#will patton's voice fits it PERFECTLY and he really pulls off all the different characters

[tiktaaliker]

fuck man i used to be soooo anti audiobook but holy shit sometimes the audiobook is in fact better. its reallly touch and go sometimes but occasionally the reader just fucking NAILS it and i cant think of the story without thinking about the narration

[northlight14]

Breakup’s, birthdays and drag shows

Description: Roman and Janus broke up and now Roman can't celebrate his birthday with him. Now it's Virgil's job as his best friend to cheer him up.

TW: breakup mention, crying, cursing, Janus isn't intended to be unsympathetic but since Virgil doesn't like him it might come across that way, alcohol mention, brief violence mention, let me know if I need to add anything else

Ships: platonic prinxiety, past roceit

Genre: hurt/comfort

Prompt: alt prompt 4, drag (prompt by @pridewrite2021)

Virgil was browsing the card isle looking for a birthday card for Roman when his phone started to buzz. He pulled it out to see it was Remus calling him.

"Ugh, what is it Remus?" Virgil said, already not interested in whatever Remus had gotten himself into.

"Hey Virgin! Can you come over?" Remus chirped.

"I'll be coming over later to drop off Roman's card. Why, what's up?"

"Well, you know how Roman and Janus broke up last week?" How could Virgil forget? Roman had spent the entire week being an absolute wreck and Patton and Logan had to hold Virgil back in order to stop him beating Janus up.

"Yes." Virgil gritted out through his teeth.

"Well, Roman just realized that he isn't gonna be able to celebrate with him and that this is gonna be his first birthday without him in 3 years and what not. So now he's crying in his room, lookin' like a hot mess. And since he's your best friend and all I was wondering if you could come and cheer him up or whatever."

"What! How the hell am I supposed to do that?!" Virgil yelled, before realizing he's still standing in the middle of the card isle, hiding his face which was now scarlet.

"I don't know man but you'll come up with something! You're like a brother to him, Virgie!"

"You actually are his brother, Rem!"

"Come on Virgil, please!" Remus pleaded through the phone. "I just...I really don't know what to do, here." He said, voice suddenly going quiet.

Virgil sighed. "Ok, I'll be ten minutes."

———

Virgil always forgot how big Roman's house was. The drive way alone seemed to go on for ages, outlined by large trees and red rose bushes. The pathway to the door was a red brick and clearly well taken care of. The house itself was a faded red brick with large windows and balconies. The front door was too tall and painted black, standing in the middle of two white pillars.

Looking at where Roman lived, it was easy to see why Virgil had disliked him at first. When they'd first met, Roman had a much bigger problem with his bratty rich kid attitude and with his life seemingly perfect from an outsiders point of view it was easy to see why they clashed. after all, Virgil had absent parents and had to work several jobs to help pay bills. But as he got to know Remus better it made it much easier to see through Roman as well. Mr and Mrs Prince were nice enough but they had a bad habit of pitting Roman and Remus against each other, both with academics and creative pursuits. It turned out Roman's arrogant attitude was a coping mechanism for his surprisingly low self esteem. It also turned out that Roman wasn't just "lazy" when it came to school work like Virgil had first thought, but he was actually struggling with ADHD. The more Virgil learned about Roman and the more Roman learned about Virgil, the closer they became until they began to see each other as brothers. Brothers that would make fun of each other relentlessly but brothers non the less.

Virgil knocked on the large door and waited for a response. Not too long after, Mrs Prince answered. She was a tall and slender woman with tanned skin. Her dark hair was tied perfectly in a bun. She wore a black dress with a red shall, both of which looked as expensive as Virgil's car.

"Oh, hello Virgil. I assume you're here for Roman? Remus said you were coming." She said.

"Uh, yeah. Can I come in?"

"Of coarse, Roman should be in his room. He hasn't come out since this morning." She said, stepping aside to let Virgil in.

'Oh God.' Virgil thought to himself before heading upstairs and hoping he would finally be able to remember which room is Romans.

In the end Remus came out his room and pointed Virgil in the right direction but hey, no one else needed to know that.

Gently, Virgil knocked on Romans door and waited to be let in.

"Remus, I told you to go away!" Roman yelled from inside, his voice sounding muffled.

"Hey Roman, it's Virgil. Can I come in?"

There was a brief moments pause before Virgil heard a quiet voice he decided to interoperate as Roman inviting him in.

Virgil was very taken aback by the sight before him. The room, which was usually kept as neat as possible, was covered in tissues, chocolate wrappers and a mix of opened and unopened presents. Roman was sat on his bed, eyes puffy and hair messy.

"Um, hey, are you alright?" 'Fuck sake Virgil, obviously he isn't.' Roman sniffled, smiling despite himself. "Yeah, I just...I miss him, ya know?"

"Yeah." Virgil said, sitting beside him. "Oh, um, I got you this..." Virgil awkwardly passed him the card.

Roman smiled, accepting it. "Thanks."

"So...what do you want to do? For your birthday, I mean." Virgil said, trying and failing to hide his discomfort.

"I don't know..." Roman sighed, looking down at his hands. "I was just going to continue to watch Carmen Santiago. But I always watched that with Janus. It was our show, ya know? He'd always make a comment about how she's still stealing and I'd counter it with how she's stealing from thieves so surely that makes it ok! I don't know, it just...it feels wrong to watch it without him..." Roman laughed sadly. "Which sucks because the last episode left on a cliff hanger and I really wanna know what happens next." He laughed a little at his own expense.

Virgil couldn't help but smirk. "Well, why don't we go out somewhere?"

Roman looked down again. "I don't know..."

'Crap. What the heck am I supposed to do here?!'

Virgil looked around awkwardly. He then spied in the corner what looked like a new makeup pallet. Roman must have gotten it for his birthday. 'Bingo.'

"Hey, why don't we do each other's makeup?" Virgil offered.

Romans face immediately lit up. "Really?!" He said, excitedly.

"Yeah, why not?" Virgil said, scratching the back of his neck.

"Well last time I asked to do your makeup, you said you'd rather stab yourself in the eye with your eye liner."

"Yeah, well..." Virgil coughed. "Consider it my birthday present to you."

Roman immediately shot up and grabbed the eyeshadow pallet and several brushes. "I promise you won't regret this!" Yeah, Virgil was already regretting this but Roman seemed happy and that's all that mattered.

———

The brushes tickled Virgil's face as Roman layered the purple eye shadow. Virgil almost started to object as Roman began to apply silver jewels at the edges of the eye shadow, before stopping himself. Roman then finished the look by applying a purplish pink lipstick and brushing Virgil's bangs out of his face. He then handed Virgil a mirror. The look was very 80's glam, far from Virgil's usual style but he had to admit, it looked really good. The eyeshadow looked sharp, the upper lid being a lighter shade than the under eye and corners of the eyes.

"It looks great!" Virgil said, admiring it. Roman smiled proudly from the compliment. "Alright." Virgil said, taking the eye shadow pallet. "Your turn."

Roman laughed. "I appreciate the offer, rainy day real estate, but I don't really wanna look like I haven't slept in a hundred years." Roman teased.

"Says the guy who's went entire weeks not sleeping because he was binge watching a new show!" Virgil teased back.

"And I'll have you know I wear that like a badge of honor!"

"Besides," Virgil continued to laugh. "I know how to do other makeup looks."

"Ok..." Roman said. "But if I end up looking like a Tim Burton character, I will kill you with my bare hands." They both couldn't help but laugh.

Virgil decided to go for a similar style that Roman went for, layering different shades of red and mixing in some gold glitter. He also decided to draw a small crown on his right cheek, just below the eye. The look was then finished off with red lipstick to match.

He passed the mirror over to Roman who gasped in delight at his reflection. "It looks so good!" He exclaimed.

"Yeah? I'm glad you like it." Virgil smiled, pulling back on his purple patch hoodie after taking it off to give himself more mobility when applying the makeup.

"Wait, wait, wait!" Roman said, waving his arms in front of his face before jumping up and handing Virgil a black leather jacket that was hung on his chair as well as a pair of purple tinted heart glasses. "Put these on!" He exclaimed.

Virgil once again pulled off his hoodie, replacing it with the leather jacket. It fit him surprisingly well considering Roman was a fair bit taller and more muscular than him. He then put on the glasses and Roman eagerly pulled him off his bed and guided him to his full length mirror.

"Wow...I actually look really good." Virgil said.

"See! I told you!" Roman laughed.

Virgil examined the jacket. "I didn't think you'd own a jacket like this. Did you steal it from Remus or something?" Virgil asked.

Romans smile suddenly dropped. "It, uh, it was Janus'..."

Shit.

"Oh, um, sorry." Virgil said, honestly.

"It's ok." Roman sighed, sitting back on his bed. "I've been meaning to give it back. Especially since it still has his wallet in it. But that means I'll have to see him and I don't think I'm ready for that yet."

'He left his wallet in here?' Virgil put his hands in the pockets and sure enough, Roman was right. Virgil quickly started to feel all too powerful now knowing this.

"Hey, come on, let's go out somewhere. Show off your makeup." Virgil tried again.

"For someone who looks like they belong in a vampire novel, you're awfully eager to go outside." Roman laughed.

"Come on, I just think it'll do you some good to get out for a bit."

Roman averted Virgil's gaze. "I don't know..."

"Come on, man. Do you really want to let that jackass ruin your birthday?"

Roman sighed. "Ok, fine."

Virgil waited outside Romans room as he changed out his pajamas. When he came out, he was sporting a white shirt paired with a black jacket that had a red floral pattern. He was also wearing a pair of glasses, his in the shape of two fairy wings that matched the gold in his eye shadow perfectly.

As the two walked out the house, Roman called "Mom, weren't going out! I should be home soon!"

His mom sounded surprised by this but happy non the less. "Ok sweetie, be back soon!"

"So where are we going?" Roman asked as they walked out the house.

"How the hell should I know? I'm just winging it." Virgil laughed.

———

The two wandered through the town as the sun began to set, the reds and oranges bouncing off Romans glasses and the glitter perfectly. Virgil was all too aware of the judging looks they were being given but when he looked at Roman, he seemed happy. And right now that's all that mattered. Just keeping Romans mind off Janus.

Eventually, Virgil began to hear the sound of music and he subconsciously started to follow it, Roman tailing behind. As he wandered through the town he eventually found the source.

A bar putting on a drag show.

Roman was staring off into space, standing next to him. Virgil tapped his shoulder, pulling him back to reality. "Hey, I know what we're doing."

———

Romans face lit up once more when he saw the stage. It didn't seem like they missed too much, which was good. The drag queen that was stood on the stage currently was singing, her hair done big with makeup that shone and reflected the lights perfectly. Her dress black and covered in sequins and frills. The heels she wore didn't look comfortable in the slightest but she walked in them with ease.

The two sat at the bar. They were each 18 and 19, meaning they wouldn't be able to drink but given the circumstances, it was probably best if Roman didn't get drunk right now.

Instead, Virgil just ordered them some non alcoholic drinks and fries. Roman was about to hand him the money to pay but Virgil immediately declined. "My treat. It's your birthday after all." Virgil then remembered Janus' wallet still in his jacket pocket. 'I mean, if Janus is the reason we're here, it's only right he should be the one to pay for us, right?' Virgil couldn't help his smirk as he handed the money over.

The night continued and Roman and Virgil cheered loudly for each queen on stage, each one quite different from the last. Virgil watched as any sign of grief seemingly dissolved from Romans face.

The final queen for the night came on the stage and they both watched with joy as she performed.

"I know what you're doing, you know." Roman said, not taking his eyes off the stage. Virgil froze instantly, slowly daring to look at his friend. Roman once again had small tears in his eyes but he wore the most genuine smile Virgil hadn't seen on him in ages. "Thank you."

Virgil smiled at his friend. At his brother. "Of coarse."

-------

Authors note: I’ve been wanting to write something based on the glam looks Thomas posted for Roman and Virgil for a while now and I obviously wanted to write something for Romans birthday. So when I saw the prompt for today was ‘drag’ I immediately thought “well that’s convenient”. So happy birthday Roman! Anyway, hope y’all enjoyed. I’m still practicing my writing and hopefully I’m improving. 

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[sign-from-god-complex]

Self-Control

Summary: The sound of footsteps pad across the landing above and though Virgil has come all this way he’s suddenly struck with the feeling that he’s not ready. It’s been 15 years since they’ve seen each other—so much can change in 15 years; so much has changed in 15 years.

Though, maybe things haven’t changed quite as much as Virgil thinks.

(AKA, a past-punk moxiety AU)

Pairing: Moxiety!

Warnings: Mentions of alcohol, smoking, homophobia and nondescript injury. Vague allusions to past abuse (or at least mentions of terrible parental figures). Brief discussion of a parental figure having died.

AO3 Link

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

It isn’t at all the place Virgil imagined for him. The flower pots all sit in a row on the steps, red ivy climbing up the fence like spider webs and a garden hose curled up on a perfectly manicured front lawn. Everything about it is picturesque—almost to the point of insanity—and as a butterfly floats by and lands delicately on a ladder leaning onto the fence from the backyard, Virgil wonders what in the world could have changed Patton so drastically to have led to this.

There’s an image, in his head, of teenage rebellion—of 2 am milkshakes and stolen bicycles, of broken glass and laughter, so much laughter, as they took advantage of what time they had left to live. It doesn’t fit in with this pastel blue sky in this pastel blue neighbourhood full of pastel blue people but he knew that it wouldn’t. He knew things would be different.

Though, that doesn’t make it all that much easier to comprehend.

Vaguely, Virgil hears the sound of excited squeals coming from the yard and he ducks his head over the fence just a bit, catching sight of a young girl flying off of a trampoline at a hundred miles an hour—hair a mess and grin bright.

The kid must be Patton’s—it’s unmistakable, that dark skin and reckless look, like she’s ready to take the world on at any moment—and Virgil can’t help but remember the nights the two of them spent drinking and talking and vowing to never tie themselves down to anyone or anything. 

He supposes no one really does know what they want when they’re young.

It takes Virgil a while to gather up the courage to knock—he’s all too aware of his leather jacket and patches, his dyed hair and piercings. He couldn’t feel more out of place in this suburban neighbourhood and he hadn’t thought that around Patton he could ever feel out of place.

In the end, though, the choice is taken out of his hands. The young girl throws open the door, clearly looking to haul ass across the street to the park—the kind of place he and Pat would have smoked, once upon a time—but is stopped short as she notices Virgil standing in her way. There’s a moment where he’s afraid she’s going to scream or cry or something else he would have no clue how to deal with but instead, she just grins cheekily.

“Dad!” she yells, barely turning her head to face the soft white interior of the house, “There’s a man here for you!”

The sound of footsteps pad across the landing above and for a moment Virgil is so afraid that he’s gotten the wrong house or that Patton won’t want to see him and though he’s come all this way he’s struck with the feeling that he’s not ready. It’s been 15 years since they’ve seen each other; so much can change in 15 years.

“Riley, what do you mean? What ma-”

And then, there he is.

His face is void of any of the makeup he used to wear, his hair faded from turquoise to its natural black and left curly in a way he wouldn’t have been caught dead with once. And, over the top of a graphic t-shirt displaying some characters Virgil doesn’t recognise and unripped light-wash jeans, Patton had thrown a familiar blue flannel.

Virgil remembers that flannel, worn under heavy coats to help fight the evening windchill, tied around Patton’s waist as they scaled fences just to see if they could and left in a pile on the floor in his room as they finally escaped back to comfort and warmth. Honestly, he’s just surprised it still fits.

Patton does nothing but stare at him for a moment, his lips parted in shock and his eyes big and wide and god, looking at him now is like falling in love all over again.

“Virge?” he breathes, a melody of disbelief in his voice. Virgil can’t exactly blame him—it isn’t as if he’s someone Patton was expecting to see.

Virgil rubs over the fabric of his jacket, a nervous tick he’d had even back then. “Hey, uh… surprise?”

And in an instant, has Patton pitched forward right into his arms. Virgil catches him—of course, he catches him, he’ll always catch him—and Patton laughs, displaying some level of joy Virgil hadn’t known he’d needed to hear until now. He can feel Patton breathing against his neck as they hold each other and, distantly, the sound of light footsteps echoes away and up the stairs.

They pull apart, eventually, the separation like trying to peel a sticker off of a concrete wall—the easiest kind of graffiti to enact while still being tricky to remove. The distance Patton puts between them seems almost reluctant and Virgil wishes he had the courage to tell him to stay.

“What are you doing here?” Patton asks. It’s soft, like the white fuzzy carpet of his new home and Virgil realises suddenly he’d been so caught up in him that he’d forgotten that this him wasn’t the same.

Patton had always been soft but not soft like this. He’d been soft in redirected conversation and distractions, in Virgil’s favourite TV show on in the background and stolen chocolate bars in his pocket, guiding hands mimicking steady breathing. This Patton seems soft around the edges—worn down, almost—and Virgil feels those 15 years as more of a lifetime.

He doesn’t answer the question—truthfully because he’s not sure how, not sure where to start with the mess of events and near-misses and regrets that finally brought him here to Patton’s doorstep—and instead replies with one of his own. 

“My mom died. Did you know that?” It’s a stupid thing to ask, they hadn’t spoken to each other in 15 years, there was no way he could have known. Virgil asks it all the same though. “I have her money now. Didn’t write me out of the will even after everything we went through. Guess she didn’t want how much she hated me and my “lifestyle” to come out even after she’d kicked it.”

Patton just looks at him. There’s something sad in his eyes, maybe, something regretful or sympathetic, something holding years worth of apologies and love confessions in not so many words that every night they'd pretended they hadn’t said.

Maybe not, he isn’t sure. He’s never been very good with stuff like that. 

“You owe me a party,” Virgil continues impulsively. Patton grins and shakes his head and the urge to kiss him is so strong for a moment Virgil can’t breathe. “You promised me when she was dead and I didn’t have to worry about her anymore we’d have a party. With cheerio sausages and expensive liquor and-”

“Sparkling juice and bad karaoke,” Patton interrupts, “I remember.”

Nobody speaks. Patton doesn’t invite him in and Virgil doesn’t ask for fear of being turned away. 

He knows there’s an element of worship in the way he looks at Patton. It’s worship like the way farmers pray for rain in a drought, worship like how sailors are drawn to the rough turn of the sea and worship like teens relishing in the night when they’re bored and alone and angry, yearning for freedom that only comes in years they feel they don’t have left.

But now, dark eyes gazing at him and breath catching in his throat, Virgil thinks maybe he isn’t the only one who feels it.

“I have a kid now, you know?” Patton asks and Virgil knows instantly that question isn’t about the party but everything that comes after it—all of the hundreds of possibilities that stem from this decision that neither of them can quite voice out loud, “Single parent. I made a lot of bad choices in those 15 years—gave myself away to a few people who didn’t deserve it, maybe—but she’s… helped. I want to be better for her.”

Virgil nods. It’s a little hard to reconcile teenage Patton with this one but he tries anyway. He has to; he owes him that much.

(In truth, he owes him so, so much more than that but right now this is all he feels he can give.)

“Yeah, uh, Riley, right? Seems like a sweet kid, if not a bit mischievous.” Virgil smirks slightly, somewhere between teasing and nostalgic. “Kind of like you were.” 

At that, Patton grins and he laughs and it feels right—feels like early morning rainfall and crackling log fires, like the burning in your lungs as you run and the way your eyes slowly drift shut against your will when you’re up too late, like every ending and beginning in just a moment. 

He shakes his head again, almost affectionately chastising and there’s a stuttering of Virgil’s hand as he goes to reach out, to brush a strand of hair away from Patton’s face but stops himself halfway through.

Patton doesn’t seem to notice. Virgil once thought Patton never noticed—never saw the longing in his eyes and the flushed red of his cheeks as they sat side-by-side on a park bench in the middle of winter, running from the heat of harsh words and high expectations.

He wonders if maybe that was naive. 

“Well, I’ve gotta make sure to raise her right,” Patton jokes and his smile is amused—fond and familiar like the worn leather of Virgil’s jacket between his fingers, “If she’s not questioning authority and getting me called down to the office at least once a term then I’m doing something wrong.”

With that, there’s a flash—just a moment—of principal visits and angry rants, of cutting class to sit with the other in the silence of the school office and knowing, that outside of the two of them, there was no one else to come. And he thinks of Patton—this Patton, not his Patton—taking up the empty space of that office with kind reassurances and defensive words, protecting and protecting and protecting, fighting for Riley the way he had Virgil.

Parenthood suits Patton more than he’d first thought, perhaps.

“Ah, office visits.” Virgil nods sagely and can’t resist the quirk of his lips as Patton giggles. “A hallmark of a punk child. Next thing you know she’ll be dyeing her hair, running off to the park in the middle of the night to meet up with boys.”

It’s obviously a joke but still, Patton quietens, taking on a more contemplative look. It seems as if he’s remembering something and Virgil needs, all at once, to make sure he’s more to Patton than simply that expression on his face in the midst of just another day.

“Yeah,” Patton finally says, “Yeah, she was thinking purple actually.”

Virgil doesn’t reach up and drag a hand through his own purple hair but it’s a near thing. He hums—soft and low. “Good taste.”

A heavy silence rings in his ears—an echo of all the memories they share and all the memories they don’t, a collision of black and pastel blue on a canvas already painted with teenage angst and first love—and Virgil can't stand the way it feels like it may be too much to overcome. It isn't; he won't let it be.

He takes a step closer and Patton doesn’t move away, just lets Virgil crowd him against the doorframe till their chests are pressed together and each shuddering breath is a joint effort.

“I’d like to get to know her. If you’ll let me,” he murmurs and he’s so close that he can hear Patton’s heartbeat pick up as he slides a hand up to brush at the strands of hair against Virgil’s neck.

The air between them is tense and pulled tight—gazes tracing over freckles and foundation, their skin warm with each point of contact and the rushing of blood in Virgil’s ears drowning out the pounding of his heart. Each second that goes by without comment feels to Virgil like sinking into quicksand, like fingers losing their grip on the edge of a building and threatening to let him fall.

But, before he can draw away, throw up his walls and stumble his way through apologies like they’re nothing more than kids again, Patton tugs him forward and, softly, he brings their lips together.

The kiss is a teenage fantasy come true, the culmination of every moment—under streetlights or under blankets or under nothing more than the cover of night itself—where Virgil longed to reach out and tell Patton that he wanted to kiss him until the world faded away and all that he could focus on was the taste of cherry red lipstick and the joy and love pounding in his chest like a second heartbeat.

It's the comfort in late-night knocking, Patton taking Virgil in and patching him up and holding him as he cries because he has a mother that doesn’t love him and a father that’s always absent and a world that doesn’t care, muttered reassurances a quiet backdrop to his sobs.

It's the warmth in drinking their way through meagre retail paychecks, Patton’s soft touches like fire against his skin and the thread of restraint holding Virgil back from blurting out a love confession worn down to something as thin as a spiderweb and just as delicate.

It's the exhilaration in grocery store runs with no money and bags filled with spray paint cans, their gloved hands clasped tight as they race against the biting evening wind, giving in to the urge to let out a cry of victory that bounces off the empty alley walls.

So, yes, it’s the culmination of years of pining but it’s more than that too. It’s an apology, it’s acceptance and it’s an offer of a future, to stay here with them. 

“I think I’d like that,” Patton gasps as he pulls away and Virgil’s so enamoured even after all these years that he barely knows what to say, “For you to know her, I mean. She’d like you. She’s like you, or at least the way you used to be—always a bit loose with self-control.”

Virgil doesn’t tell Patton that all his self-control had been going towards keeping himself from telling him he loved him. He doesn’t think he’d know how.

Slowly, Virgil blinks and he nods and it’s all he can do to keep himself standing as Patton beams up at him with a smile reminiscent of stars colliding—bright and beautiful enough to take his breath away. And suddenly Virgil feels like maybe he can fit in here, that maybe he can fit in anywhere he needs to if Patton keeps looking at him like that.

He smiles back, smaller than the one he’d received but the way Patton’s eyes light up makes Virgil feel like maybe that doesn’t really matter. “Okay, yeah. I want that; I want to stay.”

“Okay,” Patton parrots and he’s barely holding back giggles, Virgil can tell. It’s okay though because he feels it too—that sense of happiness and disbelief that has almost no other way to present itself—and giving in feels more like an inevitability.

So, laughing and hands joined together, Patton pulls Virgil inside to the soft white of his suburban home. And he closes the door.

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

Taglist: @mutechild @super-magical-wizard @shadowsfromthesun @teadays @sandersships @camcam774 @autism-goblin @deadlyhuggles6 @romanthestarstruckqueer @whispers-stuff-in-your-ear @rainboots-are-for-snobs @welpweregonnadie @spirits-in-my-thoughts @hold-my-hat @goodandbadisallmadeupnonsense @stop-it-anxiety @figurative-falsehood @jadedfantasies231 @idosanderssidespromptssometimes @poisonedapples @sanders-screams @another-sandersidesblog @do-not-just-see-observe @mychemicalpanicattheemo @harleyquinnamiright @localtransgrape @fandomsofrandom @gattonero17 @airiervessel @ollyollyoxinfree @tired-and-probably-crying .

[oliviaischillin1204]

a stupid bet

Pairings: Romantic Prinxiety

Word Count: 2,139

Warnings: Character Thomas

this is kinda a weird one! it was originally gonna be part of my t2eb series for the “holding it in” prompt, but it very quickly got out of hand lmao. it’s not a trope/premise i normally play with, but i think i did an alright job!

This was all Roman’s stupid fault.

Well, Virgil begrudgingly reasoned, it was his own stupid fault, too. When Roman made the suggestion, he could have said no. He could have told him he wasn’t comfortable with it, or that it was too embarrassing, or he didn’t want to risk the others noticing. But if he was being honest… he was kind of excited to try it.

“If you need it to stop immediately, scratch your nose,” Roman repeated, strapping the belt-like device he’d created around Virgil’s waist.

“I know.” As soon as Roman pulled his hands away, Virgil pulled down his shirt and hoodie. The belt was snug, and it fit perfectly around Virgil’s waist, although it was also connected to a few padded squares that reached down to his belly and up to his ribs.

Roman stepped back, looking him up and down. “Completely undetectable.”

Virgil opened his mouth to respond, but suddenly felt the familiar pull in his spine that meant he was being summoned. From the way Roman jerked slightly, he felt it, too.

The two looked at each other, nervous smiles inexplicably rising on their faces.

“Are you sure about this?” Roman asked once more. Virgil exhaled slowly before nodding.

“Let’s do it.” And with that, the two sunk out to join the others in the living room.

Thankfully, Thomas’ current issue really had nothing to do with either of them: he was having another heart-versus-mind crisis, so all Roman and Virgil needed to do was occasionally offer input on Logan and Patton’s debate.

Virgil tried to pay attention, but the feeling of the belt rubbing against his skin kept pulling his focus away from the video they were recording. He watched Roman out of the corner of his eye, but the creative side seemed fully ingrossed in the conflict.

Virgil frowned a little. Had he forgotten about their game? Did he not want to do it anymore? He felt doubts starting to pile up in his head, until-

“Virgil? What do you think?”

His gaze snapped back to Thomas, who was looking at him expectantly.

“I-”

Virgil gasped, barely turning it into a cough at the last second. He felt something pulsing against his stomach- a light touch, like someone was merely rubbing the skin, but it was enough to distract him for just a beat too long.

“I think this whole argument is pointless anyway,” he finally spat out. The vague answer seemed to satisfy the others, as they continued their conversation. Virgil peeked back at Roman, who wasn’t looking at him. His gaze fell to Roman’s hand, which was shoved casually into his pants pocket.

His pocket. Where the remote that controlled the belt was located.

Virgil inhaled sharply. Okay. So they were really doing this.

As if on cue, the sensations on Virgil’s torso increased just slightly: there were now two sections of the belt gently buzzing against his skin, one on his tummy and one on his waistline.

Virgil shoved his hands into his pockets, hoping to hide the way he was clenching his fists. It felt… weird, really weird; he could tell Roman was experimenting with all of the different features, considering the way the sensations kept changing. It kinda felt like when Roman would dig his fingers into Virgil’s body, but there was also a slight vibrating feeling, like a less concentrated version of an electric toothbrush.

The feelings were distracting enough on their own, but the knowledge that Virgil couldn’t smile, laugh, squirm, or otherwise react without drawing the attention of the others (or worse, the audience) made them so much harder to ignore.

The conversation continued around and around, and Virgil couldn’t find any rhyme or reason in how Roman was controlling the tickles. One minute he’d be focused on the pads attached to his stomach, causing Virgil’s gut to suck in on reflex; the next minute he’d be struggling not to wiggle as wave after wave of tickles massaged his sides.

At one point Roman cut off all of the tickles abruptly, and Virgil could barely wonder why before they all came back on at once, ruthlessly tickling him all over his tummy, ribs, sides, and waist at the same time. It lasted for less than a second, but Virgil couldn’t stop the high pitched giggle that managed to escape. He flushed bright red, slamming a hand over his mouth, but no one seemed to think his reaction was strange.

Until he heard Logan complaining about Patton’s puns, and he saw Roman smirking at him triumphantly, and- oh. Roman had timed the sudden attack just in time for one of Patton’s dad jokes, knowing that no one would question it if Virgil laughed. Virgil didn’t know if he wanted to kiss him or kill him.

The game continued, and although Virgil was struggling to keep his face neutral and his breathing regular, he didn’t want to give his signal. Plus, Roman was kind enough to turn the belt off when Virgil was talking- ironically, this made him partcipate in the conversation more than he normally would, as he used the opportunities to catch his breath and rebuild his resolve.

Speaking of which, he felt like he needed a bit of a breather, actually. But there was a problem: Logan and Patton would not shut up. Virgil was only barely aware of what they were arguing about, but whatever it was had them both firing back and forth, speaking too quickly for him to get a word in edgewise.

Virgil bit back the whine that threatened to rise from his throat. His eyes darted to Roman, who was looking way too smug, in Virgil’s opinion. Virgil glowered back, which- uh oh. Judging from the way Roman raised an eyebrow at him, that might have been a mistake.

Virgil felt the belt tighten around his waist, the buzzing sending tingly tickles all over his torso. Virgil coughed again, this time a little too forcefully to pass off as natural, but he couldn’t waste any focus on the others’ reactions to his outburst, because these tickles were suddenly much more intense.

The pads on his stomach, ribs, and sides were all buzzing anew, and the feelings seemed to travel deeper into his core than before. The belt itself, now ever more fitted to his waist, was mercilessly attacking the hyper-sensitive stretch of skin. It took all of Virgil’s strength to not fall to the floor then and there.

By that point he’d completely lost track of the conversation. Logan said something, then Patton retorted- he’s pretty sure Roman added something to the conversation, but he found he couldn’t even look at anyone else, lest they see right through his crumbling exterior. He just hoped that whatever the argument had turned into, it would be over any minute now-

“Virge? You good?”

Oh, fuck. Thomas’ concerned voice broke through his giddy stupor, and suddenly everyone’s eyes were on him- including, he noted, Roman’s, who was perhaps watching him the closest of all.

Virgil pictured what he must look like to them: shoulders tense, face red, desperately trying to keep himself still as he sporadically twitched at random. He wanted to assure them that he was alright, but after just a few beats he realized… Roman wasn’t turning off the belt. Roman wasn’t stopping the tickles.

“Kiddo?” Patton’s voice was laced with paternal worry. “What’s wrong?”

Virgil just shook his head, hoping beyond hope they’d let it drop. He was inches away from losing it, in front of the other sides, in front of Thomas, in front of the camera. His stomach flipped as he imagined breaking down into helpless laughter, his completely embarrassing giggles being filmed for all of Thomas’ viewers to see.

“Virgil, are you alright?” Even Logan seemed close to distress at Virgil’s bizarre state. Virgil bit the inside of his cheeks, staring resolutedly at the floor. This was it, they were gonna make him talk and he wouldn’t be able to hide his laughter anymore, and they’d realize he’d been getting tickled for the entire video, and-

“Of course he’s not alright,” Roman interrupted. “You two know-it-alls have been driving him crazy with all this fighting. Right, Virgil?”

The tickles intensified further, all parts of his torso being assaulted with evil buzzing vibrations and rhythmic pulses all at once. Virgil nodded a little too desperately.

Thomas, Patton, and Logan all got similar regretful looks on their faces.

“Our sincerest apologies, Virgil,” Logan said gravely. Virgil dugs his nails into his palms to not burst out laughing.

Patton nodded. “I think we’re almost done here, kiddo, but will you be okay to stay?”

No, no, no, he could not stay out here another second, but he couldn’t just say that-

“If I may,” Roman interrupted again, “perhaps I could escort Virgil back to his room? We’re not really needed for this fight, and I don’t wanna leave him alone in this state.”

Patton awwed at the offer, Logan hummed in agreement, and Thomas nodded.

“Yeah, of course, guys,” he said, waving his hand. “You’re good to go.”

Virgil couldn’t duck out fast enough. He couldn’t even focus on where he ended up, which is probably why he found himself back in Roman’s room.

Immediately he fell to his hands and knees, bright screams of laughter escaping from his mouth. The belt had not once stopped tickling him, and now that he was away from the others he had no qualms over desperately clawing at the belt to get the tickles off of his skin.

Unfortunately for him, the belt could only come off at Roman’s command, leaving Virgil no choice but to flop to the floor, rolling into a fetal position as he let loose the giggles that had been building up for the past half hour.

“Rohoho!” he gasped, the rest of the word lost to his peals of laughter. Two feet appeared in his line of sight, and as he blearily looked up he saw Roman’s gleeful grin.

“Yes, Virgil?” Roman asked nonchalantly. “Do you need something?”

Virgil batted at his leg before uselessly wrapping his arm back around his stomach. “Plehehehehehease!”

Roman chuckled, squatting down so he could be closer to Virgil.

“Please, what?” he asked. Virgil couldn’t even respond; he just threw his head back as the tickles refused to deviate from his most sensitive spots.

“Please use this?” Virgil looked over to where Roman was now waving the remote control in the air. He reached out for it, but Roman easily pulled it out of his reach.

“I’m pretty sure the bet was that you could last an entire video, right, stormcloud?”

Virgil groaned as much as he could through his laughter. “Cahahahan’t!”

Roman laughed. “So you admit you lost?”

The words were hardly out of his mouth before Virgil nodded desperately. “Yehehehes!”

His laughter fell silent after that, leaving him writhing on the floor in ticklish agony. Finally he felt the sensations start to lessen, allowing him to gradually take in more and more oxygen; eventually all that was left were light giggles and the occasional snort as Roman eased the tickles down.

“Good?” he heard Roman ask, although Virgil was so far gone it took him a few moments before he could respond.

“Yeah,” he murmured, flushing a little as he heard his wrecked voice. “That was fucking crazy.”

Roman laughed softly. “I kept waiting for your signal, but when you didn’t use it I kinda... intervened.” He bowed his head. “Sorry, my love.”

Virgil was already shaking his head. “Don’t be. I knew I could’ve called it off, but...”

He cut himself off, blushing profusely before he mumbled, “I kinda liked... being at your mercy.”

A beat, then Roman chuckled darkly. “Oh, you did, did you?”

Virgil’s eyes widened, but he met Roman’s gaze and nodded.

Roman hummed in consideration, leaning back. Virgil realized with a start that he hadn’t removed the belt, and that he was now slowly turning the remote over in his hands.

“Well,” he pondered, “you did lose the bet, my dark prince. And I doubt anyone’s gooing to come looking for either of us for a while.”

He held up the remote control, his fingers hovering over the control panel.

“Would you like to take your punishment now?”

Virgil inhaled sharply, watching the remote control with trepidation. But despite the fact that he’d just nearly lose his mind to Roman’s newest tickle torture invention, he couldn’t deny the jolt in his stomach at the thought of another round with the belt.

So he rolled his eyes and rolled his shoulders, eyeing Roman with an unearned confidence.

“Let’s see what you got,” he replied flippantly, as cocky as ever.

Judging from Roman’s predatorial smile, he’d definitely be paying for his attitude. And he couldn’t wait.

[jwillowwolf]

Magic and Miracles - Chapter 5

Sanders Sides Big Bang fic, Chapter 5!

< Previous Chapter | Next Chapter >| Masterlist

Summary: “Our boss, uh, Frank?”

“Are you lying to me?”

“No! I’m just terrible with names.”

Warning/s: food mention, kidnapping.

Characters: Logan, Virgil, OCs, Roman, Remy, Remus, Patton, Janus.

Tag List: @theimprobabledreamersworld @remy-please-come-back

Read on AO3

5 | Pixie Problems

Logan noted that with each passing week, the group grew closer and became more like friends than classmates. Thanks to this, lessons became easier. Especially lessons where Remy had them working together towards a common goal. The teens of now perhaps looked like they had at the beginning of the school year, but it was almost like they’d become different people as time went on.

He had been anxious about having to fit in with a bunch of noble children, but it turned out that they were a lot more like him than he’d realised. Since the first outing to town, they had gone every Saturday to read Nigel Hawk’s adventures and other interesting books about adventurers.

This shared experience gave them something to talk about. They discussed what they liked or disliked about each adventurer, and what they would personally have done differently. As time passed, they became more and more familiar with each other until they could predict with nearly exact accuracy how they’d all react.

But, Logan also noted that there was an outlier to their group.

Virgil was a very guarded person. He metaphorically kept his distance from the others, and never shared much of anything of his personal life. It was almost like he was hiding his identity but didn’t want to lie about anything so he just kept the details to himself. Even as the group became closer and friendlier, Virgil remained stoic and secretive.

Logan wasn’t exactly bothered by this, he understood that sometimes people wanted to keep their private lives private. But for some reason, he just wanted to know more. Virgil was, in some ways, like magic: dark, mysterious, and figuratively driving Logan mad with curiosity.

Perhaps it was because Logan was a naturally curious person. Though, he found it odd that he wanted this particular knowledge since the only things he’d ever really wondered about before were stars, science, and magic. It seemed illogical to be this interested in a person. Virgil was just his classmate after all. And it wasn’t like he needed to know about him. Yet at the same time, he needed to know about him.

It was strange and confusing, so Logan decided that he might as well try getting to know what he could about him. After all, curiosity killed the cat but satisfaction brought it back. He was not a feline in any way, shape or form, but he was curious so why not?

He didn’t want to outright frightened Virgil with questions though, so he decided to simply observe. And while he didn’t learn a lot from this, he noticed a handful of subtle things. How he carried himself, confident but not arrogant. How he pulled at his hood when he felt nervous. His uncanny ability to guess what a person was going to say before they said it. And, though it might have been his imagination, the underlying echo in his voice when he was stressed.

He also noticed that Virgil would sometimes look his way if Logan was thinking of him. It was a bit odd but not exactly something to fret over. His dad said that you sneeze whenever someone’s talking about you, so maybe people also get a sort of sense when they’re being thought about? Logan never experienced such a sense personally, but he had other things to think about.

Such as today’s assignment. Remy finally trusts them enough again to go out gathering without supervision. And this time everyone’s agreed to stick together. Roman and Janus are walking in front of the group, sort of speed-walk racing each other to be the leader, though no one is sure where they’re leading them if anywhere. Remus and Willow have made a game out of touching every tree they pass by, with Patton trying to keep score for them. Which leaves Virgil and Logan silently walking beside each other at the back.

The smell of the surrounding trees feels refreshing after being mostly indoors learning for the past few days, and Virgil seems to be thriving here in the forest. Logan doesn’t know how to explain it, but he seems most at home walking here. The hood of his cape is down for once, and his face is tilted upwards to catch the warmth from the brief sunlight shining through the trees. His eyes are closed yet he walks with complete confidence in his steps. Almost as if he’s memorised the path ahead of him. Still, Logan finds himself watching the path in front of them both for any obstacles.

He suddenly stops, causing Logan to pause as well, and looks around with a critical eye.

“Is something wrong?”

“I thought I heard something,” Virgil explains, staring at the path behind them. “Probably just my imagination…”

Logan is about to respond when suddenly he feels pain in the back of his neck. In front of him, he can see Virgil’s eyes widen then struggle to stay open, like his own. Before he can even register falling down, his mind goes blank and he falls unconscious.

---

“Why are there two? You were told to get one. This one, not this one and that one.”

“Well, they were right beside each other when you pointed them out.”

“I very specifically pointed to this one.”

“They were right beside each other. If I took out one, the other would notice and then there’d be an entire group on my tail.”

“Why didn’t you wait until they were separated?”

“Ugh! I got the one we need, so can you just get off my back!”

Logan groaned and opened his eyes to locate the arguing voices. He had been sleeping so soundly before they decided to start bickering. Didn’t they understand that undisturbed rest was important?

His eyes adjusted to the dimly lit room and he noted that the voices were coming from two pixies with orange and pink wings respectively. He also realised that they were upside down. No, he was hanging upside down, by his feet, beside an unconscious Virgil.

It was then that his memories came flooding back and he realised that he and Virgil had just been kidnapped by pixies. Oh no, this really wasn’t good. Especially since he’d been gagged and therefore couldn’t use any magic to escape.

What did these pixies want with two teenagers anyway? From what Logan remembered, pixies were a relaxed neutral race, who mainly just protected areas where gates to the fae realm could be found. They were a sort of subspecies of the fae themselves, but Logan couldn’t remember how. Unless you stepped into/messed with their territories they left you alone.

He was sure that neither he nor Virgil had done such a thing, but he was also sure that pixies were extinct. They were said to have been wiped out decades ago during the revolution against the fae monarchy who had been oppressing the other races. Pixies had been eradicated and the fae had sealed themselves away in their hidden realm, wherever that was.

Logan’s mind was reeling with questions about what was going on right now, but Virgil moving beside brought his mind back to the present. Virgil had woken up and was looking around the room in a panic until his eyes landed on the pixies across the room. His eyes change from the usual stormy grey to a darker almost black shade and the next thing Logan knew, they were both standing upright and staring down the pair of pixies now tied up by their feet.

How on earth did they just switch places?

“Who are you?” Virgil demanded, his voice loud and noticeably echoing.

“Fu- Mercy! Please, have Mercy! We’re nothing more than lackeys, I swear!”

“Yeah, we were just carrying out orders!”

“Whose orders?”

“Our boss, uh, Frank?”

“Are you lying to me?”

“No! I’m just terrible with names.”

“Our boss’s name is Oscar!”

“Dang, I wasn’t even close.”

“And what exactly were your orders?”

“To bring you to the grove.”

“The what?” Logan asked.

“The grove.” A voice answered from behind.

Logan and Virgil turned to see another pixie, this one dressed much more smartly than the other two, and with an apologetic expression on his face. “I am so sorry about them, your highness. I meant for them to ask you to come, not drag you here.”

Virgil frowned and spoke in his normal voice. “And why on earth have I been dragged here?”

“If you can just follow me, I’ll explain as we go.”

“Uh, can someone let us down?”

“You’re smart enough to get down yourselves, I’m sure.” The third pixie replied as he left with Virgil and Logan.

They went down a short dark passage to a grey door with some symbols Logan didn’t recognise engraved in it. The pixie opened this door and Logan had to shield his eyes for a moment from the bright light that suddenly flooded in. After his sight adjusted, however, he found himself figuratively floored with awe at the sight that lay beyond the door. It looked like a massive cylinder chamber, with tree roots along the walls, weaving in and out of each other, supporting variously coloured platforms all around. There were pixies walking all over these platforms, some even flying around in the centre.

“I am not sure if you want to wait for someone to assist the human...” The pixie said.

“Would you mind if I carried you?” Virgil asked Logan, who was honestly so awestruck by the architecture he could only silently nod.

Virgil picked him up bridal style and the next thing he knew they were both in the air. Somehow not falling to their doom. What? Logan then noticed that Virgil had a pair of dark purple-almost black wings protruding from his back. They looked perfectly natural and seemed like they were as much a part of him as they were of the various pixies flying around, but Logan was quite puzzled about where they had come from.

“Can you now explain why we’ve been kidnapped?” Virgil asked the pixie guiding them as they flew through the air.

“Again, I apologize for those two. I only wanted to have them ask and escort you here because, well…”

“Well?”

“Queen Tanya has fallen ill.”

Virgil paled. “What do you mean, she’s fallen ill? She can’t get sick.”

“Not physically, no. We fear she’s been magically poisoned. None of our healers can find a cure though.”

“So why send for me? What could I possibly do?”

“There is a spell that could save her, but for the best success rate, we need someone of royal blood to perform it.”

“What kind of spell is it?”

“I am not sure. I can show you the book we found it in though, so you can figure out how to perform it.”

Virgil nodded. “Can you bring it to my room?”

“Yes, your highness.”

“Good,” Virgil flew to one of the landings and continued to carry Logan down a hallway that seemed lit much better than the one they’d been walking through earlier.

Logan was getting more confused by the minute as he tried to mentally sort through all that had just happened. 1, They had been kidnapped. 2, That was an accident, but apparently, the pixies needed help from Virgil. 3, Virgil had royal blood, and while that was normal for a higher noble, a - there was no one of nobility in the human kingdom even closely related to the kings and b - he was being addressed as ‘your highness’ which indicated he was a prince. 4, Where did those wings come from? He’d never really seen Virgil without his cape but surely that couldn’t hide a pair of freaking wings!

There were too many questions on Logan’s mind right now, so when Virgil asked him, “Are you okay?”

All he could reply was, “I don’t know.”

He noticed that Virgil had brought him to what appeared to be a bedroom. It was nice and clean, with dark furniture, and many shelves full of odds and ends. Some books, a few rocks, a picture frame with different kinds of colourful leaves inside. It was the room of someone who perhaps didn’t stay here often, but kept many precious memories here.

He was sitting on the bed, with Virgil standing in front of him, nervously tugging on the hood of his cape. “You uh, probably have a bunch of questions. Right?”

Logan nodded.

“Well, I’ll try to answer them as best I can, but you should know that I did not mean for you, or anyone, to find out about this like… this.”

“Who exactly are you, Virgil? Is that even your name?”

“Virgil is my name, and well… I’m the crown prince of Srednas. My parents are King Thomas and Prince Consort Nico.”

“I still don’t understand how you are familiar with this place? Aren’t Pixies meant to be… dead?”

“Yes, and no. My papa, Prince Nico, is actually also the Prince of the fae realm. I’m well known with the pixies here in the grove, since this is where the gate that my parents and I use to visit my grandmother is located, and Queen Tanya was my surrogate mother.”

“That’s why you have a room here?”

“Yes.”

“So you’re half-fae?”

“Yes, but please don’t freak out.”

“I think I’m too shocked for that.”

“I know that the fae have a bad reputation. A terrible one, really, but please you have to understand that things aren’t as black and white as they seem.”

Logan looked closely at Virgil. “You’re scared.”

“I- how did you?”

“Your voice has an underlying echo and you’re playing with the hood of your cloak. I promise not to tell anyone of your identity if that is what you fear. They’d probably call me insane anyway.”

“Thank you, but that isn’t what… I just… honestly I’m scared I won’t be able to help,” Virgil admitted. “My magic skill is okay, but there’s a huge chance I won’t be able to pull this off. Especially if the success rate is as critical as Oscar said.”

“...What is your skill level in healing magic?”

“Um, seven, why?”

“That gives you an advantage on any healing spells, with only a thirty percent chance of failure. Add that to your overall magic skill level, the added success rate from being of royal blood twice over, and the fact you’re aware of the dangers means you’ll be doing your best. Overall, you have a chance to succeed.”

“There’s still the possibility I’ll fail.”

“And that would be there for anyone. Everything can go wrong, and will if you just give up so easily. I know you’re scared but personally, I believe you can do it.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

Virgil and Logan stared at each other for a silent moment. Virgil seemed to be searching his face for any hint of falsehood. He didn’t find any though. There was nothing to find. Logan truly believed that Virgil possessed the skill to pull this off.

A knock at the door startled the boys. Virgil got up and opened the door to find someone with a small stack of papers. The spell. He took the papers, thanked the person, and went to sit down and read through the spell’s details.

“This… looks very complicated.”

“I can try to help you understand it. My healing magic skill is not very high, but if we’re both trying to work the spell out then you’ll get it figuratively in no time.”

“That would be good. Thanks, Logan.”

“No problem.”

Okay, sure, Logan was feeling a bit shell shocked to find out that one of his friends was not only royalty but also shared the blood of a race that he had been raised to believe was dangerous although no longer on earth. It was crazy really but right now he cared a heck of a lot more about helping his friend than anything else. All he wanted to do was make Virgil feel better right now. He could ask questions another time.

The spell was indeed quite complex, but working on it together made it easier for Virgil to understand. He felt a lot more confident in himself by the end.

“I better cast the spell now that I’ve got it. Um, do you want to come with me or wait here?”

“I’d like to accompany you if you don’t mind.”

Virgil nodded and then they both left his room and headed straight to what Logan assumed to be the Queen’s chambers. Now that Logan’s mind wasn’t being drowned by confusion and questions, he had a chance to look around as they walked through the halls. Everything seemed brightly coloured and almost sparkly, from the green-wood floors to the various paintings on the walls. The paintings also seemed to have some magic to them, a few showing not only pictures but small animated scenes with the people inside the art moving like they were alive. It was quite mesmerising.

Soon they came to an ivory door with golden swirls painted like a frame around the edges. Virgil knocked on the door and it was promptly opened by a worried-looking pixie with silver hair and wings whole perked up at the sight of Virgil.

“Young prince! Thank Ysla you’re here.”

“Dune, is Tanya here?”

“Yes, please, come in.”

Dune stepped back and allowed both boys to enter the room, which was somewhat smaller than Logan had expected. Across from the door was a large bed where several pixies were gathered looking down in worry. A few looked up and seemed relieved at the sight of Virgil who on the other hand tensed with anxiety. He was scared of failing before, but now there were all these people here counting on him too. What if he failed them all?

Logan noticed this and reached to hold his hand. He looked at him and Logan gave a reassuring smile. He could do this. Everything would be just fine. Virgil took one last deep breath then went over to the bed. As he prepared to cast the spell, Logan had time to look at Queen Tanya.

She looked very young and had a strange sickly yellow tint to her skin. Her long grey hair was draped all over the pillow. Both her hands were clutching the bedcovers tightly as if her hold on them was all that was keeping her alive. Logan looked away as memories of his mother came up. Now wasn’t the time for reminiscing.

Virgil kept his voice and hands steady as he began to create the spell. There were several intricate runes involved that needed to be set off all together. Meaning he would need to draw all of them now before using the sealing word. He drew them in a sort of circle above the Queen’s bed, almost like a halo of bright runes.

As he finished the last one and sealed them, they all turned white. Everyone stood still and seemed to be holding their breath as they watched the runes begin to slowly spin. They spun around faster and faster until it looked like they were simply a single ring of light and then they burst into sparkles and fell onto Tanya.

The Queen seemed to stop breathing for a moment. Then she took a deep breath like she was gasping for air. Her skin changed to its natural shade and her hair began to turn bright purple. She let go of the bedcovers and sat up straight, her eyes opening wide and looking around in shock. There were shouts of joy from various pixies and many including Logan and Virgil breathed a sigh of relief.

“By Ysla’s bow, what’s going on?” Tanya asked.

“Tía, how do you feel?” Virgil inquired instead of answering her.

“Well, I was having quite the night terror, but I feel fine now. My goodness, Virgil, why are you here? Not that I’m not ecstatic to see you but I thought you were busy with that magic school project.”

“You were unwell, Tanya. We had to fetch him to heal you.” Dune explained.

Tanya looked around at everyone gathered critically then nodded. “Well, I’m fine now. Please leave me a moment to speak with Virgil.”

The pixies all nodded and left the room as requested, except for the Dune, who instead closed the door behind them then flew to sit beside the Queen. “Are you sure you’re well?”

Tanya smiled. “Yes, dear. I daresay I feel better than ever. Though I have quite a few questions.”

“I have a few of my own too.” Virgil said.

Tanya nodded. “May I start with inquiring about your human companion?”

“This is Logan.” Virgil introduced.

“Oh, that’s the one-”

“Lovely to meet you, Logan.” Dune said, interrupting whatever Tanya was about to say.

“Oh, yes, it’s a real pleasure. Virgil’s spoken quite highly of you.”

“Oh, um, thank you. It’s an honor to meet you as well, your majesty.”

“Please, dear, call me Tía. And this is my darling partner, Dune. Did Virgil bring only you along or are your other classmates here as well?”

“We were sort of abducted…” Virgil explained.

Dune looked at him in shock. “What? I told Oscar to send you an escort.”

“There was a mix up, but nevermind that. What led to Tía getting so sick?”

“We’re not sure.” Dune answered. “She was feeling unwell this past week, but it wasn’t until yesterday that she fell into an unconscious state like… Well, you saw.”

Tanya frowned. “I’d been getting some powerful headaches on and off, but I didn’t think too much of it with the Grand Alignment coming up and all. Hang on, why did you send for Virgil instead of Thomas or Nico?”

“There’s something wrong with the mirrors. I haven’t been able to contact them or anyone from Faehaven. We of course couldn’t send anyone through the gate, and the castle is outside of the forest bounds while the manor, and by extension Virgil, are within our reach.”

“Tía was poisoned and someone messed with the mirrors?”

“Well, we can’t prove someone’s messed with the mirrors, but something’s messed up their signal. I have sent a messenger to the castle though, so perhaps they can tell us if it’s something for all of us or simply on our end here.”

“I spoke with my dads two nights ago, so I’m not sure if anything happened with my mirror.”

“I think we can leave this alone for now. There isn’t much we can do with just us here. I should thank you for saving my life, Virgil.” Tanya said.

“Well, Logan was a huge help with understanding the spell mechanics.”

“Then thank you both. We should have a feast to celebrate!”

“Perhaps we can plan it for another day though. You have just been healed from the brink of death.” Dune pointed out.

Virgil nodded. “And Logan and I ought to head back to the manor. I can only imagine the kind of stress everyone will be going through at our disappearance.”

“Aw, but you just got here,” Tanya complained.

Virgil smiled softly. “I promise to visit properly soon, Tía.”

“Good. you’ll come too, won’t you Logan?”

“I would be honoured.”

---

A/N: thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed this. I'll be posting two chapters a day until the full fic is up, so if you want to be tagged, you can just ask.

I'd love to hear what you thought about the chapter if you wouldn't mind commenting. Thanks again for reading! Here's hoping you have a magical day 💜

[snowdice]

Gaps in His Files (Part 5) [Relabeled; Refiled Series]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Logan/Patton

Characters:

Main: Logan, Patton

Appear: Remy, Virgil (but only in the epilogue)

Summary:

Logan Berry has learned many things the last 10 years: a lot of math and physics, a bit of humility, and how to be a hero being just a few. Through his education, his experience teaching, and his exploits as the superhero Bluebird, he’s changed in a lot of small and large ways. He has recorded these changes in well-organized documents and files. He’s even had to create two new file designations: a red one for files about his moonlighting at Bluebird, and a light blue one dedicated to his boyfriend, Patton.

When Bluebird is targeted by a memory device and all of those 10 years of progress suddenly disappear, Patton Sanders and Logan’s extensive files are left as his only resource to get those memories back. But what is Patton supposed to do when there are clear gaps in his files? And what does he do when he is one of them?

This is set 25 years before Sometimes Labels Fail though it’s story is completely independent of it and it is not necessary to read that one first.

Notes: Superhero AU, memory loss, past child abuse, past child neglect, unhealthy ideas about ones place in relationships, emotional suppression, self-deprecating thoughts, medical procedures mentioned, very brief unhealthy views of sex

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4

Logan contemplated his new companion, Patton, he’d said once they were in the car. The man had removed his own mask when they’d switched cars in some underground location and had given Logan cloths to change into in the back seat of a much more normal SUV. The cloths fit perfectly, and he imagined they must be his. The large and soft sweater was one of the most comfortable things he could remember wearing.

Not that he could remember much of anything.

To distract himself from that concerning thought, he once again refocused on studying the man driving the car. He appeared to be in his late 20s or early 30s and the dark marks around his eyes indicated that he was likely exhausted. It was only a little past 6pm, so Logan had to wonder why. Of course, the man had to have been out searching for Logan for hours. He was surprised the man was able to find him at all in such a large city when Logan himself was hiding. It was likely good that he did however considering that Logan had no idea where to start with dealing with whatever had happened to him on his own.

He seemed vastly more comfortable driving the SUV than he had driving the other strange car. His hands moved to buttons without looking for them and he sat back against the seat instead of sitting up straight and attentive. Logan deduced this must be either his car or one he drove frequently. He also clearly knew the path from the underground garage to wherever their destination was well as he anticipated turns and stoplights despite the fact that it was getting quite dark.

He glanced over at Logan and noticed him watching. He gave a small smile. “Yes?” he asked. There was something different about the way Patton often spoke to him, but Logan could not put his finger on what. A type of familiarity perhaps that was strange coming from someone who was to Logan all but a stranger.

“That phrase was a code I made up when I was a child in case a time traveling future version of myself needed to gain my trust.”

Patton laughed lightly. “Yes, I know. You read The Door into Summer when you were eight and came up with a time travel protocol.”

“Why do you know it?” Logan asked. “Why do you know the context?”

“I’ve been briefed on all of the Logan Prime Directives even the silly ones though…” he contemplated, “I guess that one wasn’t as silly as we both thought it was, all things considered.” He shook his head. “I did not think I’d ever use that one when you told me that story.”

“No, but…” he said. “Why would I tell you about it? I never even talked about it with my parents and certainly not with my peers.”

“We…” Patton glanced at him. “We’re close. How, uh, how far back do your memories go? You clearly have some of them if you remember being eight.”

He hummed in thought. “Many things are rather fuzzy, though I don’t know if that is an effect of the device that erased my later memories or just an effect of those memories having aged. I have a good impression of most of my childhood. The latest memory I can access was from when I was 18. I don’t recall graduating high school. How old am I now?”

“28.”

“That is a concerning amount of my life to be missing,” he commented. It was more than 1/3rd of his life and likely an important 1/3rd. He would have graduated high school and college, moved away from home, and, if things have gone to plan, entered a doctoral program. He felt as though he should be hurrying home for dinner with his parents, but he likely hadn’t lived with them in many years. He does not even know if his parents still live in his childhood home; many people downsize when their children move out, and he highly doubts they anticipate grandchildren which might have prompted them to retain the home. His parents might not even be alive. They were both in good health, but much can happen in 10 years. His mother would be approaching her sixties, his father already well into them. The average life expectancy was in the 60s and he’d never really thought about that in the context of his parents, but he’d likely had to confront that fact sometime in the last 10 years even if they weren’t yet deceased and…

“Are you alright?” Patton asked.

“Of course, I am,” Logan said.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his tone softening.

“I am simply contemplating the possible information I am missing.”

“I can answer questions if you’d like to ask.”

Logan thought about it for a long moment. “Are my parents still alive?”

“Oh sweetie,” Patton said. “Yes, your parents are fine and in good health. In fact, after your mother retired, they’ve been going off on hiking trips together. They’re probably more fit than I am at the moment.”

Logan let a slow breath out. “That is good,” he said, his voice level.

Patton reached over a hand to touch his knee, startling Logan a bit at the ease at which he casually touched him. “It’s okay and I’m sure we’ll get your memories back soon.”

“That is rather optimistic,” he replied. The hand still on the steering wheel clenched just barely, but the one on his knee didn’t even twitch. He slowly took the hand touching him back.

“Nothing wrong with optimism.”

Logan didn’t respond and they soon pulled into a parking garage. Patton parked the car and then let him to a 3rd floor apartment. Logan was careful to memorize the path in case he needed to retrace his steps for some reason. Patton reached into his pocket for a key and unlocked the apartment door.

The second he walked into the front room, Logan knew this had to be his space. Perhaps it was the repressed memories or perhaps it was simply that everything about it was exactly how he would have organized it himself. The couch was positioned perfectly based on the position of the door, window, and air vents that he could see. There was a small television screen set up on a stand made for that purpose at a reasonable distance and angle from the couch and the recliner next to it. There were no blankets or pillows in sight, likely stored away in a closet, the two pairs of shoes by the door were plain and carefully straightened on the rug, and there were no extraneous papers anywhere, but there was one single notepad on the table between the couch and the recliner with a capped pen laying parallel to it. It was exactly right. Any doubt that somehow Patton was lying and did not truly know him fled completely.

Tension he hadn’t even been aware of leaked out of him like water swirled down a drain after a bath, but apparently that tension had been the only thing keeping Logan on his feet. The body aches and headache that had been looming behind the adrenaline and survival instincts swamped him for the first time since he’d first awoken. It suddenly felt as though he had not slept in the 10 years he did not remember. There was a tingling feeling between his ears and forehead. He turned to the other man calmly as he finished locking and bolting the door. “I am passing out,” he informed him, and then he did.

Thanks for reading!

Also, self-plug, I’m doing a special event for my 10th dice roll fic. If you look at the rules here, you can give me prompts in my AUs including the Labeled Universe. I’d really like to get some more prompts for the event! You can also vote on ones people already sent it!

Want to read more? Click below!

AO3 Part 6

[acrobaticcatfeline]

So far what we know about the dark sides lines up perfectly with our newest reveal.

1. They are traditionally thought of as bad or taboo. Deception, intrusive thoughts/dark creativity, anxiety/fear/(dare I say) paranoia. Parts of your mind that you have that you don't like or want to accept.

2. They are things that are perfectly normal for an average Joe to have, but if had in higher amounts are things one should consider seeing I psychiatrist about. Everyone lies, has a bit of anxiety, a passing thought that they find disturbing. If you don't, that's... Also in most cases Not Good. But in the same vein, too much is a disorder. Social anxiety and other anxiety disorders, compulsive lying, ... I don't know which specific disorder would connect to intrusive thoughts, but I know its a symptom for many.

3. Less important, especially since it applies to Logan some what as well, black clothing that covers most, if not all their body. Virgil and dukes hands are the only pieces of skin that we see(aside from the song because you know I don't want to deal with the dukes wily antics right now) aside from their faces. Deceit wears gloves and a cape and maybe the Others are just extra, but their outfits are (before Virgil was accepted) mostly if not completely black with a single accent color. On this vein Logan also fits most of it but I'm choosing to ignore that to instead inspect Roman and Patton.

3.5. Roman's base color on his outfit is white. He has his signature read sash, but he also has his new gold accents on his outfit ever since the change. Patton's base color is sky blue. However he also has a white accent, his logo and the cat paws on his hoodie, and a grey one. These two have far softer color palettes, easier on the eyes. And then there's Logan who is totally throwing off my game here man, I love you but could you stop looking like you're trying to be a dark side I would appreciate it.

4. Voice thingies!!! Virgil has tempests tongue we all know that much. Deceit hisses when irritated. We only heard it for a moment, but Duke did a voice thing similar to tempests tongue at the very end of his song. Their voices warp into things that are Traditionally scary.

4.5. Makeup. They all have weird spooky eye makeup straight out of a horror film. Next.

5. Again pre AA, all of them have gone head to head against Logan and lost. And they have used every trick in the book to make sure that Thomas Does Not listen to what ever Logan is saying. My negative thinking, Virgil pulls reason after reason that Logan is wrong and Thomas should listen to him instead come on Thomas just go sleep away the rest of our life. However Logan does emerge victorious. Logan is ultimately the one to reveal deceit, and get him to leave through facts in can lying be good. And in this latest episode he knew exactly where the true issue with Duke came from and instead of specifically arguing with Duke, he knew 1, that it was a pointless venture and 2, if he dealt with Patton and Virgil's feelings on the matter as well as making sure they listened to Thomas, the dukes power would be gone and he wouldn't be able to manipulate them anymore.

5.5. I do love the way that Logan dealt with each of them. Virgil needed to have the truth told directly to him to curb his anxiety. He needed to be told that he was over reacting. That's still how Logan deals with Virgil's high stress, albeit softer and kinder. Deceit he needed to refute, specifically rendering all of his points invalid with straight facts. If he hadn't been benched svs would've gone very differently. Remus he literally had to ignore. If I remember correctly, I don't think he talks directly to the Duke much at all. I remember the figuratively speech, the "but I thought you said..?", the part where he keeps attacking Logan, and the deodorant thing. That's all I remember. And none of those pertain to the actual point he has, but are breaks in his train of thought. Just don't pay him any attention and he can't do anything to you.

6. This is where I jump into Virgil is Logan's dark side territory. Spots. We know that deceit has taken multiple spots, but he's originally Patton's alter. He has a much better grasp on Patton's character than anyone else's. He has been in Patton's spot with Patton and Patton very passive aggressively told him to get out of his spot. Remus was in Roman's spot. Now go all the way back to the first two episodes of Sanders sides. Where was Logan standing? In front of the stairs. When Virgil first showed up, Logan wasn't there to notice his spot had been taken. And any episode with the two of them never had a passing line or glance to show that Logan noticed or cared. Honestly, why would he? They still had their separate spots now, he wasn't uncomfortablely close to anyone, Virgil respected his boundaries and gave him enough space so of course he'd return the favor by not mentioning that little fact.

Logan's been knew Virgil was a dark side, Patton also seems to have been knew, so really it's just Virgil who didn't know how badly kept that secret was.

[vincent-frankenstein]

To My Heart and Soul

[ 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | you are here | 16 | 17 | 18 | read on AO3 ]

Warnings: major character death, villain/abusive deceit, blood, fighting, panic attacks, creepy imagery

Pairings: logince, hints of moxiety, a tiny smidge of remile and past abusive anxceit

He was halfway to the house when the world exploded.

The sky filled with sickly yellow light, powerful magical energy rushing past him quickly enough to tear trees from the ground and send them flying. But even as it tore up the world around him, the energy didn’t touch him. The first wave passed quickly, dangerously fast, and a beacon of molten gold shot into the sky, blazing brighter than the sun.

Logan mapped out the city in his mind, and wasn’t at all surprised to find that the beacon was coming from his old house. His feet carried him towards the light before the terror in his lungs could freeze him, and he held the weapon even tighter, face hardening. People rushed around him, panicked, terrified, and they paid him no mind.

The weapon thrummed in his hands, a deep, steady hum, melodic and comforting as it urged him on. He ran a finger down the hilt, his thumb catching in the hole. It was barely half an inch deep, with grooves dug around the side, as though something was meant to slot inside. A key, maybe?

Oh.

Oh.

His feet didn’t slow, even as his mind reeled with the realization. The weapon was filled with Roman’s magic — his lifeblood, essentially. In other words: his heart and soul. And to his heart and soul, Logan held the key.

Mind racing, he pulled his wedding ring from his finger and held it up to the hole. The sizes matched up perfectly; it would be a perfect fit. Could it be that easy, that poetic?

Of course it could. Roman had designed it.

A shaking breath fell from his lips as he slipped his ring back onto his finger, bold determination sparking to life in his gut. It didn’t feel like he was marching towards his own death anymore; rather, he felt like he was marching towards someone else’s. He’d cracked the code, solved Roman’s puzzle, just as Roman must have known he would — and now he could give Dorian back every ounce of pain, every moment of grief, that he himself had been suffering with since Roman left.

The house came into view, and he stopped without meaning to, grief slipping, unbidden, into his chest. The windows were shattered, the wood rotten and twisted beyond repair, empty and barren and wrong wrong wrong in too many ways to count. It was only a reflection of the home he once had, he knew that — but that fact didn’t make it hurt any less. Facts rarely did.

Golden light emanated from the attic window, bursting through every hole in the dilapidated roof. Even as it brushed past him, leaving him unscathed, the impossible power of the golden magic sent cold, buzzing fear jumping into Logan’s throat. He’d never felt magic like this before.

With a wave of warmth, the weapon spurred his feet into motion. Dorian was powerful — but the weapon was, too. Logan only hoped it was enough to stop him, once and for all.

He slipped his ring back off his finger and held it up to the hole as he stepped into the wreck he’d once called home. The moment he stepped over the threshold, silence fell over him like a thick, suffocating blanket. His footsteps echoed down the hallways no matter how softly he stepped. His heart pounded in his chest, and for a long, paranoid moment, he wondered if it was loud enough for Dorian to hear, loud enough to get him killed.

He held the weapon tighter.

His feet carried him down the path from his nightmare even as a small, foolish voice in his mind screamed at him to stop, to turn and run and get help. But there was no one who would help him, not without hiding him away first, and he couldn’t, couldn’t be taken from his husband again.

Roman was exactly where he knew he would be, but Logan still cried out the moment he saw him, rushing to his side in an instant. The room swam before him as his eyes began to sting, his hand shaking as he lifted it to hover beside Roman’s face. “Roman,” he whispered, and his voice shattered, shards of broken glass landing on his tongue. Slowly, he brought his hand down to cradle the side of Roman’s face.

And Logan touched Roman for the first time in months.

It burned, it ached — Roman’s skin set fire to Logan’s hand and it raced up his arm, sinking deep into his bones, filling his lungs with ash — and he wanted more. He pressed his forehead up against Roman’s with a desperate, pained noise, his tears burning their frigid tracks down his cheeks.

With a soft, pained groan, Roman shifted, eyes fluttering open. Their eyes met, and Roman’s filled with tears, a desperate gasp falling from his lips. “Logan,” he breathed.

Logan surged forward and pressed their lips together, and Roman’s words died on his tongue. The fire spread between them until they were both aflame — Logan’s hands tangled in Roman’s hair and Roman leaned into him with aching desperation, and they pressed closer, closer, closer —

Roman pulled away with a sharp, pained gasp, pressing his forehead into Logan’s. “What are you doing here?” he whispered, his voice trembling so badly that Logan could barely understand him.

“Rescuing you,” Logan said. “I told you, sunbeam. I’m not leaving without you.”

Tears pooled in Roman’s eyes at the nickname, spilling over onto his cheeks. “Y-You idiot,” he whispered. “You brave, wonderful idiot, you — it’s all happening exactly like —”

“Like I said it would?”

Roman cut off with a choked gasp. “You — you know?”

“I only just learned,” Logan said. “I… spouted a prophecy in the Council hall. Given your strange behavior and your apparent knowledge of the future, coupled with my… my abilities, it wasn’t too hard to determine that I’m the reason you left.”

“Logan —”

“It’s my fault,” Logan continued, and he really, really wanted to stop, but the words poured from his mouth in a deluge of guilt and desperation and every ounce of grief he’d shoved away. “I — somehow, I made you believe that you had to leave, that you had to face things alone, and because of that, Dorian was able to capture you. It’s — it’s all my fault —”

“Logan,” Roman said sharply, and there, there was a hint of his passion, his fire, beneath the grief and the pain. “That night, you predicted that Dorian would come for me. That if you got involved, you — you would die. I thought I could change the future by leaving.”

“I —” Logan’s voice broke. “You could have told me, we could have figured it out together. You didn’t have to leave.”

“I-I know,” Roman said, his voice just barely above a whisper. “I panicked. I couldn’t — I couldn’t lose you.”

 “So instead, you made me believe I lost you?” Logan dragged a hand across his eyes, swiping away the tears that refused to stop gathering. “I — do you have any idea what I’ve been through? How much that hurt? Roman, I though you were gone, I thought I had lost you forever, I —”

“I know,” Roman said, a sob tearing through his words. “I know, I — I regretted it as soon as Ieft, but I thought I was protecting you. And it didn’t even work! Dorian — he knew I was still alive, and of course he knew about you, so it didn’t make a damn bit of difference.”

“I —” Logan cut himself off with a sharp sigh. “It doesn’t matter. Right now, we have to get you out of here. We can… talk later.” He set the weapon on the floor beside Roman and kneeled down behind him, grabbing the chains that bound his hands to the floor. “These don’t appear to be magical.”

“They’re not,” Roman said. “Magical bindings would have probably killed me.”

Logan dug a pair of pins from his pocket and lifted the chains. “There is one thing I don’t understand,” he said as he worked, twisting the pins through the keyhole with a practiced precision. “If your goal was to keep me away from all of this, why did you leave so many clues that only I could figure out?”

“Because I know you, starshine,” Roman said. “The last thing I wanted was for you to come here, but I knew there was a chance you’d find this place — or it would find you. I wanted to give you a fighting chance.  I meant to give the other key to Patton, with a letter explaining everything, so you wouldn’t be the only one with the answers, but… well, you can see why I didn’t get the chance. I ended up giving it to Vir —”

Logan yelped as the chains were suddenly jerked from his grasp, and Roman cut off with a choked gasp, both hands rushing to slap over his mouth. Yellow light flared around the chains and yanked them away, forcing Roman down.

“Such a lovely reunion,” Dorian said softly, his slow claps echoing unnaturally through the room. “It’s a shame I have to cut it short. Hello again, Logan.”

For a moment, Logan couldn’t move. His breath caught in his throat beneath a wall of words and he choked, insults laced with venom dying on his tongue. Something was… wrong. Deeply, deeply wrong. Golden light burned around Dorian’s figure, acrid smoke curling through the air; and with every move he made the light shifted to follow, afterimages searing along beside him. Something flickered around him. Logan blinked and it was gone.

Roman cried out as the chains grew tighter, pressing his face into the floor. Logan didn’t hesitate — he shoved away his terror and grabbed one of the shackles, jamming his lockpick into the hole. Dorian tutted, golden magic swirling from his fingertips to wind, snake-like, around Logan’s limbs, but he fought with all his might against them, and with one final jerk, the shackles fell to the ground.

And Logan was jerked up and away from the floor, coils of magic lashing around his wrists and burning into his skin. Pain flashed up and down his arms but he refused to scream, refused to give Dorian the satisfaction. His job was done; Roman was free, and the weapon was at his feet.

“Let him go.” Roman’s voice dripped with venom, his face contorted with rage. He lifted the weapon towards Dorian, the tip pointing straight at his chest. But Dorian… didn’t look scared. He raised a disinterested brow, waving a hand through the air to draw Logan closer.

“Have you discovered a way to make that thing work without a key?” he asked, smug victory laced through his tone. Roman’s expression faltered; his fingers tightened around the hilt of the sword, doubt flashing in his eyes. “You never cease to amaze me, dear brother. Go on, then, if you’re so confident.”

Logan strained against the bonds with all his might, desperate to reach his wedding ring, desperate to somehow, somehow give it to Roman. A searing golden coil snaked across his mouth before he could cry out, and tears gathered, unbidden, in his eyes.

“That’s what I thought,” Dorian said. “Now, here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to give me the weapon, and you’re going to give me the key,” he said, pointing to Roman and then to Logan with all the languid ease in the world. “Then, you will either return to your mortal world and leave this one to me, or you’ll die by my hands. Either way works for me.”

“No,” Roman said, lifting his head to glare regally down at Dorian. “I won’t leave this world to suffer. I won’t let you win again.”

“Oh, honey, it’s a bit too late for that,” Dorian said, and the golden magic flowing from the attic pulsed as if to prove his point, washing the world outside in a sickly yellow glow. “I’m trying to spare you. Don’t play the hero, Roman. This world is a lost cause.”

“I would rather die than let you destroy my home,” Roman spat. He stood tall despite his bruises, shifting the weapon in his hands as he shifted into a fighting stance. Logan’s heart stopped; the magic binding him flared painfully. Dorian’s form seemed to flicker — a thousand emotions crossed his face before he settled on a cold, placid rage.

“How noble,” he whispered. “You would sacrifice your own life for your home. Tell me, Roman…” He lifted a hand and Logan drifted towards him. Darkness tugged at the edges of his vision; the pain had begun to subside into a dull, throbbing numbness. Probably not a good sign. “Would you be as eager to sacrifice his?”

Horror flashed across Roman’s face. The weapon lowered; he seemed close to dropping it. Dorian laughed, high-pitched and cruel. “You’ve forgotten who holds the cards in this scenario,” he taunted. With a sick grin, he twirled the end of the magical ropes around his finger. “Tick-tock, Roman. I need an answer.”

“I —” Roman’s gaze caught on Logan and his eyes filled with tears. Logan shook his head. Don’t do it, he pleaded silently. The weapon was their only hope; Logan’s life wasn’t worth it.

“Time’s up.” Dorian closed his fist around the rope — and they tightened so swiftly that colors popped before Logan’s eyes, agony racing through every inch of his body. Darkness sank into his bones and tugged; he was coming apart, coming undone, dissolving under the pain —

And then it stopped. Cold relief dripped through the searing pain, and bit by bit the darkness receded. He was on the floor, cold tiles digging into his face. Someone was talking to him — their voice pitched with panic, their hands shaking as they urged him to his feet. A face swam before his eyes.

“Roman,” he wheezed, his voice haggard and raw. “Where… where is the…?”

He didn’t finish his sentence. He didn’t have to; with a dawning horror he realized where the weapon had gone, his gaze trailing up Dorian’s form. He turned the weapon over in his hands, slowly, deliberately, glee sparkling in his eyes. His sclera had begun to turn black, Logan noticed with a start.

“Perfect,” Dorian whispered. His voice echoed through the room, double-edged, wrong. Roman shook, the blood draining from his face.

“You’re not Dorian,” he breathed.

“Of course I am,” Dorian said, tilting his head to the side. “Just not as you knew him, I suppose. You see, I’m not alone anymore.”

He spat his words with such venom and such force that Roman nearly toppled. Suddenly, Logan was supporting him just as much as he was supporting Logan. That horrible something flickered around Dorian’s form again, hideously golden, and it was gone in the blink of an eye.

“Now then,” Dorian said, moving his terrible gaze from Roman to Logan. “The key, if you don’t mind.”

“N-No,” Logan managed. Dorian having the weapon was bad enough; he refused to give him the power to activate it. “I don’t know how to activate it. I — I don’t know what the key is.”

Dorian rolled his eyes. “You’re a terrible liar, Logan,” he said. “I am not an idiot, and neither are you. You wouldn’t have rushed into this without knowing how to activate the weapon. Give me the key.”

Logan’s gaze flicked to Roman. Roman shook his head minutely, terror painted across every inch of his face. Something was deeply, deeply wrong. Logan clutched his husband even tighter, narrowed his eyes, and spat in death’s face.

“No,” he said again, as forcefully as he could manage. Dorian raised an eyebrow.

“You really don’t know when to quit,” he said, lifting a hand. Logan braced himself — no matter what happened, no matter what sort of pain Dorian could invoke, he wouldn’t give up the key. Yellow light flared and pushed against them like a wall of fire, painful, agonizing —

Until a deluge of purple pushed it back.

[sonicrainicorn]

Made of Love, Chapter 22

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Table of Contents

Ship(s): Logicality, (platonic) Prinxiety

All Characters: Thomas, Virgil, Roman, Logan, Patton, Dr. Picani, Joan, Talyn, and Deceit

Synopsis: Humans Roman and Virgil get wrapped up in some serious magic business without meaning to. Their other companions aren’t exactly as they seem, either. Together they all must defeat a great threat for the safety of humanity.

Chapter Desc.: Thomas's worst fear is realized.

TW: Cursing, death mention, violence, blood (somewhat descriptive), existential crisis (vague)

Prefer to read it on Ao3? Click here!

In the past few days, Virgil noticed something odd. Logan started wearing more long sleeves -- going so far as to wear Patton’s sweaters just so he’d have something covering his arms. Not that Virgil could say anything about it. He wore things with sleeves as often as he could since he always needed something to fidget with. Still, he decided to keep an eye on it for any further developments.

But perhaps he was overreacting. He often did that. He’d worry over things that didn’t need to be worried over. There was a chance this was one of those times. There was also a chance that it wasn’t. Nevertheless, It was better to be safe than sorry.

Other than that, everything was fine.

Well, as fine as it could be.

There was still the ever-looming threat of losing Logan forever which wasn’t fun to think about. At all. It didn’t help that he glitched out two days in a row, and it wasn’t any less terrifying than the first time. In fact, it seemed the more it happened, the scarier it got. A constant reminder that time was running out. Thankfully, Thomas had yet to witness it firsthand. No one could comprehend how traumatizing that would be for him.

Today, however, started somewhat normal. Patton and Virgil left the other three in the living room while they went outside to train. Training had become less frequent since they first started out, but it still happened. It was necessary. Practice makes perfect, as they say. Or at the very least, practice makes for a better outcome in a fight.

Speaking of fighting, Virgil couldn't help but wander over to what happened with the Theorist those couple days ago. Of how genuinely frightened he was of Patton. As if he had every reason to believe that Patton would hurt him without reason. He seemed so convinced if it. And Patton himself even admitted to being raised to fight. It all… it all sort of made sense. That was the reason he was so scarily accurate with weapons. That's why his first reaction upon hearing Arlene's name was to punch as hard as he could. It's why he didn't even hesitate to start training Roman and Virgil. Training is normal for him. Fighting is normal for him.

Did that make killing normal, too? Has Patton killed anyone? How many? Was Anxiety right? How long did he stay with his tribe before leaving? Did that affect how ingrained this was into his system?

"Look out!"

After a brief moment of alarm over hearing Roman's voice, Virgil plunged both Right and Left into the dummy's shoulder as a panic response. A bit unnecessary, and not at all what Right wanted him to do, but it got the job done. The dummy crumpled into a pile of sticks.

“You know, if you’re going to fight something you should probably focus on that rather than what’s going on in your head,” Patton mentioned from the log he sat at. A teasing smirk played at his lips. “Maybe you should take a break.”

Virgil ignored the heat rising up his face and tapped the hilts of his daggers together. They turned back into pens. He took a seat on the log as Patton stood up from it. “And what are you planning to do?”

“Well, everyone needs practice.” Beside his foot started to sprout thick, interweaving branches. They grew similarly to how someone might knit a scarf, except it started to curve. Patton pulled it out and a thin vine connected the two ends, creating a complete bow. After it, something resembling a sapling sprouted up with its needles forming along three sides to create the fletchings of an arrow.

Virgil decided not to comment on that. He watched Patton wander over to the opposite side of the dummies and take aim with his bow. He pulled back the makeshift string and let the arrow go. And missed -- but just barely. It scraped along the side of the dummy’s head and landed somewhere behind it.

“Whoops.” Patton grinned sheepishly. “This thing’s a little janky.” He sprouted another arrow from the ground. His movements were automatic, almost mechanical, as he plucked the arrow out and nocked it -- that is to say, he put the arrow to the string. He drew it back, aimed, and let it go. It hit the dummy’s head, causing it to crumble into a pile.

“So how long have you known how to use a bow and arrow?” Virgil watched another arrow hit the second dummy with rather remarkable grace. Like someone who had done this same action a dozen times over.

“A few hundred years.” The dummies built themselves back up. “Just about my whole life, really. Why?” Patton flicked his finger side to side in the direction of the dummies. They started to walk in opposite directions like cartoon characters on patrol.

Virgil followed one of the dummy’s steps with his eyes. “Wondering how much practice you actually need.” It fell to pieces.

A new arrow grew from the ground. “I mean, it’s good to brush off old skills every once in a while.” Patton nocked it and proceeded to aim at his next target.

“Even if those skills have been with you your whole life?”

“Yes, even then.” He hit it.

Virgil continued to watch Patton with increasing fascination. Every time both dummies went down, he had them start at a faster speed after they built themselves up again. He never missed. He hit the dummies' heads every time. A near-constant stream of arrows sprouted from the ground whenever he plucked one. Well, if someone did one thing for hundreds of years, they better be pretty good at it. Virgil assumed skills like this were only seen in books and movies.

It only made Virgil more curious. He wanted to learn more about Patton's heritage -- about the Machai elves. Were they as feared as the Theorist made them out to be? Why were they so focused on fighting? But Patton didn't want to talk about that. He made it very clear he wasn't interested in discussing his history.

There had to be some other way to do it -- some way to ease him into the topic. Because Virgil wouldn't be able to get any damn rest until he had at least some idea of who Patton was.

After hitting yet another target, Patton paused to push his hair out of his face. The wind picked up and caused the already rowdy curls to disobey any type of practicality. He had to spit out the few strands that made it into his mouth.

"Here. Looks like you need this." Virgil slipped off the hair tie on his wrist and offered it to Patton.

He grinned. "Thanks, Virgil." He set the bow down to walk over to him.

Then a lightbulb illuminated over Virgil's head.

As Patton gathered up all his hair, Virgil tried to figure out the best way to go about his question. It would sort of seem out of the blue, there was nothing he could do about that, but he figured he could use it as a leeway. "Hey, um, Patton. I have a bit of a question."

"What is it?" He pulled his hair through the tie.

"Do you know anything about soulmates?"

He cracked a small smile. "I know a lot about soulmates. Why? What's up?" He placed his hands on his hips. His hair was successfully pulled back into a little ponytail, though a few rebel strands decided to go their own way.

Shit. He wasn't prepared for this yet. "Oh -- uh -- just, like, what are they?"

"Well, they can be a lot of things. It depends on who you ask." He picked his bow back up. "If you want a textbook definition, they’re two people with a very close connection.”

“Is there a way you would define it?” Virgil put his hands in his hoodie pockets and put his back against the tree.

The dummies reformed. “Hmm. I guess I would say that soulmates are kinda like best friends. They’ll always be there for you and you’d understand each other better than anyone else.” He nocked another arrow. “I was taught that soulmates are sort of like stars. They’re bright and wonderful, but intense. They burn. And then they go out. Not every soulmate relationship sticks until the end. Sometimes they burn too much to really work out.”

“You sound so sure that they’re real.”

“There’s nothing saying that they’re not.” Patton sent him another grin. “It’s even possible for soulmates to be products of past lives. The Machai liked to believe that’s how soulmates are formed, anyway. Two people meet, they had a deep connection, their souls try to find each other again after they’re reincarnated.” He plucked another arrow.

Reincarnation. That was something Virgil didn’t want to think much about. It made sense, didn’t it? People kept seeing something in him -- someone that wasn’t him. Not anymore, anyway. It made sense that reincarnation would play a role. But it was terrifying. He existed before -- Roman existed before. They didn’t have any recollection of it. Did that change anything about them? Were they meant to remember more?

Ah, shit. There was that existential dread again. A puzzle piece from the wrong puzzle thrown into the mix. He had a perfectly fine puzzle before that extra piece forced its way in. Now nothing was going to fit right until he found out where it went.

Fuck.

Change the subject. “Would you consider yourself to be Logan’s soulmate?”

Patton stopped mid-action. He stayed frozen until slipping his fingers away from the string, continuing with the motion of shooting. He missed. “I’d say we’re something else entirely.”

Virgil stared at the arrow embedded in the nearby tree. “What would that be?”

He lowered the bow and looked up at the treetops. For a moment, Virgil was afraid he somehow asked the wrong question, until he saw a bright smile creep along Patton’s face. “It’s not something with a name, I don’t think. It’s different. It’s more like we rewrote our own stories to be how we wanted them. Sort of threw destiny off track a bit."

That was enough attempting to pry for today.

When they went back inside, the other three were still in the living room. Thomas was the first to notice their return. He gasped and leaped to his feet, running over to them like an energetic puppy. Paint was smeared along his cheeks and many splatters were over his clothes.

"Guys, look what we did." He threw his arms out to the canvas on the floor. It was a serene portrait of a tree branch with a bird resting on it. In the back was a lush field of green, scattered with bits of orange flowers. "Logan sketched out one of Roman's pictures and then we painted it. What do you think?"

Patton smiled. "It looks great." He leaned over the back of the armchair to get a better look at it without getting in the way. Roman and Logan were still working on it.

"It's not finished yet." Thomas beamed at Virgil.

"Looks pretty good to me." He returned the smile at a lower watt intensity.

"Well it has to be perfect," Roman called from the floor. He sat back from the painting. He was the least covered in paint out of the three of them. It only seemed to be on his hands.

"He's been insisting that since we started, even though we've said it doesn't need to be." Logan sat back as well. There were a few specific smears of paint on his face and even some in his bangs. He lifted his eyes from the canvas and they froze at Patton. "Your hair is up."

"Huh? Oh, yeah." He put a hand to his hair and gave a nervous smile. "Do you not like it?"

"I never said that. I think you look rather nice. It makes it easier to see all the constellations on your face."

Patton placed a hand on his cheek, his smile switching to be more reserved.

"Plus, you get to see your cute little elf ears," Thomas added.

Virgil felt heat rise to his cheeks. He could see Roman's turn pink.

"Thomas!" Patton covered his ears.

"I agree with that," Logan said.

Virgil's face got warmer.

Sometime around noon, they decided to walk down into town for lunch. They hadn’t gone out for food in a while and it seemed like a perfect time to do it. Well, perfect as a relative term. No one dropped dead or anything like that. So that was the standard for perfect nowadays, which was a bit upsetting for various reasons. But whatever.

As they ate, they ended up falling into a discussion about one of the biggest things they’ve ever gotten in trouble for. Patton and Logan elected not to participate, and Virgil was reluctant to admit anything. Roman, on the other hand, told them about the time he and one of his brothers put a wad of gum in their older sister’s hair and no one could get it out. She had to cut it super short and they ended up feeling bad about it. The days they were meant to be grounded for got canceled out by their sister shaving part of their heads and forcing them to get haircuts as well.

“What were you even expecting to happen?” Virgil gave Roman the usual ‘you’re-a-dumb-idiot’ look (but in a rare addition of amusement) as he messed around with the straw of his drink.

Roman shrugged. “I don’t know, dude. We were dumb and he’s a bad influence, but we learned not to mess with her after that. Especially after she started taking taekwondo lessons.” He reached into the large fry pile that they made. “Don’t act like you’ve never done anything dumb like that before.”

“Of course not. I’m an only child.” He hid his smirk by taking a sip of his drink.

Roman tossed a fry at him. “Whatever. You’ve had to have done something stupid in your childhood.”

“I somehow doubt that Virgil has ever done anything along your lines of idiocy,” Logan commented.

“Okay, rude.”

“He’s got a point, though,” Virgil said.

“You two don’t need to pick on Roman all the time,” Patton interjected. “Give him a break.”

Roman stuck his tongue out at Virgil. “Yeah! Thanks, Dad.”

Patton grinned while Logan rolled his eyes. Virgil was forced to stick his tongue out in retaliation.

“Back on the subject,” Thomas snuck into the conversation, “is there really nothing you’ve ever done that’s gotten you into big trouble?”

Virgil went back to messing with the straw. “I don’t know if I’m willing to confess my childhood shenanigans to you guys.”

“Oh, come on. They can’t be as bad as that time I got arrested.” He snatched up a fry as if the most Earth-shattering thing didn’t just come out of his mouth.

Roman inhaled a piece of food and started choking. Virgil’s jaw dropped. What the actual fuck.

“You’ve been arrested before?” Virgil didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Part of him wanted to scream instead.

Thomas stopped and grinned sheepishly. “Just once. I used to be a graffiti artist in the seventies and I got caught writing on something I shouldn’t have. The charges were dropped, though.”

Roman downed the rest of his soda. “Oh my God.” He coughed. “I can’t believe you’ve been arrested. You’re just a little baby. How could that happen to you?”

He shrugged. “Accident.”

Patton and Logan didn't look very amused.

After continuing to freak out over Thomas being arrested by an actual police officer before, they finished up so they could get back home. But neither Roman or Virgil could get over it. Thomas Sanders -- the same Thomas that cries during emotional movies and the same one that tried to avoid cursing -- was arrested for committing a crime. A minor misdemeanor really, but that didn’t change the disbelief. Roman was right. Thomas was a little baby. It wasn’t comprehensible for him to be doing any kind of illegal activity.

They freaked the fuck out even more when he mentioned, at the time, he could have passed as a twelve-year-old. In hindsight, he probably should have kept that to himself. He wasn’t ever going to hear the end of it.

By the time they were almost home, Roman and Virgil calmed down about it at least a little bit. Patton decided to change the subject before one or both of them had an aneurysm.

The street that led back home was empty once they got there. It wasn’t ever busy on the weekends since the majority of the buildings lining it were businesses or other buildings of that nature. So it was quiet and there wasn’t anyone to give them a second glance. It was because of this, though, that Virgil noticed Thomas coming to a complete stop. When people were around, he tried to avoid their attention and move as fast as possible to where he needed to be. Without them, he was able to look around more.

He stopped as well and turned toward Thomas. He was looking up at an office building. Virgil followed his gaze, but couldn’t see anything of note. “You okay, kid?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I -- I just --” He glanced at the group before returning his eyes up to the building. “I just thought I saw… something.” He frowned. “Hold on.” He took off before anyone could say anything about it.

“Thomas,” Patton cried out in alarm.

Virgil was the first to follow after him, glancing vaguely in each direction of the street before running across. Thomas already made it inside by the time he got to the door. He could see him turn up the stairs. Not wanting to waste any time, he tugged on the door. But it didn't budge. “What the hell?” He pulled it again, but it didn’t swing open as it had for Thomas.

“It’s locked?” Roman ran up to him. He stared at the door in confusion. He pulled at the second one beside it, then pushed, but it didn’t move either way.

“What do you mean it’s locked?” Patton hovered nervously at Virgil’s side. “How is it locked?”

“Maybe he locked it?”

“Wha -- you can’t lock a door like this without a key.” Virgil shook the handle for emphasis. There wasn’t any way to lock it like a normal house door. It was an entrance to an office building -- it needed a key to be locked.

Roman threw his hands up. “So then how the hell did he get in if it was already locked?”

Patton and Logan shared a worried glance. “We have to get in,” Logan said.

“How?” Roman waved his arms in the direction of the doors. “We have no way of opening these.”

“I’ll just --” He reached for the door, only to yank his hand back -- “I can’t… I can’t do anything.” He looked down at his hands, then back up at the group. “Patton.” He fumbled over his words, struggling to push out a complete sentence, before giving up and pointing at the door. “Open it.”

Patton grimaced, inching forward to be in front. “Oh, I hope I don’t break anything too much.” He placed his hand between the two doors. Soon, weeds began to break through the crack. They pushed out and out until both doors popped open. He pulled one open all the way and rushed inside, followed by Logan.

“You can wait for us at least,” Roman called after them.

“Taking off just runs in the family.” Virgil grabbed Roman’s wrist and tugged him through the door.

They tried to keep up with Logan and Patton, but that proved a much more difficult task than anticipated. It was almost unfair how fast they were compared to Roman and Virgil. Though, if she perceives that her cub is in danger, it isn’t as if momma bear will take her time.

It wasn’t until they reached the third floor did they find Thomas. He stood in a partially vacant room with a large window that faced the street. It appeared as if the contents of the room were in the process of being taken elsewhere. Boxes were piled up in various corners.

"Thomas," Patton and Logan exclaimed at the same time. They hurried over to him, inspecting to see if he was okay.

"What made you run away like that?" Patton asked. He put his hands on Thomas’s shoulders.

Thomas took his eyes off the window and onto the very concerned faces of Patton and Logan. "I just thought I saw something."

"So you run away?" Logan crossed his arms

"What if something happened to you?"

Virgil and Roman idled in the doorway. If anyone has ever had a moment where you're at a friend's house, and then their parent starts lecturing them, then you know that uncertain and awkward feeling. It was an uncertain and awkward feeling that Virgil and Roman were being exposed to. They weren't quite sure if they should speak up, or walk away, or do anything. So they ended up keeping their mouths shut and pretended to focus on other things.

Thomas sighed. "I'm sorry."

"It's our job to keep you safe," Patton continued. "We can't keep you safe if you wander around without letting us know."

“I know.”

Patton gave a vague semblance of a smile and dropped his hands. “Let’s go home, alright?”

“We’ll discuss this later,” Logan added.

They walked back out to the open office floor. There were a lot of things put in boxes out here as well. Perhaps this particular floor was moving elsewhere. No matter, that wasn’t the main focus of this trip. Patton continued to make worried comments toward Thomas, asking if he was sure he was fine, but Thomas didn’t make very convincing answers. He mostly brushed it all off.

Once they made it back down to the second floor, everyone stopped dead when they heard a door creak open. They held their breath, seeing the door pulled into another room. Virgil expected a businessman, or otherwise threatening authority figure, but who stepped out did not meet his expectations. It was a rather soft-looking woman. A woman of average height with short brown hair -- who wasn’t even wearing a suit or dressed formally at all. She closed the door and looked up, peaceful expression turning surprised.

“Oh, well, wasn’t expecting this,” she said with a small smile.

Virgil wasn’t sure if that phrase was supposed to be significant in any way. He hadn’t ever seen this woman before. At least, he didn’t think so. And by the looks of it, Roman hadn’t either. Patton and Logan, on the other hand, seemed as if they just saw a ghost. Thomas stood there with wide eyes. No one said anything. No one moved.

“M-Mom?” With that simple word, Thomas’s eyes began to water.

The woman looked at him and her smile widened.

“Mom.” Thomas booked it over to her before Patton or Logan could stop him. He crashed into her, wrapping his arms around her, and crying. “Mama.”

Virgil felt as if the air had been pulled from his lungs. Something… something wasn’t right. A little voice screamed at him to get Thomas away from her. But the voice wasn’t his. It didn’t sound familiar. His uneasiness increased tenfold when he saw Logan and Patton. They were still horrified. Patton had his hands covering his mouth. He must have been doing a very good job holding in his empath magic because there were tears in his eyes but Virgil didn't feel a single one.

“Thomas,” Logan started, voice serious and steady. “You need to get back here. Right now."

"What?" Thomas pulled back, wiping his eyes. "But it's my mom. You know how long it's been since the last time I saw her."

"Yes, but that's not --" His voice cracked. Virgil could see the tears forming in his eyes before he shut them.

"Don't listen to him, baby," she said. Her voice was soothing. Like any mother who tries to calm down her child. "He doesn't know what he's talking about."

Logan took a deep breath before attempting to speak again. "Thomas," he still sounded serious, but much more hollow than before, "look at her. Really look at her." He opened his eyes. "That's the last thing we ever saw her in."

Thomas took a step back from her to do as he was instructed. She wasn't wearing anything modern. Or even something that was intended to be worn outside of the house. She had on a silk robe decorated in flowers with a soft pink nightgown underneath. Even her feet were bare.

She wasn't real.

"But…" Thomas took another step back. "How -- why --?" He looked so torn.

"It's alright, Thomas." She took a step toward him. "I'm right here." She opened her arms for a welcoming hug.

And Thomas hesitated.

"Thomas," Patton begged. "Please."

Virgil was almost convinced Thomas wouldn’t listen. This was his mom. Why wouldn’t he think to turn to her first? But he didn’t. He took another step away from her. Fresh tears welled in his eyes as he continued to back away.

The woman frowned. “Thomas.” She dropped her arms. “I’m your mother.”

“I…” He stopped. “M-my --”

“She’s not,” Logan insisted as he stepped forward. “Not anymore.”

“Thomas, you have to believe us.” Patton joined Logan and took his hand. “She really isn’t your mom.”

The woman’s frown deepened as she looked at them. “As if you two would know anything about that. Neither of you had much of an example of what a mother should be.”

Patton's expression shifted to hurt while Logan appeared ready to punch her in the nose. Thomas stared at her in shock.

"Come on, Thomas, I think you've spent enough time with them." She regained her sweet smile and extended a hand toward him.

He didn't take it. He put more distance between them. "I've spent most of my life with them. I'm not just gonna leave."

She looked genuinely surprised by this. "You would rather stay?"

"I can't imagine doing anything else."

Confusion flicked across her face before steadying into something else -- an almost complete 180 of her original sweet persona. More than a furious mother, she seemed downright pissed off. “Thomas, I am trying to make this easier for you. Come here right now.”

“No.”

That didn’t appear to be the right thing to say. “What?”

“I, I said no. I’m not going with you.”

Virgil put his hands in his pockets, curling his fingers around the pens inside. He noticed Roman fidgeting with his bracelet.

“Fine. We’re going to have to do this the hard way.” She straightened out her robe and reached out for him.

Then a few things happened at once. Roman and Virgil summoned their weapons. A bright flash of light erupted before them, and a figure moved swiftly to be in front of Thomas. He seized the woman’s wrist.

“Picani,” Thomas exclaimed.

Or at least… it almost was. He didn’t quite look like himself; appearing more mashed together than usual. Not even his height was the same. His skin was darker. His hair was also darker and a bit curlier. The most drastic difference, however, was his eyes. One was a scalding bright blue, and the other was a dark sky.

“Oh, Cali, I was wondering if you were going to join us.” She yanked her arm back. Her eyes scanned him up and down. “You seem a bit broken though. Are you sure you can hold it together?”

“We can hold it just fine,” he said, Patton’s and Logan’s voices layering over one another.

The corner of her mouth turned up. “Sure sounds like it.”

He scowled. “Thomas, go over to Roman and Virgil.”

Thomas didn’t hesitate to do so.

The woman watched him go with an unreadable expression. Virgil couldn't tell if she was angry or not. "I never figured my own son would stop listening to me one day. After everything I ever did to keep you safe."

"You're not her."

"I was," she snapped, turning her head back to glare at Picani. "I was alive once. I used to be Brigida Sanders -- you used to know me. I'm the reason you're even here at all." She threw a punch at him, only missing because Picani deflected her hand. That didn't appear to slow her down at all.

Roman pulled Thomas back so there would be a greater distance between them and the fight. Virgil followed after.

"Think about it, Cal." She twisted his arm back and pressed her forearm across his shoulders. "What would have happened if Booker and I never found you? Do you think you would have made it very far?" She pushed down on him. "Would you have even accepted yourself?"

Picani's form flickered, allowing him to break out of her hold. "You are not the only reason we are here today."

"I beg to differ." She went at him again, though this time Picani wasn't as capable of blocking her. "I gave you everything. I made sure to protect you. I never let anyone put you down for being who you are. And yet you won't even let me have my son back." With every sentence, her blows hit harder.

Picani stepped away. He put his hands on his knees and breathed in and out in quick successions as if experiencing an intense exercise for the first time. “We promised to protect him.”

“And look what a great job you’ve done,” she retorted, sarcasm dripping from every word as she kicked him back.

In a quick flash of light, Logan and Patton fell to the floor.

“I gave him to you so he’d be safe from those who wanted to hurt him, but now he’s right on Altair’s radar.” She stood in front of them with a scowl. “What kind of protection is that?”

“We tried.” Patton struggled to sit up.

“A lot of good that did.” Her eyes lifted to Thomas. “It’s time for you to join everyone else.”

Thomas tensed. Roman and Virgil stood in front of him protectively. But she didn’t even get to take a step. A tip of a sword appeared in front of her face, halting her progress. Her eyes widened in shock. Logan rose to his feet. He adjusted the sword so it was properly in his hands, but kept it trained on Brigida.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” She raised a brow.

“Have to get rid of you somehow,” he responded.

“I suppose so.” She reached into her pockets and pulled out two matching daggers. The blades and handles were white. The grips had an intricate twisted design laced with gold leading up to the pommels. She put them together and they morphed into one, changing shape and size into a sword. “But I think we both know how this is going to end.”

Logan seemed less confident now -- not that he had time to feel that for long. Brigida swung at him.

As Brigida pushed forward, Virgil made a bee-line to Patton with Roman and Thomas following close behind.

“Are you okay?” Virgil kneeled in front of him.

“What? Y-yeah, yeah I’m fine.” He kept his eyes trained on Brigida and Logan. “I have to --” he stopped abruptly, patting his pockets with widened eyes. “I don’t have a weapon.” Panicked, he placed his hand on the carpet. “We’re on the second floor.” He drew his hand back, eyes briefly scanning over Roman and Virgil’s weapons, and looked around. “Dirt. I need dirt. A potted plant -- something.” He stood up.

“What about this one?” Roman picked up a succulent resting on a nearby desk.

Patton's eyes fluttered over it. “Fake.”

Roman and Thomas looked at it. In all fairness, it seemed pretty real, but perhaps the elf who could control plants knew what he was talking about. Roman tossed it back on the desk.

“You’re doing great, honey,” Patton called out with a nervous smile.

“Some help would be nice,” Logan shot back. He ducked out of the way of an oncoming sword.

“I’m working on it.” He glanced around the room, shifting from foot to foot. “I need to find a real plant.” He looked at Virgil and Roman. “Stay here with Thomas. I’ll be back as fast as I can.” He took off.

“Shouldn’t one of us help Logan?” Virgil cried out after him.

“I wouldn’t recommend it.”

Virgil stood up. “He can’t be serious,” he deadpanned.

“Think about it,” Thomas started in a whisper. “You’ve only known how to fight for two months. My mom’s been able to fight for a couple centuries. I don’t even think Logan would be able to beat her on his own.”

“Isn’t that a good reason to try?” Virgil tightened his grip on his daggers. As he gazed at the two fighting, Right made quiet suggestions on how to best assist Logan.

“I’m kinda with Thomas on this one, Virge,” Roman said. “We have almost no experience -- especially compared to her. How much help can we possibly be?”

That was a solid point. They wouldn’t be able to put up much of a fight against her. But still. Virgil couldn’t help but feel he had to do something. As if it was his responsibility to fix this somehow. There was something deep inside of him that insisted he needed to get rid of her. He had to protect everyone.

Logan hit the ground. His sword was on far from his reach. Brigida stood over him and pulled apart the hilt of her sword, forcing it to return to her hands as two daggers. She adjusted one of them to be in a proper grip. "Good effort, kiddo.”

Virgil reacted on pure instinct. He heard Thomas and Roman's muffled voices, but they didn't impede his progress. He had to do this. Almost as if by muscle memory, he hit his forearm against Brigida’s and pushed it down and around, using her momentum to turn her body away. Once her back was toward him, he shoved her as hard as he could. After it happened, he realized he had an open opportunity to strike, yet he didn’t utilize it. He just wanted to get her far away.

“How the hell did you do that?” Logan’s voice almost didn't register to Virgil's ears.

“I have no idea.” Virgil turned to him.

“Well, we’re not out of it yet.” He got up and grabbed his sword.

The hairs on the back of Virgil’s neck stood on end. He spun around in time to see Brigida slash down with her dagger. He narrowly missed the blade by sidestepping out of the way. He tried to ignore how close she was to almost stabbing him. It was easy to do once he had to block another one of her attacks.

"Oh, those are cute," she commented, eyeing up his daggers. "I'll have to take them off you later." She used their interlocked daggers to her advantage. She pulled on one of them and kicked his leg up, sending him tumbling down.

Much to his chagrin, he realized this was a similar move he had seen before. When Logan threw Roman to the ground.

"Move!" Roman's voice hissed at him.

No need to tell Virgil twice. He rolled in time for Brigida to slam her dagger down. Instead of hitting Virgil, thank God, it stuck into the ground.

She lowered herself enough to whisper, "Stand down, kid." She almost sounded genuine. Then she stood up to deal with Logan.

Like hell would Virgil listen to her. If anything he was being a rather good distraction. He needed to buy Patton more time. With a new goal in mind, he tried to stand up -- except he couldn't get anywhere. He fell back to the floor. It didn't take him long to notice that Brigida's dagger was stabbed through his hoodie pocket. Fuck. He should have zipped it up. He let go of Left so he could pull it out, but when he tugged on it it wouldn't budge. "Jesus, lady," he grumbled to himself. How the hell did she manage this?

"Virgil," Thomas called out. He was hiding behind Roman, eyes apprehensively glancing between his mom and Logan fighting, and the predicament Virgil found himself in. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine." He tugged on it again. This time he managed to move it, but not very much. He had no clue how she stabbed the floor this hard.

“Do you need any help? Or do you have any other dumb stunts to aid you?” Roman raised a brow in his usual ‘you’re-an-idiot-and-I’m-right’ expression.

Virgil glared at him. “I got it.” Sort of. Much to his pain, he realized the easiest option would be to tear his hoodie loose, which would leave a rather unfortunate hole. If he tried to continue pulling out the dagger he’d just be wasting more time. In the end, he decided ruining his favorite hoodie was a small price to pay.

He took each side of the pocket and yanked it up. It got caught on the hilt the first time. But the second time the fabric gave way. He couldn’t lie; that hurt his soul a bit.

“Virgil!”

Virgil didn’t have any time to react. In a split second, he saw Roman and Thomas disappear and then he fell. He landed flat on his back with enough force to knock the wind out of him. The clang of metal was loud and clear in his ears as Right slipped out of his hand. He tried to pick himself up, but he didn’t quite get there. Instead, he rolled to his side, which was at least halfway there and deserved some form of compensation in his opinion. Getting the air knocked out of you was tough shit. Give him some credit.

All of that seemed rather irrelevant, however, when he saw Brigida’s dagger fall over the edge. “What the hell?” His chest constricted as the words passed his lips, but he ignored it. He pushed himself to his feet and immediately wanted to sit back down.

He was on a rather high catwalk. More confusing was that he seemed to be in a theatre. All the seats below him were empty and the bare minimum of lights was on. He held onto the bars to calm his vertigo, but it didn’t help that his hands were slick from sweat. Luckily, part of his attention got dragged somewhere else. Voices. Brigida and Logan were on the stage below.

“You know,” her voice carried up to the catwalk with traces of annoyance. “I don’t even have to take you back to Altair at all. I just have to kill you.”

Logan took a defensive position. “Do it, then.”

“Sure thing.”

No.

No, no, no, no. She would absolutely be able to do that. No. That couldn’t happen. Virgil needed to get down there as fast as possible. Patton would kill him if he stood back and watched. Not that he even entertained the idea, anyway. He located the exit of the catwalk and scooped up his daggers, scurrying off to the door.

He took the stairs down as fast as was safely possible which resulted in him almost running face-first into the door when he reached the bottom. He pushed it open and raced out. He was in one of the wings. None of the main lights were on, but he could see props and equipment silhouetted by the dim blue light. There was a chance he’d trip over something with the rather large mess this posed. Who the hell was performing here? Didn’t they care about safety?

As Virgil navigated his way to an opening, he glanced through the legs to see onstage. With one dagger it seemed as if Brigida struggled to fight back. Not even someone like her would have a good time going up against a sword with such a close-encounter weapon. This was good. By the time Virgil made it onstage, Logan already had Brigida on the ground. Disarmed and with nowhere to go.

He held the tip of his sword to her throat.

Brigida stared at it before bringing her eyes up to Logan. Her expression morphed to be one of hurt. Both frightened and betrayed at the same time. “C’mon, L,” she said, voice wavering. “You wouldn’t hurt me, would you?”

Logan hesitated. Recognition and uncertainty crossed his features. She struck a nerve.

Virgil didn’t get to register what Right had whispered to him before it happened. And he became frozen.

Brigida kicked Logan back, knocking the sword out of his hand. As he stumbled, she picked it up. All sound was caught in Virgil’s throat as she ran it through Logan. Her face showed no remorse -- or even a lack of expression as other Figments -- instead, she wore a sly smirk. She was proud to have lowered Logan’s defenses so easily. She felt something.

She drew the sword back out. Logan took a step back, shaky hands moving to cover his gaping wound. “You were always the weak one.” She shoved him down. “Always too afraid to use your full potential.” He tried to get away, but she kept him down. “Always needing someone to say you’re doing it right. Because mommy and daddy didn’t love you enough. You’re nothing but flaws, Logan. After all this time, that's the one thing you haven't changed.”

“Throw me!” Left all but screamed at Virgil in Patton’s voice.

Brigida lifted the sword.

Like a gear in clockwork, Virgil raised the dagger and threw it. After it left his fingers, a crippling fear hit him at once. He hadn’t thrown his daggers much before. He could miss. He could piss her off and get Logan killed. Why didn’t he think before he threw?

The dagger struck between her eyes. She looked straight at Virgil in surprise. Black ooze leaked out, sliding down over her mouth, then she was gone. Both the dagger and sword fell from their positions. Everything around them fizzled out of existence; they were on the first floor of the office building again.

Virgil stood there in shock. It took Right yelling at him to get him to move. He ran toward Logan and kneeled at his side.

“Oh my God,” he muttered. “Are you alright? No, God.” He placed his hands over the wound, earning a wince from Logan. “I, uh, what do I do?” He tried to not start panicking, but that proved easier said than done. Blood was seeping in between his fingers. Real blood. Actual blood. This wasn’t some horrible vision or a what-if scenario. This was happening right here and he wasn’t prepared for it.

“P-Patton,” Logan choked out.

Virgil furrowed his brows. “Patton?” Then it sunk in. “Patton. Heal. H-he can heal.” He shot up from the ground and ran up the stairs.

The three stood around having an argument that no doubt was seeded in worry.

“Patton.”

They stopped and looked in the direction of Virgil's voice.

Virgil couldn’t think of any words. He held out his hands, both covered in blood. He saw Patton’s eyes scan every inch of him. “Logan.”

Patton’s eyes shot up to Virgil’s face as if needing to see validity. Seeming to find it, he wasted no time in bolting down the stairs.

The others followed after.

All of Patton's English flew out the window when he reached the first floor. Logan winced as his hands were removed and replaced by Patton’s. He whispered calming foreign words as a soft blue glow clashed with the jarring red. Logan kept his eyes screwed shut throughout the whole thing.

Soon, Patton sighed in relief and removed his hands. No one commented on the blood that stained them. “How you feeling?”

Logan groaned and sat up. “Sore.” His hand hovered over the previously open wound. The only evidence that it ever happened was the tear in his shirt and the blood. “You’d think it would be easier the second time.”

“Wait, what?” Roman cried.

Patton chuckled. “Don’t worry about that.” He helped Logan to his feet.

“Are you sure he’s alright?” Virgil gazed at Logan worriedly. “Don’t people who lose blood need transfusions or something?”

“Transfusions only occur if hemoglobin levels are seven or eight grams per deciliter. And he hasn’t passed out so I’d say that’s a pretty good indicator that he’ll live without one.”

Virgil and Roman stared at Patton. Then turned their eyes to Logan.

He seemed to be trying to keep himself steady until he noticed the eyes on him. He looked at them in confusion. “What are you staring at me for? He’s right.”

“Besides,” Patton continued. “We don’t technically exist. The only identification we have is Picani’s."

“Can we just go home now?” Thomas cut in.

Patton stared at him for a moment. "Oh, of course."

They had to be careful to not let anyone else see the blood on their way out.

When they got back, Thomas wasted no time going up the stairs to his room. He didn't say a word. Just left the others behind as soon as the opportunity came up. Patton and Logan watched him go and sighed when his door slammed closed. That didn't seem like a good sign.

"Does this seem like a Picani problem?" Patton turned to Logan.

"It most certainly does. But if we try fusing again I think that might actually kill me so let's avoid that." He placed a hand where Brigida stabbed him.

Roman frowned as he gazed up the stairs. "We could always send Virgil up there."

"What?" Virgil gave him an incredulous look.

Roman returned the look as if it was obvious. "You're the next best thing. He likes you. You help him with so many things and he tells you everything. You'll probably deal with this better than all of us."

"I think he's right," Patton agreed.

Oh great. Now he couldn't weasel out of it. "Let me clean the blood off first," he sighed.

After scrubbing his hands, he headed up the stairs. The little blackboard on Thomas's door had the same message it did for the past two months. No one changed it or attempted to erase it all the way. Virgil knocked underneath it. "Hey, kid, it's me. If you don't want me coming in say something now or else I'm going to take it as an invitation." He waited but didn't get anything. Taking a deep breath, he opened the door.

He couldn’t see Thomas at first. His initial thought was that he somehow got out, but his reasoning skills set in. There was a scrunched up pile of blankets on the bed. He had to be under there.

He sat down at the edge of the bed. The bundle of blankets didn’t move. “You doing okay?” He placed his hands in his lap.

There came a muffled response of, “Peachy.” From the one word alone, Virgil could tell something wasn’t quite right. It didn’t sound like him. A quiet sniffle soon told him why.

How would he approach this? “Do you wanna talk about it?”

“I want Picani.”

Oh, sweet Jesus. He sounded like a heartbroken little kid. Virgil couldn’t handle this right now. “He’d come up here if he could, but I don’t think he’d stick around very long. I’m afraid you only have me. If you don’t want to talk, you don’t have to.”

He let out a broken sound. “I… I didn’t want to think about it. I didn’t want to believe that she -- that everyone -- that they’re… they’re…” He shattered into pieces. Even through the fabric, his sobbing was clear and audible. “I-I just wanted them to be fine. I wanted it so bad, but it was dumb and naive to keep thinking that way. And it hurts. I ignored everything telling me the truth because I didn’t wanna stop believing that they were out there somewhere. But they’re not. Of course they weren’t. I knew that the moment I met you, but it took me seeing my mom as a Figment to get me to believe it.”

“The moment you met me?” Something squirmed inside Virgil’s chest. His hands turned clammy.

“You have her eyes.”

Her eyes.

“You’re a lot like her. You have that same light in your eyes."

“Because they’ll see the same thing I did.”

“I guess history repeats itself, after all.”

He… he used to be Brigida.

“I-I just wanna be alone right now.” Thomas further pulled his blankets around himself. His next words came out even more muffled than before, “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

Virgil obeyed without another word. His movements didn’t feel quite like his own as he walked toward the door. Like he had control but someone else was doing the action. Maybe it had to do with his missing puzzle piece making things more complicated rather than complete.

(Next)

[pokii-jonas]

Purrfectly Virgil : A New Story Emerges :D

OVERALL FIC SUMMARY -- Virgil has always been different from Logan, Roman, and Patton which they have all grown used to and accept.

However, Virgil may be a bit more different than they originally thought.

If only they knew...

(aka, the cat virgil fic no one asked for :p)

Chapter Summary: Something new and unusual is taking place in Thomas's mind. What's happening?

Chapter’s Characters: Virgil, Patton, Roman, Logan, Thomas, Deceit

AO3

Chapter 1          Previous          Next

CHAPTER WARNINGS

sympathetic deceit

PLEASE TELL ME IF I FORGOT SOMETHING!!!

It was three in the morning when Deceit was finally ready.

She stepped back with a sigh from the mirror and smiled at her reflection, happy with what she saw.

The dress and shoes fit perfectly, which didn’t shock her in the slightest. Virgil had always been good at that sort of thing.

She was also happy to note that the dress did indeed pair very nicely with her hat and cape, in both the shape and the color, and her elbow length yellow opera gloves.

Her hat had been placed to the side of her head so as not to fully cover her hair that she had spent many painful hours putting into soft curls that danced delicately around her face.

Her make-up, however, was what brought the entire look together she thought.

Gold and green eye shadow paired with a highlighter bright enough to kill and cheekbones that could cut a hoe, all held together with a dark red glossy lip.

She smiled at herself as she felt her dysphoria melt away.

Giving a small turn, she laughed as her dress lifted up with the air and flowed softly and delicately around her.

Stopping for a second to let her head stop spinning, she gracefully walked over to her stereo to put on some music.

She couldn’t remember the last time she felt this good.

She would definitely consider herself as more laid back when it came to fashion, usually opting for no makeup and sweats, but when she did dress up she always did it with a bang and went all out!

In the middle of the night when her host was most likely asleep so she wouldn’t get summoned, accidentally or on purpose.

There was no way she wanted the others or Thomas to see her like this. That was too personal. Why give them another reason to outcast her?

Though, of course she could care less about what they thought of her. Really, that was something Virgil would be more afraid of. Deceit didn’t care though.

She was fine. Really. The fact that she was a ‘she’ was just personal, that’s it.

So as she was putting in a One Direction CD(another thing no one needed to know about), she couldn’t help the scream that left her as she found herself suddenly standing in Thomas’s living room with everyone else.

“God damn it.” she whispered to herself, closing her eyes.

Taking a deep breath to get herself together, she opened her eyes again to face the others with her usual front of cold composure.

Deciding to ignore the four surprised gazes on her, she addressed the second matter on her mind.

“Thomas, it isn’t past three in the morning, why aren’t you up?” Deceit asked smoothly, crossing her arms over her chest while letting a small smile play on her lips.

Opening his mouth to speak, all he was able to let out in his surprised state was, “I, uh, what?”

Deceit tsked and was about to say something else when Roman finally seemed to find his tongue.

“Is it okay to be attracted to someone who is technically the same person as you?” he asked, incredibly matter-of-factly, while looking Deceit up and down.

Deceit felt a dark blush tinge her cheeks, but she refused to look away from Roman.

“No, not at all, Narcissus,” she said. “Especially since you’ve seemed to enjoy my company so much every other time I’ve popped up.”

Roman huffed, but before he could say anything, Thomas finally spoke up.

“Why are you dressed like that anyway?” he said, also taking a moment to look Deceit up and down.

Deceit’s blush deepened.

“Yes, let’s talk about what I do with my free time rather than what you are doing up at three a.m.” she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes.

“It’s my fault.” Virgil suddenly said, looking down at his feet and pulling the sleeves of his hoodie over his hands.

“Oh? That’s shocking.” Deceit said, giving Virgil a small smirk when he glared at her.

“So, what doesn’t have to so tweaked, Virge?” Deceit said casually, walking over to the couch and sitting down gracefully, crossing her legs.

Virgil followed and sat down opposite to her on the couch, curling his legs up to his chest.

“I don’t know,” he mumbled. “ Something just doesn’t feel right.”

Deceit frowned at this.

“What does?” she asked, momentarily forgetting they weren’t alone.

Virgil sighed.

“I don’t know, but something feels off and I don’t know what.”

Deceit’s frown deepened. Virgil had his paranoid moments, obviously, but usually they were based around something.

What was happening?

“But you are anxiety. The feeling of anxiety doesn’t always have a purpose.” Logan said, finally speaking up for the first time since Deceit appeared.

“Even so, it’s unusual.” Deceit replied, still deep in thought as she brought a hand up to rub her temple.

“What? Even for speaking in opposites, what you just said makes no sense.” Logan said, causing Deceit to look up at him.

“What?” she asked as she watched him study her curiously.

“Well, if you speak in opposites, like you’ve led us to believe, then what you just said was, ‘Even so, it’s usual,’ which sounds rather odd.” he quietly mumbled, however after the words left his mouth, his eyes widened slightly.

“Which means you can speak the truth. You asking ‘what?’ so genuinely proves it. If you could really only speak opposites, you would have said something along the lines of, ‘I know what you just said.’”

Deceit froze as she watched Logan.

“Shit,” she mumbled.

“Yeah, fine. You got me. Thanks for taking away my thing.” she snapped, crossing her arms.

Tossing her her head to the side to look at Virgil.

“When did this feeling come about?” she asked gently, not bothering to speak in opposites anymore.

Virgil hummed in thought for a second before saying, “A few weeks ago. Right after Christmas. I don’t know what’s happening, but the feeling is getting stronger.

“Oh!” Patton exclaimed from the steps, causing everyone to turn and look at him.

“What’s up padre?” Roman asked, yawning slightly.

“I… This was sitting next to be for some reason.” Patton said, confused, as he held up what looked to be an origami Pegasus.

“What?” Thomas asked, voicing what everyone else was thinking as well.

“I wonder how that-” Logan started to say when Virgil suddenly gave a jarring scream, causing everyone to jump away from him.

“Virgil, what’s wrong?” Deceit asked concerned, turning to look at Virgil who had managed to jump onto the back of the couch and was hissing at a spot on the floor.

Turning her gaze to look where Virgil was looking, she couldn’t help but let out a laugh.

There on the floor, for no apparent reason, was a cucumber.

“Virge, honey. It’s just a cucumber.” she said, incredibly amused, as she stood and picked up the offending object.

Virgil only hissed in response, but Deceit was already distracted as she felt the object in her hand.

It wasn’t even a cucumber, it was-

“AWWWWWWWWWW, HE’S LIKE A CAT!!!” Patton exclaimed happily, jumping off the steps and bouncing up and down excitedly.

Virgil’s face immediately flushed a bright crimson and he jumped back down to his spot on the couch, still wearily eying the cucumber in Deceit’s hands.

“There is no reason to be afraid of cucumbers, Virgil, wha-” Logan started, only to be cut off by Deceit saying, “It’s not a cucumber.”

The room went silent as everyone stared at Deceit with incredulous looks.

“Are you speaking weirdly again or…” Romas asked, looking between her and the rest of the room.

“It’s not a cucumber.” she repeated, grabbing both ends and ripping it in half.

“It’s paper.”

The silence continued on, deafeningly so as everyone watched what was once a cucumber disintegrate before their very eyes until there was nothing left.

“I… I’m sorry, what?” Roman said quietly, his eyes wide and unstaring at where the ‘cucumber’ used to be.

“Am I just sleep deprived? I didn’t just see that, right?” Thomas asked, rubbing his eyes and looking to Logan.

“Possibly, but you aren’t that sleep deprived. You shouldn’t be at the point of hallucinations.”

There was silence once more as everyone tried to figure out what was even happening.

Virgil was the first to break the quiet.

“We should go to sleep. Staying up later won’t help Thomas function tom-today.” he said, standing up and stretching.

Logan was next.

“Virgil is correct. If Thomas sleeps, then we can make more rational decisions tomorrow.”

“Fine, I’ll be the first to leave then. Ta-ta for now, peasants!” Roman declared, promptly sinking out as he tried to hold back a yawn.

“Yeah, I’m pretty tuckered as well.” Patton said next, placing the origami pegasus on Thomas’s coffee table.

“Night, kiddos!” he exclaimed, waving happily as he too sunk out.

“In that case, I believe I’ll go next.” Logan said, turning to address Deceit quickly.

“I presume you’ll want to join our discussion tomorrow, yes?”

She gave a curt nod and Logan returned it.

“We will call on you when it’s time then.” he said, sinking out without another word.

“Okayyyy, I’m going upstairs. You two do what you want.” Thomas said, running a hand through his hair and walking towards the steps.

Once he was out of sight, Deceit turned to Virgil.

“You wanna sleep in my room tonight?” she asked, knowing full well Virgil was probably quite shaken by everything that was happening.

Plus, she liked sleeping with Virgil. He was so warm, she didn’t even need her electric blanket.

She would probably still use it though.

To her delight, Virgil gave her a small smile and nodded.

Sinking down together to her room, Deceit gave a quick snap of her fingers and her makeup was off and her sweats were on.

Virgil followed suit and the both climbed into the bed, Deceit curling herself up to Virgil as he turned off the light.

While they both happily drifted off to bed, the strange events of that night were still fresh on their minds.

What in the world was happening in Thomas’s mind?

Next

-*-*-*-*-*-

SOOOOOOOOO :D

i had an idea for a plot and um... yeah, i'm getting there ;p

chapters will mainly focus on Virgil's pov, but Deceit just really fit in here i thought so i went with it :p

i hope you guys enjoy the direction this fic is taking!!!

ALSO I DIDN'T RE READ THIS AFTER WRITING, SO SORRY FOR ERRORS BUT IT'S 3 AM AND I NEEDA SLEEP OMG IT'S A SCHOOL NIGHT, I'M A DISASTER

TAGLIST:

@avocados26  @sherlock-lives-on-bakerstreet

[anxiously-unsatisfied-world]

The Heart’s Home - Chapter 7

A/N: So I got to have a lot of fun planning out cute outfits and stuff for Pat, but @fairytailtwists helped as well by compiling some examples. So thank you! <3

Warnings: None - let me know if you need something tagged!

Word Count: 1401 (are these good length chapters? should i make them longer (though that would make them take longer ^^;)) 

Main Four Sides / Other Characters 

Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 |  Chapter 8

“Anything catch your eye?” Roman asks as they step foot into the store, a few items catching his own attention but he wants to let Patton have the first pick here. After all, he’s the one who is going to be wearing them.

Patton scans the area in front of them, his eyes wide at how many options there are. “Um…” Patton shrugs, finding it hard to choose just one section he wants to look at when there are so many interesting colors and patterns and styles in all directions.

“Do you want one of us to choose something first?” Logan asks, his voice soft and sympathetic, and sets a hand on Patton’s shoulder.

Patton smiles at him gratefully and nods, both of them looking to Roman, who straightens up and reaches for Patton’s hand. Patton grabs his hand and follows behind Roman as he leads them over to a rack of graphic tees.

Patton giggles at the cute animal designs on some of them and he lets go of Roman’s hand to look closer at the shirts. All of these are so cute! It’d be difficult to choose just a few…

“See anything you like, dear Prince?” Roman asks, kneeling down to both be at Patton’s height and to look at something a bit lower down.

“They’re all so cute!” Patton says with a grin, “How am I going to choose?” He continues to scan the different designs, trying to figure out which ones he likes most (though he likes all of them!).

Roman nods seriously, “Yes, this is a difficult decision. However, I want you to pick whichever ones of these make you smile the most or the happiest. Can you do that?” Roman asks like he’s imparting an important task to Patton.

Patton takes to this easily, nodding with a determined look. “Of course, I can, Ro!” Patton looks closely at the shirts and points at one. “How about that one?”

“Splendid choice! Now, you need to try this on so we know your size for certain, alright?” Roman takes one of the shirts in what he thinks is Patton’s size and hands it over.

Patton nods and clutches the shirt to his chest. “Okie dokie, Ro-ro!” Patton says with a grin.

Roman smiles softly at him and ruffles his hair lightly, laughing when it causes the boy to squeal softly. “Good.”

“I can take him to the dressing rooms if you’d like to keep looking.” Logan offers and Roman nods, already determined to find some of the cutest, yet stylish outfits for their sun.

Logan reaches out a hand, which Patton takes eagerly, leading him over to the dressing room and letting him inside. Once they’ve made sure that the shirt fits him, they head back to the graphic tees and pick out a few more. One spells out the word love in black lettering but the ‘o’ is a paw print. Another has an upside down cat on it while another has a few puppies playing on it.

“Alright, I’ll hold onto these. Now, why don’t we find Roman again? Heaven only knows that he’s probably planning too many outfits.” Logan says with a fond, yet exasperated expression that causes Patton to giggle softly.

“Ro-ro? Where are you?” Patton calls out, looking around but the standing racks of clothes tower over him and block his sight.

“By the jackets!” Roman returns and Logan looks over, spotting his husband trying to choose between two jackets. Logan leads Patton over to Roman, standing off to the side and watching as Patton helps Roman choose the jacket he likes most.

Both jackets end up making the final cut as Patton liked them both for different reasons. One was really soft and pastel colored while the other was denim and better-suited to keep him warm.

Next, they head to the hoodies since they’re right next to the regular jackets and Patton giggles at the first one he looks at it. It has the image of a cartoon seal on it with the words ‘Majestic Dog Mermaid’ surrounding the picture. Something about that description fits it perfectly and Patton turns to look at Roman.

“Would you like that one?” Roman asks and Patton nods, his eyes brightening as Roman looks through the stack for one in his size.

“Yay! Thank you!” Patton cheers and Roman smiles, setting the hoodie on the pile of clothes he has draped over one arm.

“I’d say you can choose another hoodie so you can choose between them?” Roman suggests, glancing at Logan, who nods in approval.

Patton nods and bounces excitedly on his feet as he turns to look at the rest of the hoodies. There are a few plain ones that he gives more than a cursory glance to but when he finds a pale gray hoodie that has cat ears on the hood as well as holes in the sleeves to make sweater paws out of, he knows he’s found the one.

Roman smiles, not even having to ask if Patton wants that one, as Patton is practically glowing when he looks at it, so he pulls one out of the pile and adds it to the rest. Patton grins and thanks Roman once again, looking much like the cat who got the cream.

The rest of their time in this particular store is spent just stocking up on some plain t-shirts in a variety of colors and sleeve lengths.

Once they make it out into the main area of the mall, Roman turns to them both with a gleam in his eye, already knowing what store he wants to head to next. He doesn’t even have to speak for Logan, far too familiar with that particular store, to know which store that is.

“Yes, we can go to the Disney store,” Logan says and chuckles softly when both Roman and Patton cheer in a very similar manner.

Logan gestures for them to go ahead, chuckling softly when Roman takes Patton’s hand and they speed walk to the store while Logan follows behind at a more sedate pace, keeping them in sight the whole time.

The second Patton steps foot into the store, his eyes widen and he can’t help but grin at the sight of shirts and plushies and toys all centered around his favorite movies. He lets go of Roman’s hand and races over to a wall that is covered in character plushies and starts looking through them, geeking out over the plushies.

Roman quickly follows after, knowing how amazing this part of the store can be. Especially since there is a plush toy for pretty much any character you could think of! “So, any character striking your fancy?” Roman asks after Patton’s gotten a look at most of them.

“Yeah! I can’t believe they have a Wall-E plush! They’re my favorite character ever!” Patton says, turning and grinning at Roman, bouncing lightly on his heels.

“Go ahead and grab one,” Roman says and Patton gasps, quickly hugging Roman and dashing over to where he had seen the plush. Roman just smiles, thinking back to his first time in the store. He was just as excited as Patton currently is and he left the store with a stuffed Mickey Mouse along with a promise to come back for more plushies.

Patton comes back with his plushie in tow and the most pleased expression on his face as he cradles it to his chest. Roman just smiles and lets him pick out two more similarly sized plushies (as the store is currently having a special) before they head over to look at the shirts.

Patton ends up with nearly one shirt for every movie he likes (or what feels that way to him), but he’s not complaining. It’ll be awesome to get to show off how much he likes Disney by having all these different shirts.

After they get everything they want from the store, Logan, who had been watching them run around and have fun looking at everything, suggests that they should stop by the food court before going to any other shops as it’s been several hours since breakfast and it’s about time to eat.

Patton nods enthusiastically at that and so does Roman, both of them realizing that all of their running around has left them famished. So they all link hands and head off towards the food court.

Taglists: (Let me know if you want to be added or removed from either! ^^) 

General TS Taglist: @anuninspiredpoet, @echomist13, @theresneverenoughfandoms @fiive-second-cookies @sevencrashing, @virgil-is-verge @fandermom @evilmuffin

Heart’s Home Taglist: @a-lexicon-of-words , @scorching-scotch , @bunny222 , @but-jesuschrist-im-never-good, @anuninspiredpoet, @echomist13, @ab-artist, @ashlynrivers, @fairytailtwists @just-another-rainbowblog

[terminally-anxious]

Lost in shadows (part 2)

summary: Patton had been difficult to play. But only because didn’t really know how the other behaved, but also because Patton was everything he wasn’t. Honest, compassionate, kind and overly emotional.

Playing Virgil would be easy compared to playing the moral aspect. 

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, those fully belong to Thomas Sanders and his friends.

Word count: 1932

Tw: Swearing, Deceit, violence, lying, blood, wounds, anger, manipulation, unconsciousness (if there are anymore please tell me)

Pairings: LAMP (Platonic/Familial)

Deceit scowled down at his wrist, he’d been able to wash away the blood, but the deep and jagged gashes were another matter entirely. They were the only thing that was different from Virgil’s appearance. 

Deceit was glad he had caught the other off guard, if he hadn’t... well he’d be sporting much more damage than just a couple of deep scratches on his wrist. 

Virgil wasn’t really a side he could win against in an honest fight. Which was the main reason he had used illusion, and a few dirty tricks to win. 

Seeing as Virgil was fight or flight personified, he was also the best fighter of them all. Most people would have thought Roman to be the best, and while he wasn’t the worst by far, he certainly wasn’t the best either.

No, Virgil had a hidden strength to him, and stamina and agility as well. Truly a dangerous opponent when the facet decided to fight rather than take flight.

Yes, Deceit was lucky to only have a few scratches. 

He pulled Virgil’s hoodie sleeve over his hand, effectively hiding them from sight. He’d had no time to bandage it, Virgil’s room made him acutely aware of the passage of time, and he had needed to reappear for the end card. 

Now it was a couple of hours after the entire video ended, and Deceit just couldn’t stay in the anxious side’s room anymore. The heavy feeling of dread was awful and he couldn’t stand it anymore. 

Exiting the room, he hunched his shoulders and shoved his hands into the pockets. He schooled his expression to mirror Virgil’s perfectly.

Patton had been difficult to play. But only because didn’t really know how the other behaved, but also because Patton was everything he wasn’t. Honest, compassionate, kind and overly emotional.

Playing Virgil would be easy compared to playing the moral aspect. 

Before Anxiety had joined the ‘light sides’ he’d been stuck with the rest of the ‘dark sides’, but he hadn’t really been accepted there either. 

Virgil wanted to protect Thomas, which meant he belonged with the main sides, but with some help from Deceit, he’d been able to convince Thomas and the others that Virgil was the villain. 

The other dark sides had wanted to nothing with anxiety. But Deceit knew it was important to have some control over the facet that was responsible for fear. 

Hadn’t it been for Virgil’s stunt of ‘ducking out’, then Deceit and the others would have stayed in the shadows, all the while Virgil played the antagonist. 

Well, there was no point in thinking over lost plans, he needed to stay focused on the task at hand. 

Deceit trudged down the stairs, his mind sharp and alert.

“There you are kiddo!” Patton’s excited voice beamed. Deceit looked to where he heard the chipper voice, only to see Patton sitting in the sofa while...knitting? Deceit stared in confusion, he’d never seen the moral aspect knit before, not even when he had been spying at them. 

Patton put his needles and yarn into a basket, before turning his full attention to the disguised side. “I was getting worried about you. I spoke to Logan and he said you were exhausted, so I didn’t want to bother you, but now that you’re here, do you think we could talk a little?” 

“okay... about what?” Deceit answered. 

“About what happened earlier today, with... Deceit.” Patton looked mildly surprised, they hadn’t really been able to say his name without their hands covering their mouths. 

Deceit on the other hand, had a hard time trying not to muffle his name. It had become such a habit to just block them from uttering it. 

“Then you know what he did today..?” The liar inquired.

Patton nodded. “I have spoken to the others, getting their side of the story and such. The only one I haven’t talked to is you and Deceit himself.” 

‘oh sweet irony’ He thought, fighting a grin.

“Can I ask you something first Patton? 

“Of course kiddo.”

“How do I know you’re not Deceit?” He grinned inwardly, his earlier confrontation with Virgil was a good reference point.

“Well, we’re famILY!” Patton grinned, thinking back at the card he’d given Virgil after ‘Accepting anxiety’. 

A quick glimmer of confusion and anger crossed Virgil’s face. If Patton hadn’t been looking, he wouldn’t have seen it. But the thing is, he had seen it.

‘That’s not Virgil.’ 

Morality was shocked by his own thought. He tried to dismiss it, but the more he thought about it, the more it made sense. Contrary to popular belief, he wasn’t in fact stupid. Quite the opposite actually. As the embodiment of emotions, he was a genius at body language and emotion. And while the counter fit Virgil on front of him was almost perfect, Patton could see that something wasn’t right. 

The hoodie was genuine, but the way ‘Virgil’ wore it was wrong. The hood was inside out, the sleeves not reaching over his fingers anymore, but only to the wrists. He seemed to favor his right side, even though Virgil was left handed. The eye shadow too gray and his hair was swept in the opposite direction. 

‘Virgil’ stood too still and his eyes held a certain cockiness to them.

‘That’s not my son.’ 

Not wanting to give his suspicion away, he smiled warmly at the imposter. 

“You know what, we can talk about this tomorrow instead, how about a movie night?” 

Deceit tried for Virgil’s loop sided smile, but it fell short.

“sure, what are we watching?”

“Oh you know, some of our favorites! The older Dream works movies for Roman, The black cauldron for me, Treasure planet for Logan and The nightmare before christmas for you!” 

Deceit Mulled over the movies, it made sense that Virgil would like The nightmare before christmas, and if he remembered correctly he had seen a poster of the movie within anxiety’s room. 

What he didn’t know though, was that the only truth to Patton’s sentence was the anxious aspect’s favorite movie. And even that didn’t apply to Deceit himself. 

Patton just needed some solid proof, if ‘Virgil’ didn’t correct him on his movie choices, then he would know. Virgil knew all of their favorite things by heart, that was just one of his many good qualities.

“Cool, do you want me to go get the others?” ‘Virgil’ asked, not even blinking at the wrong information Patton had given him.

‘That’s not my dark strange son.’ 

“I’ll do that, how about you take a look through the movie cabinet and see if you can find all of our favorites?”

Deceit nodded, and moved towards the cabinet and sank to his knees, trying to locate the movies. 

The staircase creaked as Patton ascended to the 2nd floor.

As Deceit was looking through the cabinet, he noticed that they were sorted into different categories. Probably Logan’s meticulous nature coming into play.

His eyes scanned the shelves, seeing labels such as; Rom-com, Comedy, Sci-fi, Favorites, Horror... 

Deceit’s mind snapped back to the shelf labeled favorites. He froze.

They were mostly Disney, not Dream Works. The black cauldron was together with multiple Tim Burton movies and The nightmare before christmas. These were Virgil’s movies... 

Quickly looking to the stack next to it, he could see it belonged to Logan. Documentaries, Big hero 6 and no treasure planet.. 

‘Why would Patton give him false informa-!’ 

Realization Broke him out of his frozen stupor, but before he could retreat; Roman came thundering down the stairs, sword in hand and murder in his eyes. 

“Roman? What are yo-!” Roman’s sword pierced into the fabric above his right shoulder, and thus forced the purple clad liar to the ground. 

His back smacked into the floor, the sword pinning in place. 

“What the fuck are you doing princey?!” Deceit hissed, trying to keep up his facade. 

“Don’t you dare, you vile snake!” If looks could kill, Deceit would have been dead ten times over. Roman placed his boot on top of Deceit’s rib cage, pressing him further into the ground.

“What Roman is hoping to accomplish, is to threaten you. Seeing as you are not the one you’re pretending to be.” A voice sounded to his left. Logan was glaring down at him, his eyes cold and full of disdain. 

Patton joined in last, standing on his right side. “Where’s my son.” 

Oh, how could he have forgotten that Patton was almost every emotion Thomas possessed. How Patton was sorrow and Happiness, but also his fury and anger.

Deceit tried to dislodge the sword as he felt the first tendrils of fear creep up inside him.

“It’s me! Virgil! What the hell’s gotten into you?!” They weren’t supposed to find him out so soon. 

Patton’s expression tightened as Roman pressed his foot harder into his sternum. 

“You are not. Patton has a sufficient amount of evidence against you Deceit, and upon closer inspection I’m inclined to believe him.” Logan Spoke, a snarl working it’s way onto the logical sides face.  

Deceit opened his mouth to protest, but stopped when the strings that were connected to his fingers tugged. 

‘Caught you!’ Deceit thought triumphantly, a sadistic grin spreading across his face.

He didn’t care that it gave him away. He’d finally caught Virgil. The elusive side was good at running, but even fight or flight couldn’t last forever. 

“What are you grinning about Jekyll and lied?! Where’s virgil!” Roman growled.

The three main sides glared down at the grinning man, the expression was completely foreign on Virgil’s face.

“I have no idea where Virgil is.” Deceit didn’t see the need to hide, so he let his eye fade back to it’s normalcy. 

“Deceit... Tell us where he is, now.” 

The liar grabbed a hold of Roman’s ankle, his grip unforgiving. “How about I just show you?” 

Suddenly the floor opened up under all of them, and with nothing for them to stand on they fell. 

The last thing the three light sides heard was Deceit’s dark chuckling and the words.

“We have prepared the most marvelous of plays for you, but we’re not quite ready for you to see it yet, are we Virgil?”

Then, they were consumed by darkness. 

(( tag list: @bunny222 ))

[justanothercinemaniac]

Epic Movie (Re)Watch #203 - The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)

Spoilers Below

Have I seen it before: Yes

Did I like it then: Yes.

Do I remember it: Yes.

Did I see it in theaters: Yes.

Was it a movie I saw since August 22nd, 2009: Yes, #275.

Format: Blu-ray

1) The very first frame of this film shows us the structure which Walter’s life thrives on, the order of it. That, mixed with the silence of the scene, defines Walter’s life. As does his hesitation to do a simply yet slightly risky move by sending his crush a wink on a dating website. Walter’s life is simple, reserved, and a tad empty (as the silence indicates). It’s something that will be challenged as the film continues.

2) Walter’s imaginings/fantasies are incredibly relatable and I think that’s why I think the story is so interesting in the first place. Most everyone wishes to be more than they are in some way shape or form and we imagine what that would be like. That’s the core thing this story relates to. Our wish to be more adventurous or just live a fuller life.

3) Ben Stiller’s direction in this film is a lot more precise than, say, his work on Zoolander. Which makes sense considering this is a much different film. There’s much more of a distinct purpose in his decisions such as with cinematography and pacing. It all just gives the film an aesthetic and taste unique to the actor/director’s work.

4) Ben Stiller as Walter Mitty.

Much like his skills as a director for this film, Stiller’s acting is much more subtle than some of his broad comedy work. He makes Walter a crazy sympathetic and relatable character instead of a loser (which he could’ve easily come across as in lesser hands). He’s reserved, defined by his imagination and at times his lack of ability to act on it. Not only does Stiller play Walter well, but he plays all the imaginings of Walter well. They all FEEL like Walter in some basic sense but also are more; they’re a little more showy, which makes sense because they’re not really in the world of the story. All in all, Stiller as Walter Mitty just works.

5) Adam Scott is freaky good at playing a conceited jackass/punchable douche bag. He is just SUCH a jerk in this movie I want to pull off his stupid freaking beard. I gotta go watch some “Parks and Rec” to cool down.

6) The loss of the photo known as “The Quintessence of Life” - which is meant to be the best by this legendary photographer as well as something which Walter’s job hinges on - sets up a clear external conflict/goal for Walter to achieve. This in turn helps to motivate the plot.

7) For me, Walter’s REAL encounters with Cheryl as far more interesting than the fantasies. The fantasies play out in an obviously scripted and fictitious fashion, whereas the real encounters have a sense of honesty to it. This is in part due to Kristen Wiig’s performance as Cheryl, which is notably strong. She’s very heartfelt in the part and has a nice connection/chemistry with Stiller’s Walter. He’s not objectifying her. His fantasies aren’t about her being sexy with him, it’s just about being someone she finds interesting. It’s about having a life with her. I like that.

8) It’s interesting to note that Walter seems a lot more comfortable around his family than the people at his work, which makes sense. We all have different comfort levels around different people, especially our family. So I appreciate that this film made the conscious decision to address that.

9) The extended fight sequence fantasy between Walter and Ted (Adam Scott) may be more of a distraction from the plot than anything else, but there is an entertainment value to its action which means it’s not just a waste of screen time.

10) Patton Oswalt has a recurring mostly voice over role in the film as Todd, an employee at eHarmony who keeps checking in on Walter. Oswalt is a wonderful performer with a great voice (see Ratatouille for proof), so the character coming in repeatedly is actually a nice touch. It creates a nice sense of consistency through the movie’s journey, representative of the little voice that eggs Walter to go further in his life. We get a sense of his character through these interactions (he cares about this customer enough to keep calling him and actually develop a sort of friendship) and as I mentioned before Oswalt’s voice is just full of life. It’s a nice part of the movie.

11) Perhaps the film’s biggest problem is also something which helps give it its tone and that is the slower pacing. Slower pacing can work as a tool to drive up tension and get the audience more invested in character’s, but here it doesn’t really do that. There’s not enough of a continued exploration of why Walter is searching so desperately for this picture. We as the audience do understand he needs more adventure in his life and the external motivations have been set up well, but the film could spend its slower pacing really digging deep into why this is so important to Walter. Why he’s going so far for this one thing and not something else. It does get addressed in the film, but I think a continued addressing of it would help with the pacing problems.

12) The film has a nice sense of quirky humor which comes through sometimes. It’s subtle, less broad than some of Stiller’s other work, but effective in giving the movie its flavor. I almost wish there was more of it.

Greenland Rental Car Employee [after Walter asks if they have any cars]: “Yeah, we have a blue one and a red one.”

13) This movie’s best fantasy scene is when Walter sees Cheryl singing “Major Tom” to him. In this moment he’s not fantasizing about doing something but instead finding the inspiration inside him to do something REAL. Taking an ACTUAL risk in his life, and Wiig’s vocals of this classic Bowie tune set the tone for that choice wonderfully.

14) The non-fantasy moments of this film, the exciting ones when Walter actually DOES something, are so much more interesting to me than the fantasy ones. I think they’re meant to. Take for example the scene where Walter jumps into the ocean from a helicopter and encounters a shark. This injects some much needed life and adrenaline into the film. It’s interesting because it’s based on choice not just the character’s longing to do something. He actually DOES it. There’s a compelling sense of honesty to this that is not found in the fantasy sequences and I think that’s why it works so well.

15) One of the more charming elements of this film are all the little connections Walter makes on his journey. From the chopper pilot to the guy on the fishing boat to the man who helps him run form the volcano. There’s (and I’ve used this phrase before) a sense of honesty there. I think most of us have these memorable encounters with people we’ll never meet again, but we carry them with us as we go on in life. That’s what these moments are for Walter and I dig it.

16) Okay, in reference to something I discussed in note #11, THIS is what I wish was constantly in the film!

Walter [talking about when he was younger]: “I used to have a mow hawk and a backpack and I guess this idea of who I wanted to be…”

I wish every scene was DRIPPING with this. Walter’s life kind of stopped after his dad died, which makes sense. But after something like that you have to get your life moving again at some point, which he never did. That’s why there’s this difference between who he wanted to be and who he is. He never got back on some sort of track. I just would LOVE more of this idea throughout the film.

17) Walter needing to come back to New York only to get fired and think Cheryl isn’t available anymore disrupts the flow of the plot a little I think. It adds a sense of realism though and leads to the nice surprise of Sean having met with Walter’s mom earlier in the movie, but it kind of just takes me out of Walter’s journey. That might just be a personal thing though.

18) So for most of this movie we don’t meet Sean, who is a major character. Yet we get a clear sense of his character. It comes through in his photos, his communications with other characters, and the discussions those characters have ABOUT him. It all works. So when Sean Penn does show up as Sean, it matches up perfectly with what we expect of this character.

Sean is someone who takes things seriously. He comes off as poetic and artistic without being a pretentious dick (which is a risk when writing a character who is meant to come off as artistic). There’s is a peace to him that Walter aspires to have. Sean Penn can be hit or miss with me in movies, but I do really enjoy his performance in this film. IT doesn’t get a lot of screen time but he’s able to pull me in. I don’t see Penn, I just see his character and that’s the mark of a really good performance.

19) I love this quote.

20) There is this wonderful stillness in the scene with Walter and Sean. It is quietly moving and in a lot of ways acts as the film’s climax. Everything has been leading up to this moment. Not just meeting Sean but finding out what happened to the picture. And to discover that Walter and it with him all along (the thing you were searching for was always with you, get it?) makes a lot of sense. It’s one of those resolutions which works because it’s the only one you can imagine. It just fits perfectly with the plot and action. And the scene when we learn this is great because everything fades away and its just these two characters. Walter and Sean. Who Walter is and who he wanted to be. I dig it.

21) Walter didn’t look at the Quintessence, not seeing it until it graced the cover of Life. That’s because (and this probably sounds cheesy) he found it himself. He’s not looking for it anymore because he realizes its in the choices he makes and the people he meets. The quintessence of life is its simplicities and its daringness, and the fact that the actual picture is just Walter doing his job and seeing the world through his eyes (looking over photos in the case of the photo) says as much.

While not necessarily a MUST see, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is still an enjoyable film with a unique taste and a great heart to it. The acting is enough to rope you in, with Stiller in particular being a standout, and while the film does have some pacing problems you’ll likely make peace with them as the second half dives deeper into the story. While not for everyone, I know I like it and I hope you do too.