the table, and getting drunk was illogical. In that case, simply not dealing with it was the only option.

Nevertheless, he picked up his phone and called Nezu.

"Good evening, Aizawa!" said the internally chipper maybe-rodent. "Or should I say good morning?"

"Midoriya Izuku."

"Ah, you're browsing your class list, I see. Any thoughts about their potential?"

"Illogical." It would be, to make a call about a student's potential without meeting them first.

"Quite so!"

"Midoriya. Quirk," grunted Shouta, reminding him why he was calling.

"Ah, yes, he is a strange case. He's listed as quirkless in the registry."

That woke Shouta up, just a little. He'd seen a handful of documents for the quirkless over the years. If Midoriya was quirkless, his file should read N/A, not undetermined.

"What?"

"I have reason to believe that he might have been diagnosed in error," said Nezu. "I am still investigating. In the meantime, I would appreciate it if you kept an eye on him. Assuming, of course, that he isn't expelled!"

Shouta grunted and hung up. He minimized the window on his computer and pawed through his files until he found the entrance exam video for Midoriya.

A kid who passed the UA hero course practical entrance exam either entirely quirkless or with a subtle, stubborn, or invisible quirk on rescue points alone. A kid who seemed to run straight for danger on purpose (mostly on purpose, Shouta amended after seeing him collide with the invisible girl, coincidentally pushing her out of the way of some sort of water pressure quirk. There was just no way he could have known she was there). A kid who had almost certainly faced brutal quirk harassment since the time he was four and most likely possessed the self-confidence and trauma to match.

"Least he's good at dodging..." muttered Shouta. He rubbed at one grainy-feeling eye and pulled his sleeping bag closer around his shoulders. Kid wasn't all that bad at falling, either. Some light martial arts instruction, maybe?

He paused the video and reopened Midoriya's file, flipping to school and admission records and exam results. He usually didn't look closely at this part of the file, it was enough for him that the students passed, but, exceptions...

Speaking of exceptions, Midoriya's file was a mass of contradictions. Unusually high written test score that didn't correspond with middle school grades. Dozens of citations and black marks on his disciplinary record that should have kept him from even being invited to take the exam, but a letter of recommendation from All Might.

He frowned at the last one. There was no way...

He shook his head, and clicked on the link at the bottom of the file. It brought him to a herotube video about a year old. A hostage situation with a vaguely familiar middle schooler and slime-like villain. Also, a bunch of heroes, but none of them seemed to be addressing the suffocating child. Shouta felt his lips curl. Even if this was in the past...

Then Midoriya Izuku ran into the frame and tried to pull the other boy free, just seconds before All Might arrived and punched the villain so hard it started to rain. Then the video ended.

Alright, then.

Shouta's admittedly currently-less-than-razor-sharp mind presented him with two possibilities. One, Midoriya was All Might's secret child and All Might had bribed Nezu into letting him take the exams despite his less-than-stellar records. Two, this child had, with bloody fingernails, managed to claw a single spark of luck out of an otherwise bleak existence by impressing All Might enough that he got Nezu to ignore the otherwise damning records.

If the first, well, he had still passed the practical without use of any obvious quirk. He probably had some potential.

If the second... Shouta had been a hero long enough to recognize the circumstances that drove people to desperate, and sometimes unforgivable, acts. Dangling a single hope in front of someone only to snatch it away at the last minute...

Forget the maybe-quirk. This was the real conundrum of Midoriya Izuku.

The rat knew he wouldn't expel Midoriya with these stakes. It would be the height of irrationality.

(Even if he did turn out to be All Might's kid.)

What a pain.

He flipped through a few more profiles, quickly reviewing 1-B as well, before hitting redial on his phone.

"Calling again so soon?" asked Nezu with a squeaky chuckle.

"I want Monoma." He paused. "In my class," he elaborated.

"Oh? Whatever for?"

"If I'm going to have to figure out Midoriya's mystery quirk, I want to make it as easy for myself as possible."

There was silence on the other end of the like, and Shouta checked to see whether or not he'd hung up accidentally. He hadn't.

"I must say," said Nezu, finally, "I had not considered that solution. Depending on the mechanics of Monoma's quirk... I cannot think of any reason to deny your request."

That was a strange way of phrasing it.

"We'll exchange him with Bakugo, in that case."

"Not that I'm complaining," said Shouta, "but why him? Why not..." He racked his memory. "Mineta. He's got one of those body part quirks Kan likes."

Nezu chuckled again. "Normally, I would pick Mineta, but, by my calculations, a classroom that contained both Monoma and Bakugo would be demolished within thirty minutes of their arrival."

Shouta groaned. Why did they even let people like that in?

No, wait, he had an answer to that, actually.

"Forget a mouse, a dog, or a bear," said Shouta. "You're a sadist."

"Some certainly think so! But one thing's for sure! I'm the principal!"

.

The door to class 1-A sure was big... and intimidating... and radiating a faint sense of malaise. But, then, Izuku's middle school classroom had done far worse, so...

He opened the door. No Kacchan. Thank goodness. He must be in the class B, then, because there was no way he'd let Izuku beat him to school.

The strict boy from the entrance exam was there, though, and, oh, dear, he'd noticed Izuku and was coming right for him.

(Oh, gosh, and the invisible girl was here, too. He felt himself blushing furiously.)

Still better than Kacchan.

"Hello!" he said, rather loudly. "I'm from Somei Private Academy! My name is Iida Tenya!"

"Oh, uh, I- I'm from Aldera Middle School..." said Izuku. Was stating the name of your middle school a normal thing? He hadn't read about this in any manga... "I'm Midoriya Izuku."

"Pleased to meet you!" He moved his arm in a rather robotic fashion, taking a deep breath.

Oh, no, was he about to yell at Izuku again?

.

"Danger Sense isn't even going off right now, Izuku," said Yoichi, despairingly. "Why are you still so nervous?"

"Maybe we never really gave him Danger Sense after all, and it was his natural anxiety the whole time."

"Please stop denigrating my quirk."

.

"Midoriya... you... you perceived the true nature of the practical exam. Meanwhile, I was blind! I misjudged you! I hate to admit it, but you were the superior candidate."

Oh, that was nice, but... "I didn't perceive anything, though. I had no idea rescue points were a thing. I was mostly just trying not to die."

"Ah! That curly hair! It's Midoriya!"

"Oh! Um, Uraraka?" Please, please, let him have remembered her name right.

"Yeah!" said Uraraka, smiling brightly.

Augh! Too cute!

"I'm so glad you're in my class! I was so worried I wouldn't know anyone here."

"Y-yeah. T-this is Iida, by the way," said Izuku, trying to get attention off of himself.

"Nice to meet you, Iida."

"It's nice to meet you as well, Uraraka!"

"Yeah! So, we've got the entrance ceremony and guidance sessions today, right? I wonder who our teacher will be- They're all supposed to be pro heroes, right?"

"Um," started Izuku, "that-"

"If you're here to socialize, then get out."

.

"That's a teacher, huh," said Yoichi.

"Why are you saying that like you've never seen one before?" asked Banjo.

"I've seen teachers before," said Yoichi. "I've seen all of your teachers. The ones you've had while you had One for All."

"Okay, now you're saying that like you've never had teachers."

"Yeah, that is kind of strange, Yoichi," said Nana.

"I had professors," said Yoichi.

"Still weird."

"I went to college. And med school."

"Did you graduate?" asked En, interested.

"No."

"Why not?"

"My brother kidnapped me, kept me in a vault for a while, and then I died."

"I didn't know what I expected," said En, shaking his head.

"Wait, weren't there several years between the vault and the whole dying thing."

"Yeah, but I'm ignoring them."

"Because?" Banjo hooked his thumb over his shoulder at Second and Third.

"Yep," said Yoichi.

.

"Todoroki. You were the highest scorer on the Recommendation Exam. See how far you can throw this ball with your quirk. Stay in the circle. Anything else goes."

A boy with white and red hair stepped forward, scowling faintly. He took the ball and stared at it.

"Time is valuable, Todoroki."

And then there was a glacier.

Izuku felt his jaw drop. How was he supposed to compete with that?

.

"My name is Monoma," said a blonde boy, offering his hand.

Izuku stared at it a moment before remembering handshakes were a thing.

"Midoriya," he said.

Monoma then offered his hand to Uraraka and Iida as well. "I look forward to experiencing UA's superior brand of education with you," he said.

Izuku laughed nervously. "You're confident," he said, glancing at the track where two others students were doing sprints. It would be their turn soon.

"But of course!" Monoma struck a sort of pose, fingers splayed out on his chest. "I welcome this sort of challenge, this opportunity to prove myself! It just goes to show, UA only accepts the best of the best!"

Monoma was called away to the starting line a moment later. "Two good, one dud," he mumbled under his breath.

What did that mean?

Then Monoma was at the starting line, and he was using Iida's quirk. Did he have a copy quirk? That was so cool!

... Is that what he meant by good and dud? Did he... did he see that Izuku didn't have a quirk? Oh, no... What if he told everyone? Even if people were being nice to him now...

"What's wrong?" asked Uraraka.

"U-um," said Izuku. "Nothing?"

.

"Oh, gosh," said Yoichi, crying. "I just want to wrap him up in a warm blanket. You deserve friends."

"Yeah, kid, it'll be okay," said Banjo. "Bakugo's just a freak. And so was your whole school. Place gave me MLA flashbacks."

"Sure glad they aren't around anymore," agreed En.

.

All in all... Izuku didn't do terribly. Especially given that he didn't actually have a quirk, and this was a quirk assessment. At least, he didn't think he did. At least, he hadn't tripped or hurt himself.

It had, in fact, been a rather good day. No Kacchan. No bullies. The teacher had clear standards and requirements, and he stated them up front.

He had been getting... bad vibes... from the short, purple-haired kid, and he'd noticed other people frowning at him, especially the girls. But he hadn't been able to put his finger on why, even though he had been watching him carefully during his turns.

Other than that...

UA really was the best.

"By the way, no one's getting expelled. It was a logical ruse."

Monoma raised his hand.

"What is it?"

"I must object!" said Monoma.

"You... want someone to be expelled?"

"In fact, I insist! To allow this to continue would blemish the reputation of the school."

"Well said, Monoma!" exclaimed Iida. "Living up to the reputation of UA and all the alumni who have come before us is a duty of us students! But what blemish are you talking about? Surely, as Mr. Aizawa said, we all went plus ultra!"

"Maybe so, but my concern has more to do with moral standards!"

"If you kids keep going like this, I'm just going to go to sleep. You're giving me a headache."

Izuku caught movement out of the corner of his eye, and a wave of unease went through him. He turned to see-

"Hey! What are you doing?" he demanded, shocked and more than a little horrified.

Once again, he was mortally embarrassed on behalf of the invisible girl.

"I wasn't doing anything!" said the small purple boy.

"You were looking up her skirt!"

"It isn't like there's anything to see!"

The invisible girl gasped and quickly moved away. "Gross!" she said. "That's terrible!"

"See? See?" said Monoma, wildly. "This is what I'm talking about!"

"Next time," said Aizawa, "get to the point faster. Time is valuable. Mineta."

"What?"

"You're expelled."

"What? You can't do that!"

"Go complain to Nezu."

UA really was the best.

"Midoriya."

Okay, never mind. He was doomed. Completely doomed.

"Monoma. I want to talk to you after class. The rest of you are dismissed."

Midoriya stood nervously as Uraraka and Iida bid him goodbye. Was this it? Was Aizawa going to expel him after all? At least it wasn't in front of absolutely everyone... But what was Monoma doing here?

Speaking of which, Monoma looked nervous, too... Was he okay? Surely, Aizawa wasn't going to expel him, too.

"Is this about me using other people's quirks?" demanded Monoma. "Because you said anything goes! I wasn't cheating. You can't expel me!"

Oh. There was some trauma there. Izuku could tell. Did people make fun of him for his quirk?

"I'm not going to expel you," said Aizawa, looking up at them from where he laid in his sleeping bag in the grass. He almost looked like he was praying for patience. "I need to ask you some questions about your quirk. For future reference and to better serve your needs as a student. I know how tricky meta quirks can be."

"Oh," said Monoma, slightly deflating. Then he sent a curious glance at Midoriya. "Is he-?"

"His matter is slightly more sensitive. If you would like me to send him away while we talk, I can do that."

"No, no, it's fine." Monoma sniffed, his eyes suspiciously wet. "What's the question?"

"You copy quirks through DNA contact. Do you decide when to activate passive quirks you copy, or can you choose?"

"I can choose, as long as it's within my time limit."

"When you first make contact, can you tell what quirk a person has?"

Monoma shook his head. "No, sir, I have to activate it to do that, so I can get duds- oh, that is to say, quirks I can't use because I don't have the proper activation conditions, like Midoriya's. He's got some kind of stockpile. I can get duds without realizing it. But I can tell whether or not someone has a quirk."

"Were you able to test all your classmates' quirks today?"

"Not everyone, yet," said Monoma. "I usually try to avoid more extreme mutation quirks outside of controlled conditions."

Aizawa's head bobbed up and down minutely. "Great. That should be enough for now. You're dismissed."

"Yes, sir! I look forward to seeing your superior lesson plans tomorrow!" He paused. "Midoriya."

"H-have a good day, Monoma."

Monoma had felt One for All! What a relief. Izuku had been half worried he'd lost it somehow.

But why did Aizawa want him?

"Um, sir?" he asked. Sort of asked. 'Sir' alone wasn't a question, even if it was said in an inquisitive tone.

Aizawa's eyes turned red, and his hair started floating. Izuku felt... Huh. Calmer, somehow? He was no longer vaguely aware of how the light post over there could fall on him, or any of the other many minor dangers surround him and oh, gosh, he was no longer aware of the dangers! How was he supposed to stay safe like this, when he felt like he'd been blindfolded?

Aizawa blinked. Everything came back.

"Wow," said Izuku. "That was so cool! Was that your quirk? Is it an emotional quirk? It made me feel calmer at first, but then I was, I don't know, too calm, and it made me anxious, but then-"

"Problem child," said Aizawa, and Izuku froze at the reprimand. "What I just did was erase your quirk."

Erase?

His quirk?

"Oh my gosh! You're Eraserhead! I'm a huge fan!"

Aizawa closed his eyes. Was he counting? No? Did he fall asleep?

"You do know you're listed as quirkless, right?"

"Yes?"

"But you just had a reaction to my quirk that a quirkless person definitely should not have."

"O-oh?"

"Combined with Monoma's ability to sense your quirk, I'd say you are not, in fact, quirkless."

"But I have the toe joint?" Izuku wasn't sure why he'd said that. He shouldn't be arguing against this, because, as Aizawa had said, he did have a quirk. It just wasn't exactly his.

"Yeah, that's an old wives' tale."

"Really?"

"As real as my quirk counselor license. Whoever diagnosed you was a quack."

"O-oh."

"My initial impression from your entrance exam video is that you might have a sensory quirk of some kind. On the other hand, we should take Monoma's assessment into account, and consider stockpiles. Either way, I would like to schedule some time to test things out with you."

"You- You'd do that? For me? I mean, I don't want to be a bother-"

"This is literally my job."

"It... yeah, I guess so." His previous teachers would have considered it a bother. Except Mr. Yagi, but Mr. Yagi wasn't really a teacher. He was more of a... a mentor.

(Or a dad.)

(Oh, no, he did not just think that. Bad. Bad brain. Bad brain that read too much All Might RPF as a pre-teen.)

"Besides, even if your quirk doesn't have many applications in hero work, it will be useful for you to know what it is and how it affects you." Aizawa yawned. "Also, don't tell your class that I'm Eraserhead."

"O-okay," said Izuku. "Of course, sir, but... why?"

"I have two full time jobs. I get my entertainment where I can. You can go now. We'll schedule tomorrow."

Izuku nodded, and Aizawa just... zipped his sleeping bag the rest of the way closed and rolled over.

Was... was he just going to go to sleep here? In the middle of the field.

"Um? Mr. Aizawa?"

A grunt came from the sleeping bag.

"This is... isn't this kind of a dangerous place to sleep?"

"Go home, problem child."

"... okay."