#wille was doing EXACTLY what his mom did BUT he saw that! and changed!!

[mypimpademia]

— The Teacher (pt. 2)

Single dad! Gojo x Fem! Preschool teacher! Reader

Synopsis: Little Megumi wonders if you’re his new mom, and Gojo finds himself wondering the same thing.

TW: None

Note: click/tap here for part 1! or Click/tap here for part 3! I forgot to mention it in the first part, but ig it was kinda implied, Gojo is 29 in this not a teen like he was in canon. Gojo is also very briefly implied to get around

⇶ Satoru stuck to his promise of taking you out

⇶ He left Megumi with Utahime for the night, and made sure that everything was perfect for you

⇶ Truthfully, he went a little overboard out of his own anxiety

⇶ Booked reservations for one of the nicest restaurants in town, deep cleaned his house (just in case), got his already clean car detailed, bought a new suit despite having many hardly-worn ones in his closet, stalked your socials for hints at what you might like, and more that he’d be far too embarrassed to ever admit to

⇶ Satoru picked you up from your house at 6 pm, knocking on your door with a giant bouquet of flowers in hand

“You look incredible.”

Those were the only words Satoru could come up with when he saw you.

He always thinks you look incredible, but seeing you all dressed up outside of your usual work attire was a nice change of pace, and you looked effortlessly beautiful.

“Thank you, Toru,” you beamed. “You look pretty,” you told him, scanning over his tall figure, clad in a deep blue suit.

‘Toru’, ‘pretty’. He nearly passed out on your porch.

Satoru smiled, clearing his throat in an effort to gather his bearings as he fought back the deep blush that was crawling up his face.

“For you, mon chéri,” he said, in a corny fake French accent, presenting the large bouquet of flowers to you.

They were neatly wrapped in a brown paper, and tied off with a white bow. From just the look of it, you could tell they were expensive.

“These are my favorite,” you gasped, taking them from him. “How’d you know?”

He stalked your instagram and found a post from a year ago where you said you loved them.

“Lucky guess,” Satoru smiled. “Y’ready to go?”

⇶ He led you to his shiny black sports car, opening up the door for you to get in

⇶ It even smelled expensive, and the fresh scent of car shampoo was still lingering. You could tell he had it cleaned just for this, but didn’t say anything

⇶ When you got to the restaurant, out of place was an understatement for how you felt

⇶ You were just happy you decided to dress nicer than you had originally planned

⇶ Looking around, the restaurant was beautifully decorated, and the people dining were dressed just as beautiful

⇶ The more time you spent with Satoru, the more that you realized you knew next to nothing about him

⇶ Where does he get all this money from? What does he do for a living? Who is he, really? And what’s up with the sunglasses?

⇶ You will admit, the mystery only made him all the more attractive, but you had a newfound determination to peel back his layers

⇶ But your first date might not be the best time for that, so you were willing to let things unfold naturally for now

⇶ Satoru insisted that you ordered whatever you want off the menu because he was paying, and ignored your protests

⇶ You hopped around different topics of conversation throughout dinner, and you did eventually make it to the subject of work

⇶ Satoru asked you what exactly made you want to teach preschool, or teach at all, and watched your eyes light up

⇶ Teaching was undoubtably a job you need to have a passion for, and you had more than enough passion for it

⇶ You told him that you’ve always had an interest in teaching, and loved kids and thought they were precious, sacred even, and that their early years are the best part to watch and be a part of

⇶ Satoru’s heart was getting ready to leap out of his chest just watching you talk about something you love so much

‘She’d make a great mom for Megs…’

⇶ The thought surprised even him, Satoru wasn’t sure if it was genuine or intrusive, but it had him glancing at your features and around him to make sure he hadn’t accidentally said it aloud

⇶ He told you that all the kids were lucky to have you, and that seeing you take care of Megumi and all those kids with ease made him feel like his worries from adopting were pointless

⇶ He glazed over the adoption part so easily, you almost missed it

⇶ Sure, you were more than well aware that Satoru was a single father, and when you saw that his last name was different from Megumi’s, you just assumed it was his mothers last name

“It is his mothers last name, but he’s not at all my biological kid. I adopted him from… a friend.”

⇶ You had removed a layer from Satoru, only to find how thin it was in comparison to the amount he had left

⇶ The revelation answered some of the questions you had, and left you with even more at the same time

⇶ Just based on the hesitation he showed, you knew better than to press any further, and changed the subject

⇶ The rest of dinner went smoothly, and you and Satoru once again went back and forth about the bill before he was calling the waiter back to take his card

⇶ On the drive back, Satoru asked if you wanted to see Megumi since Utahime’s house was in the same direction as yours

⇶ You said yes, because of course you wanted to see Megumi, and because it was getting harder and harder for you to say no to Satoru

⇶ When you arrived at Utahime’s, Megumi lept at you before he even said hello to Satoru

⇶ Satoru feigned being hurt by the action, but Megumi still payed him no mind, directing all his attention to you

⇶ Satoru thanked Utahime for watching Megumi, and you overheard her saying something about not dumping his kid on her again

⇶ Megumi had you sit in the backseat with him, and told you about all the stuff he did at Utahime’s

⇶ All the sudden, he asked why you and Satoru were all dressed up

“Did you guys go on a date?”

You and Satoru shared a questioning look through the rear view mirror, one that asked ‘Should we tell him?’.

“Sure did little man!” Satoru told him, but Megumi didn’t seem too surprised by his answer.

“Oh, Dad goes on a lot of those,” Megumi said, before going back to playing with the plastic dinosaur in his lap.

Satoru was rethinking all his life choices in that moment. He gulped back the saliva that had pooled in his mouth, already going over how exactly he could explain that to you later on.

To his surprise, he heard you laugh at Megumi’s comment.

“But I’m your favorite, right?” You asked the boy, playfully nudging him. He turned to you with big wide eyes and smiled.

“Yup!”

⇶ Dropping you off at your house, Satoru thanked you for letting him take you out, and haphazardly tried to apologize for Megumi’s little comment and explain himself

⇶ You told him it was fine, and thanked him for the night, hugging him and planting a kiss on his cheek

⇶ Satoru froze up at the action, but managed to say bye to you as he collected himself and you disappeared into your house

⇶ When he and Megumi got back home, Satoru made a point to explain to Megumi why he couldn’t just throw out information like that to people, especially you

⇶ While putting on the boys pajamas in the dimly lit dinosaur themed room, Megumi yawned out a question

“Hey, dad,”

He spoke through a yawn while rubbing his eye with his fist. Satoru hummed back in acknowledgment, straining out the bottom of the little boy’s pajama shirt

“Is Ms. L/n gonna be my mom?” Megumi asked, looking at Satoru with low, sleepy eyes.

Satoru thought back to the statement that popped into his head during dinner. You would make a great mom for him.

“Um,” Satoru started, tucking Megumi underneath his comforter. “I dunno yet.”

He was honest. He didn’t know if what he was feeling for you was real or if he was just in over his head.

“I hope she is,” Megumi muttered, huffing out as his breathing turned into soft snores.

“Me too, Megs.”

—

Taglist: @megurulvr @miirene @planetlunaa @kazuminari @goldenglow149 + @torusmochi

Send in a ask or DM me to be added to all taglists, or fill out my form to be added to select ones.

—

Thank you for reading, comments and reblogs are appreciated!

[xinmin-exe]

Attack On Titan characters as Parents

Note: I haven't really watched attack on titan in years, so I'm sure all of these characters are gonna be OOC ALSO i am making it so everyone survived in the end and they all got their happy ending because these babies deserve it

WARNINGS: fem!reader, brief mentions of past trauma, mentions of miscarriage, very brief mention of the birthing process,

Eren

Eren was so traumatized after what his father did, he almost had a break down when you told him you were pregnant. It took him a couple weeks, and many, many late night talks with Armin until he was willing to try to be there for you. Eren was so nervous and worried he was going to be just like his father but the moment he saw his kid, everything just clicked. He was so gentle with them and always made time to talk and play with them during the day. As they got older, their bond grew even closer as Daddy and Aunt Mikasa took them out hunting every couple of weeks. Eren is an amazing father who despite everything he went through, made damn sure to do better for his child.

Armin

Armin never imagined having children, it just wasn't something he saw in his future. that was, until you came into his life and changed everything. When your little bundle of joy was born, Armin was in tears. He couldn't help but admire them and want to give them everything. Since then, Armin has done everything to nurture their ideas and passions. He even took them to the sea and let them play around. He wanted them to grow up with everything he couldn't have (aka, parents) so he did everything he could to stick around. Armin turned down multiple high government positions just to stay close to you and his child. Armin is the parent we all need in our lives.

Mikasa

When you approached Mikasa with the idea of wanting to adopt, she was speechless. Ever since her parents were killed, she never thought about having children. However, she loved you so much that she wanted to at least try. After all, she wasn't exactly motherly (at least that's what she will tell people) When Hange introduced you two to a young child (maybe 5 or 6) from the underground Mikasa's heart melted. She saw herself in this child so much that her protective instincts kicked in. She was so protective of this child, no one, and i mean no one besides you could be left alone with them. Even if it was armin or Eren, Mikasa was always in the room, one second away from glaring the other person into the next century. Mikasa really warmed up to the idea of being a parent and fit into the role well.

Jean

Jean was the one of the only in the group who wanted to still have kids. He knew what he wanted from life and was damned if some suicidal maniac was going to stop him. So when you were giving birth, Jean made sure he was right next to you, holding your hand and encouraging you the entire time. Even though you did scream at him "this is your fault! If i live through this i am going to KILL you Kirstein!" (the nurses thought that it was funny) But once your child was here, nothing else mattered. Once you were able to leave the hospital and go home, all Jean did was take your kid around and show off. Constantly saying "look at what i did" or "aren't they just gorgeous like their mom?" He always had something to brag about (even if the thing wasn't brag worthy), to Jean, anything your child did was amazing. Jean is very much the parent to scream at the back of the room while their kid is performing and embarrass the shit out of them.

Connie

Connie hadn't given having kids much thought. Afterall, he didn't even know if he'd be surviving long enough to be given that option. But once you told him you were pregnant, he was over the moon! Connie didn't let you move a muscle, ever. You need something from the top shelf? He's getting the stepstool. You want some food? He's already getting the ingredients out. And when you went into labor, he was right by your side. He let you squeeze his hand as hard as you needed to, and he made sure you were given everything possible to make birth as comfortable as it could be. Connie was so overwhelmed with love once he laid eyes on your child, the only time he let you hold them was when they needed to be fed. Connie got up to soothe them during the night, claiming it was the least he could do since you went though the pain of giving birth. Connie was there at every single milestone for their life, and he was never, ever going to stop being there for them; or for you.

Sasha

Oh boy, Sasha is the cool mom. When you two first adopted your child, she was admittedly a little awkward around them. But, after many late night snacks and a few bad cooking experiences, Sasha blossomed into a wonderful mom. She made sure they were eating properly and always had snacks on her. Your kids friends know that they will eat good when Sasha is around, and you two have become THE family. Sasha does tend to spoil them and say "yes" practically every time they ask for something, but they never try to manipulate that. You and Sasha both make sure your kid is kind and humble and thoughtful. With Sasha at your side, nothing is impossible and raising a child together was the best decision you two ever made.

Levi

Levi initially turned down the idea of having kids. Claiming that he was not fit to be a father, but fate wasn't having it. When you found out you were pregnant, you were worried to tell Levi. You knew he didn't want kids and you had grown to be content with that. What would he say when he found out? Would he leave you? Those thoughts sent you spiraling when Hange eventually let the cat out of the bag. Levi was silent but you could see in his eyes that was he happy. Even though he didn't want kids, he knew he wanted you. If that meant having to raise another brat then so be it. At first, he did the basics, changed their diapers, fed them, etc. But he never truly bonded with them until they were older and confided to Levi that they felt like an outsider looking in. He listened and did his best to offer advice and words of wisdom that might help. From then on, Levi was so much more involved and made sure that they were getting the life they deserved.

Erwin

Erwin was possibly the most excited to be a father. After everything, when things began settling down he approached you with the idea of trying for kids. At first you were the hesitating one, but Erwin was able to convince you to at least think about it. After a while, you were on board and baby, he got to work. It was along road, you had a miscarriage and that was demoralizing. Erwin made sure to support you the entire time. He understood that you may not want to try again and he was okay with that. It took you a year or so after for you to want to try again. But eventually, with enough effort and support, you gave birth to a beautiful baby. Erwin was in love with your child the moment he laid eyes on them. He spoiled them as much as he could, whenever he could. He was a dotting husband, and even more dotting father.

Hange

Oh boy, Hange is.. enthusiastic to say the least. They see it as a new experiment, at first. Hange takes your pulse every day, they measure how much you eat as well as your weight. When you gave birth, they were overwhelmed. There was a beautiful little bundle wrapped up in your arms and all Hange wanted was to hold them. Hange was so careful that you almost had to do a double-take. They held your child so gently, like glass. From then on, it was like the whole world vanished for them. They prioritized being there and being a parent over anything. Hange recorded all the milestones (first steps, first word, first tooth, etc) but they also recorded every other moment (like when they babbled for the first time, or when they first rolled over). But to Hange, they were all important moments.

[ambers-archive]

how did it end?

"he took me out my box, stole my tortured heart. left all these broken parts." or 4 times spencer runs and 1 time he doesn't

“hey ang-uhm..you know i really like you. as you know i really struggle to open up with others as i haven’t found anyone to bond with in awhile. but i-i just don’t think this is it for me and i’m so sorry. i feel like we are on different paths in our life and i really need someone who has their life together. not necessarily figured out. but together. i wish i didn't waste your time like this, and i know what i'm saying is hurtful, but i wanted to be honest with you. i’m so sorry for wasting your time. i’ll miss you. bye”

you’re barely able to make it through the first minute, shaky hands hold your phone as you hover over his contact.

a picture of him kissing your cheek faces back at you.

it’s like a slap in the face.

“can we talk about this properly.” you manage to type through your blurry vision and shaky fingers.

white dots stare back at you, but they disappear as soon as they appear.

a series of gut wrenching shallow breaths overtake you as you crumble onto the floor, glad that no one is here to see you fall apart. 

you pray this is a nightmare. this isn’t like him, not at all.

the memory of the other night suffocates  you—the tender touches, the lingering warmth, the whispered you're beautiful, the stolen kisses—only for him to turn around and tell you you’re better off.

and after what feels like an eternity, a chime finally interrupts your thoughts

“of course” spencer echoes back only for the words to plunge a knife deeper into your wound.

another chime. it was the one you had only for him.

“i would have liked to do that in person.”

then why didn’t you? you want to say back.

only streams of your confusion talk back though.

“who just has sex with a girl? only to dump her a day later?” you type back. 

you’re waiting again, this is not funny you whisper to yourself.

“i wish it wasn’t right after. and i wish there was a way for me to prove sex wasn’t all i was after. if you want honesty then the sex didn’t help. what should i have done? waited to end things after? that’s even more evil to do in my opinion. i should have driven to see you, but i knew i wouldn't be able to say it once i saw you."

would've could've should've

and all you can ask yourself is,

‘did you really think it would be different this time?’

‘did you really think the prophecy wouldn’t come true?’ 

as if you forgot your faith was sealed, a curse meant for you to endure.

you want to beg, beg him to change his mind.

get on your knees like an infant, curse him or plead with the universe, even to god, anyone willing to listen. 

because this can’t be happening.

“please don’t do this” you type out.

delete.

“let’s talk about it.”

delete.

“i thought it would be different this time.”

delete. 

despite your pleas you know you can't force love.

the love that's meant for you isn't earned it's given. so with what little vision you have, you start typing back. 

"i can say millions of things, i can tell you not to prepare for the end of something you haven't given a fair chance to. i can say let's talk it out and find a solution. i can ask you to find some perspective and to not give up on us. but with everything i can't make you love me. love isn't earned. whatever happens i know it's for the better."

send. 

you already know what your friends are going to tell you. 

"he didn't deserve you"

"his loss"

rather than reassurance it's a mirror staring back. a reflection of all you've lost. you're so used to things ending you know exactly what to say. 

your friends are so used it ending "his loss" is now etched between your group. a swirl of repetition, of being put back on your shelf.

like a toy they return when the tricks don't work anymore. 

"it gets better." your mom tells you. "everything happens for a reason, forget about him." 

but he was my best friend you want to say.

just when you think things will last, that people will stay, the universe shows you once again that all love does, at least for you, is break and burn.

[roses-for-readers]

Hello, this is my first time requesting something and i was kinda nervous and i have a few ideas in mind.

But i was wondering if you can write an avatar x maleficent readeri don’t see many of these and i would like something different, and love your writing (if you can’t thats totally fine) thx

This was such a cute idea that I had immediately started it once I got this request! I kinda did a style of the movies still exists and it's not just a random occurrence in the universe. I cut this off to have a nice and fluff type ending but with the opportunity to do a part 2 with heavy angst. And if you want one with the second movie, like it's a growth from this one, just let me know.

Finding Home ~Avatar x Maleficent! Reader

Warnings: Small injuries and a miscommunication that almost causes a fight (Tsu'tey doesn't understand human friendship dynamics)

Masterlist

Being born with wings was definitely a surprise when everyone in the delivery room when I was born. Especially when I later began to grow horns with each passing month. I could only imagine everyone's surprise when they all found out I was exactly like the Disney character Maleficent. That the story wasn't as fictional as everyone had once thought.

Growing up I had idolized the movies of her, ecstatic that I was unique just like she was. Though their were difficulties with my uniqueness as I got older. It was harder to breathe normally compared to someone that had regular problems when I had come to be about 6.

Mom worked with the RDA as a researcher, so they were willing to take a look at me to see what might be wrong. They finally came to the conclusion it was because of the lack of natural forests with fresh air. This caused me to have to use a special inhaler at least 3 times a day. But it was also a discovery that changed my life because I got to meet Grace.

"You know, I'm going to a special place. A different planet that's supposed to have a lot of trees and all kinds of animals and flowers. I think it's just the place you need to truly thrive. Do you like that idea?"

That's what led me here 21 tear years later, technically 15 if cryosleep isn't counted. A botanical expert that would be working alongside Grace and the other members of the Avatar program.

During the safety briefing, I could feel everyone staring at me. But I had become used to it and just focused on the information that was being given to us. Feeling anxious to see Grace again after so long since I first and last saw her.

After the meeting was over, I got ushered along with a Norm and Jake to go and meet up with Grace. I had a small bounce in my step as I walked along with them, not even noticing the weird looks.

"I just gotta ask. What's with the wings and horn things? You like dressing up in them or something?"

"Jake!"

I chuckled softly at the question, casually looked over at the both of them as Jake just waits for an answer as Norm looks absolutely mortified. Stretching my back slightly, I lift one wing up to hang over his had for a second. Smirking at the look of pure awe on both of their faces. "That good enough for you?"

"Holy shit," Jake softly laughed out as he stared at them for a few more seconds before shaking his head. "Now I've seen it all."

"No, I don't think you have yet." I look ahead as we get to the control center of the Avatar program. A smile spreading across my face as I take in all the technology around us, focusing mostly on the screens that were playing overhead.

The sound of one of the pods opening drew my attention away to across the room. A genuine smile coming across my face as I saw her sitting up from the machine, Dr. Grace Augustine.

Grace spoke to some of the other researchers before she turned to look at all of us. I had to keep myself from jumping in to hug her when she turned her focus to me.

Taking in my appearance, she had a small grin as she reached out and affectionately cupped my chin. "Look at how much you've grown. I don't even recognize that little kid that used to carry around a stuffed Maleficent toy like it was a part of you. I'm glad you got to join the program, (Y/n)."

"Thank you, Dr. Augustine," I bashfully reply, feeling ecstatic that she even remembered my name from one interaction years ago. "I'm grateful for the opportunity to be here and working alongside you."

"Always the modest one. That's one of the things I admired about you." She playfully shook my head before finally letting go. Her face becoming a little more stern as she looked at Jake and Norm. Speaking a little more firmly with them.

Letting her words fade into the background, I look back over at all monitors that sit in the center of the room. Marveling at the images that were showing up along with the graphs and how quickly they changed every few seconds.

"They update in real time, you know." I turn my head over to see a guy with glasses standing there with a smile. Pointing up at one of the screens, he continues, "The graphs and the numbers. They help us monitor the vitals of everyone while they are in the pods."

I let out a small 'oh' in understanding as I look back at the monitors for a couple more moment before looking back at him. Holding my hand out, I begin to introduce myself, "I'm (Y/n)."

"I heard," he chuckled out as he took hold of my hand. "My name's Max. I help track the vitals of everyone. And I'm sure everyone heard your name earlier. Grace has never been that nice to anyone before, except for the children."

"Children?" I give him a questioning look as I drop his hand. "They have children here on the base?"

"No, the Na'vi children. Oh, I bet that they are going to love you when they get a look at you." Max's eyes widen when he realized what he had said. Opening and closing his mouth as he tries to find something else to say.

"(Y/n), follow me. Time for a little academic show around." Grace calls out as she begins to head out the door with the men close behind.

Turning back to look at Max one last time, I raise my hand with another smile as I walk away. "I hope your right about that."

I lightly jog to catch up with the group as Grace leads us through the series of hallways until she pushes open a set of doors. When we enter, the first thing I noticed was the dim lighting and blue tint that almost glowed around us. The second thing was the glass tubes that held our Avatars.

Grace placed a hand on my shoulder before leading me to a specific pod off towards the back of the room. Speaking softly when we get closer, "It will take a little longer for you to get your Avatar than the others. It decided to pick up a few extra strands in your DNA that we used."

I stare in awe as I stand in front of the tank, noticing what she had meant. There laid a Na'vi body with features just like mine. Along with a small set of horns and wings that were still developing to fit the rest of the body. Stepping closer, I set my hand on the glass as I smile down at the body. "It's beautiful."

Grace stood beside me with one arm around my shoulders as she put her other hand on the glass with me. "Just like you."

While I didn't have the Avatar body, Grace still let me tag along during the research expeditions. Just as long as I promised to keep my inhaler on my person and my mask stayed on at all times if I didn't need to use it. Just because she wanted to test out the theory of me potentially being able to breathe the air here slowly and in a controlled environment.

We were carefully walking through the forest to a spot where Grace had decided to get some new samples from earlier. There wasn't much talk as we took in the sight of living plants in front of us. Or at least me and Norm were mostly focused on them.

"So, are you able to fly with your wing? Or do they not work for that?" I turn my head up to see Jake staring back at with a confused look on his face.

"I can, but not very well. There weren't many places that I could do something like that back on Earth," I casually explain to him before looking around back around at the area around us.

Grace kneels to the ground around some roots in a tree as she begins to get the equipment ready with Norm as she guides him on what to look for with the images that showed on the screen. I tried to pay attention as I looked down, but I saw Jake walk away out of the corner of my eye.

Following after him, I see him interacting with a different kind of plant. The moment he touched it, it retracted towards the ground as a defense mechanism. I smiled as I watched him do it again with the same result. We both laughed slightly until all of them went to the ground to reveal a small group of the native animals.

We both hold our breaths as one of them gets closer to us. Grace comes running over with Norm as she calls out to Jake. "Don't move. It's only a defense tactic. Just stand your ground."

I watched as he stared down the creature until I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Slowly turning my head around and up, I saw a different animal with sharp fangs staring down at me. I held my breath out of fear as it looked over at Jake and let out a low growl. Jumping over the both of us, it stared down at Jake as he took a step back.

"What do I do with this one?" Jake called over to Grace as he locked eyes with the predator in front of us.

It let out another low growl when Grace called back, "Definitely run!"

I barely processed the fact that Jake had turned around to start running. I let out a small scream as he lifted me over his shoulder. I held onto his shoulder as I helplessly watched as the creature chase after us through the dense forest.

Suddenly Jake came to a halt which caused me to look over to see we had gotten to a cliff edge near a waterfall. "What are you doing?! Go!"

"Can you swim?!"

"Fucking jump!" I apparently didn't have to tell him a second time when a deafening roar sounded through the trees. He pulled me down to his chest and jumped down as he stiffened his body. I wrapped my wings tightly around us right before we hit the surface.

Water rushed past us for a few seconds before Jake began to swim upward. Pushing away from him to start swimming myself, we raise our heads over the surface. Jake gasped for air as we both look to see the creature slowly walk back into the forest.

I let out a small sigh as we swim over to the shore and check for any injuries. I glare at Jake after making sure I was fine from the fall. My voice laced with a subtle anger when I say, "'Can you swim'?"

Jake looks at him as he raises a hand as he backs away. "I was trying to make sure you would be safe if we-"

"Can you swim!? Can you fucking swim!? That's the first thing you thought of!? Not, 'is your mask waterproof' or 'is the thing catching up'! You could have thrown me and I would have flown down while you jumped if you were that worried! But 'can you swim' was all you could think of!?"

"You know," Jake began talking as he turned around and started to walk through the forest, "you are very angry for someone that looks like a Disney character."

"She was a villain to begin with anyways. Maybe you should watch your back Sully." I continue to glare at his back as I walk behind him deeper into the forest.

He looks over his shoulder with a smile as he takes in my disheveled appearance. Trying his hardest to hold in his laughter as he shrugged. "Grace wouldn't let you."

"Grace isn't here," I whisper to myself as we continue to walk. I hear noises of unknown animals from deep in the forest. Despite being mad at Jake, I quicken my pace to be walking beside him. Looking up at the trees, a strange feeling coming over my body as I scan the leaves overhead. "Jake..."

"I know," he mumbled as he carefully scans the trees as well. Reaching a hand out, he gently takes hold of my arm and pulls me to his side. "I feel the eyes too."

"Where are they? What are they?" I hold onto his arm as I start to breathe a little erratically. Using my free hand to rub at my chest as I begin to cough.

"Hey, hey. Calm down there. We'll be okay." Jake looks down at me as he stops walking. Kneeling down a little as his hand goes to my soaked bag. "You need your inhaler 3 times a day, right? You haven't used it since breakfast. Let's get it out and take a deep breath. Can you get it out?"

I nod my head as I let him take the bag off my shoulder. Trying to take a few shaky breaths as I begin to rummage through everything that I had packed. Quickly grabbing hold of the inhaler the moment I uncover it from under everything else. Pulling it out as I shake it lightly as I look at Jake. He gives a small nod, which help my nerves as I bring my free hand to my mask. Pulling it up just enough, I bring my inhaler up to my mouth and take a deep breath. Pulling it away almost immediately to secure my mask back into place with a deep breath.

Jake rubs my shoulder as he waits for me to catch my breath. Giving me an encouraging nod as holds my bag open as I put my inhaler back inside. "There we go. Come one, we need to keep moving. It's going to be night in a few hours and we need to find a place to spend the night."

I nod my head again as I look back at the trees above. Taking my bag back from him and securing it on my shoulder before we began to get on our way once again.

The sun had went down just a little over an hour ago. The sounds of multiple animals circling around us was all that I could hear as Jake began to sharpen a stick. I anxiously look around the trees to try and find where the animals might come from, but they just kept circling around just past our line of sight.

"(Y/n), look at me," Jake speaks in a slightly stern voice as he grabs my arm. As I look at him, I see the fear in his eyes at the situation. But he keeps his composure as he keeps talking as if he wasn't to begin with. "If anything happens, if I tell you to run, you forget about me and get out of here. You fly up and get into a tree until morning when Grace will come back and find you. You look after yourself and I know that you'll be fine. Do you understand?"

I quickly nod my head to show that I understood. I was going to say something to him, something about how it wouldn't have to come to that, but the words stopped short as the bushes right beside us rustle. I can't even fully comprehend it before Jake began to push me away in the opposite direction as we started running again.

We didn't run for long until the animals began to circle us in. I ended up with my back pressed against a tree as the dog like creatures snapped their teeth at Jake. I shut my eyes as soon as he begins to fight off the creatures. I didn't want to watch if he potentially had to kill a few of them before they hopefully ran off somewhere else.

Just as soon as everything got crazy, everything went quiet. I hesitantly opened my eyes to see Jake on the ground as a Na'vi woman kneels down to one of the creatures. Though I couldn't quite make out what she was saying, I could tell she was mumbling a prayer for the creature. That act alone made me look down and away from her, remembering how Grace told us of how sacred life was to the people.

Jake apparently wasn't informed of that or didn't remember as he tried to get closer to her, reaching out and touching her shoulder as he repeatedly tried to thank her. I had to keep from laughing as she swung her bow and hit Jake right in the face. I didn't do that good of a job as she looked over at me with a small hiss before turning around and running into the forest.

Jake quickly got off the ground and followed after her. I didn't even have the chance to protest as he called out from over his shoulder. "Come on (Y/n)."

I quickly made sure my bag was still closed, I ran after the both of them. Though it was a little harder considering that they were larger and more physically equipped to be jumping around the limbs of the trees.

"Hey, wait up!" Jake called out to the Na'vi as we got to a tree that was decently high up from the ground. He had just caught up to her when she turned around to face him.

"Away. Both of you," she spoke in a quiet tone, but the disdain was evident as she looked between the both of us. Getting so close in Jake's space that he took a step back and almost slipped. I held my breath as I watched Jake try to reason with her, even blocking me from her view by steeping to the side just slightly.

I tried to keep focused on the situation, but something moved closer to us out of the corner of my eye. Turning my head out of fear that another creature had followed us. But to my surprise there were small plant like things floating in the air. Slowly getting closer to us before most of them began to land on Jake. A hand full of them remained floating in the air nearby. Hesitantly, I reach a hand out to them, watching in awe as it slowly landed on my open palm. I laughed softly as it gently tickled my skin while the others continued to float around us.

After a few moments, they began to float away from us. I turned towards Jake with a huge grin at what had just happened. My gaze quickly turns curious as I see the Na'vi looking at us both in awe as well.

She looked between me and Jake before she beckoned us with a wave of her hand. "Follow me. Come now."

Jake looked like he wanted to protest her sudden change in heart, but I lightly pushed against his back to get him to follow her. With a sigh, Jake quickly began to chase after her with me following close behind.

We continue running across the tree limbs that seem to stretch on for eternity. Anxiety and anticipation coursing through my veins as the three of us go deeper into the forest.

"Where are we even-" Jake stops in the middle of his question as something comes in contact with his legs. I watch in horror as he violently falls down to the forest floor.

"Jake!" I call out as I lean over to see if he was injured. But I was forced to stop short as something wrapped around my chest. Throwing me off balance as I fall down to the ground as well, landing just a few feet from Jake. The impact leaves me disoriented as my head hits just lightly against a rock that was barely uncovered from the dirt.

I blink away the blur that comes into my vision as yelling sounds from almost every direction. A pair of hands lifts me up before one removes itself. My body tensing up entirely as I feel a sharp, cold blade carefully press right in between my shoulder blades.

Glancing over at Jake, I see he was in a similar situation with a knife pressed against his neck as they held him by his queue. But my attention quickly shifts again when the Na'vi who seems to be the leader of our ambush committee comes forward. He jumped down from his mount as he began to stalk over to Jake.

When he got just a few feet from Jake, the woman jumped down from the branch. Effectively blocking his path as the two of them began to argue between the two of them. I wasn't able to catch most of what they were saying due to how my head was throbbing due to the fall. What I could tell was that he wasn't happy with our presence and she mentioned something that involved their Tsahik.

The conversation came to a quick halt as the leader got back onto the horse like creature. He gave a short order to the rest of the group, which caused the Na'vi that were holding us to pull us to our feet. The sudden movement caused my head to spin so much that my stomach churned. I kneeled back to the ground before lifting up my mask, throwing up what little content I had in my stomach. Barely having enough time to secure my mask back on before the Na'vi begin to force me to my feet once again.

"Kehe!" The tugging on my arms stops when the woman calls out to them. They quickly let go of me when she pushes them away. She gently grabs my face with a small frown as she turns it to the side. Her voice is soft as she ghosts her fingers over a spot on the side of my head. "You are hurt. Let me help you to Hometree. You will get treated once we are there."

I don't stop her when she awkwardly wraps her arms around my body. Being tentative not to touch at the base of my wings too much as she lifts me up. I close my eyes with a small sigh as I slowly grasp at her words. My voice hardly a whisper when I ask, "We're going to Hometree?"

She shushes me as she begins to run with the rest of the group. I hold onto her with a small whine from the motions, even if I wasn't seeing the sights that were passing us by.

Before long, the movements came to a stop as soft murmuring echoed around us. I open my eyes to see that we had finally made it to the Hometree of the Omatikayan people. Many of them gathered around as the group came to the center.

I gently get set down near Jake, leaning into his side as I sway just slightly on my feet. I take another breath as I hear a conversation happening between the woman and another member of the clan. Making out just bits of what each of them were saying in the broken haze of focus that I had.

"What is he saying?" Jake's voice sounds out like a sore thumb when he asks the question. Though I couldn't tell if he was asking me solely or if it extended to the woman as well.

"My father is deciding on whether to kill you both or not." I frown at the blunt explanation she gave at the question. I barely even had time to register that information when I felt Jake move slightly before yelling sounded and I got jostled around.

My eyes immediately shot open at the motion as my wings stretched out in a defensive manner. This had caused more yelling as Jake pulled me closer to his side. But all the noise stopped when another voice calls out for silence. Everyone shifts their gaze over to see the Tsahik stepping into the center of the circle.

I blink away at the dizziness that I feel when she stands in front of us. Taking a deep breath, I bring my hand up to my forehead as I do my best to greet her without messing up the pronunciation.

When I lifted my gaze back up to her, she had a small grin on her face. "I see you were taught some of our ways. Though I see that you might not know the language."

I look at her confused at what she had just said. Looking up at Jake, I speak in a soft voice, "I swear that I pronounced it right."

"You didn't say anything," Jake told me with a concerned expression.

I blink at him a couple of times before I pointed at him with a serious look. "I believe I have a concussion."

"You believe? What gave you that impression?" The sarcasm dripped from his voice as he looked back up at the Tsahik. My face scrunched up slightly before I looked back at her as well.

She slowly took out a knife that had been resting in her neckwear. She quickly stepped towards Jake as she stabbed into his chest. I cringed as she licked away the small bit of blood that was on it. She looked at Jake with a curious expression before she looked down at me again.

She was about to do the same thing until the younger Na'vi, presumably her daughter with what I was gathering, stopped her before the knife hit my chest. She gently took my hand and pointed to the center of my palm. "One touched here."

The Tsahik seemed slightly intrigued by the statement, but she didn't say anything. She gently poked her knife just enough to collect a small bit of blood on the tip before licking it way with a thoughtful look. She looked between us once more before she addressed the crowd. "The Dreamwalker and the... human, shall stay with us. They will learn of our ways and what it means to be Na'vi. We shall all watch them as they learn."

Multiple reactions sound through the crowd at the choice their Tsahik had made, but she didn't pay them any mind. Instead, she turned to her daughter while saying, "Take him to get out of his demon clothes. I will tend to the child."

"I'm in my 20s. I'm not a child," I spoke up at the comment about my age. I knew that compared to their size I probably wouldn't been seen as a full adult to them. But I had been expecting to be acknowledged as more than an adolescent.

Jake gave me a light pat on the shoulder before he reached into my bag and started rummaging around. "Let's get your head working right first before you argue how old you are. But you're going to use your inhaler first before you get out of my sight again."

I let out a sigh as he pulled my inhaler out and placed it in my hand. Nodding my head at his statement, I took a deep breath before lifting my mask back up and taking a couple of puffs of the medicine. I blink back my dizziness when I put my mask back into place.

Jake takes my inhaler from my hand and puts it back in my bag for me. He tilts my head up slightly so I look him in the eyes as he speaks again. "You do what she says so you get better. And don't fall asleep for at least a couple of hours so we make sure your actually okay."

"Yes, mother," I snark at him as the Tsahik gently grabbed my arm and began pulling me up the steps that they had for the tree. I was mostly nudged up the tree by her until she guided me into a small platform that was suspended between the branches. She guided me to sit down on what seemed to be a woven blanket. She moved around and collected a few plants and a small bowl before she began to grind them into a paste.

She never looked up from her task as she spoke to me in a soft tone. "You are not entirely human."

I shake my head with a bashful grin as I watch her mix the plants together. Leaning forward slightly as I try to get a better look at her process. "Everyone thinks that I have fairy blood or something. None of the scientists could really agree on one theory about my condition. Just that I had a mutation somewhere in my family tree or such."

"You used a human thing earlier. What is its purpose to you?" She continued speaking as she grabbed my chin to turn my head. Gently rubbing the paste against where I had hit my head.

I closed my eyes with a small sigh, enjoying the cool feeling on my skin. Humming softly as I think of how to explain it to her. "It's a medicine thing. I use it so I can breathe normal enough to go on day to day. A lot of humans have the same thing. I just have an extra special condition."

"You can't breathe your own air." Based on her tone, I knew she was making a statement and not asking. I opened my eyes as she removed her hands from my body. Watching as she went over to grab a few bandages and a small bowl like container.

I shook my head as she sat down next to me again. Watching as she applied a bit more of the paste to the bandages. "No. That's part of why I'm here. Grace had thought I could maybe breath the air here with the forests. But that was before everyone knew the air here was toxic to humans. But she still wants to see if I can handle. Grace wants to do a few test before we fully see if I can."

As I finished my explanation, she began to carefully wrap the bandages around my head. When she was done with that, she then grabbed the container and held it out to me. "Drink this. It will help with the pain and let you rest well through the night."

I wanted to argue that I shouldn't go to sleep anytime soon, but I stopped myself when she gave me a stern look. I took a few quick drinks as I repeatedly took my mask off so I could drink however much she saw fit. When all the liquid was gone, she finally took it from me with a small nod. Almost immediately after I put my mask back on for the last time, she began to guide me to lay down on the blanket.

I watch her walk around he area, organizing things as she went. My eyes started to flutter shut with passing second that I watched her before speaking up just slightly in the quiet space, "My name's (Y/n)."

I thought I saw her smile a little as she continued to move things around on a shelf. I heard her voice speak out one last time before I went to sleep. "You may call me Mo'at, (Y/n)."

I begin to wake up to sound of hushed giggles filtering in and out of my consciousness. With a small groan, I opened my eyes to see a group of children standing over me. As soon as they see me wake up, they let out small shrieks before running off towards the bottom of the tree. Effectively dodging Mo'at as she comes into the area with a small basket.

She smiles as the children run by before she comes back over to me and sits down. Immediately lifting me up into an upright position as she begins to undo the bandages on my head. "I see the children have already taken an interest in you."

I smile at her before glancing over at the stairs that lead down. "I guess they do. I'm just glad they aren't terrified of how I look."

"They are young. Your world makes them curious and they have never seen one of your people with your... characteristics."

I laugh softly at the last part of what she said. Looking back at Mo'at, I saw she had set aside the bandages that she put on my head last night. My gaze becoming a bit more serious as I noticed a small bit of blood had soaked into it.

"You are fine. The worst that might happen is a small scar," her voice was firm but gentle when she reassured me. Taking a few new bandages from her basket before rewrapping my head in a slightly more snug way than last night. When she was done, she gave my head a small pat before pushing the basket towards me. I noticed that it had a small arrangement of foods in it as she stood back up and moved over to a shelf. "Take the mask off so you eat. It's not of use to you if you can breathe the air."

"But we don't know if I can breathe the air. Grace hasn't done the test to see if I could." I quickly try to remind her that it was only a theory that I could live without the mask on Pandora. That I couldn't know for certain if it would possibly to even do it for even a short period of time.

"You seemed to do just fine with it being broken while you slept." My breath caught in my throat as I took in her sudden revelation.

I frantically grabbed the small oxygen tank to see that the capacity was at zero. Frantically taking off the mask, my gaze immediately fell on a small bit of glass that had broken off and leaving a small, but still noticeable, hole. I take a few small breaths to see if anything seemed off, but it all was normal as I kept taking deep breaths.

"I'm not dead," I utter in disbelief as I look back at her in confusion. My mouth hanging open as I try to piece together how that could have worked. "But... how?"

"I believe you had said something about 'fairy blood' last night. Or did you not really mean that when you told me?" Mo'at had a playful grin on her face as she glanced back over at me.

"I'm going to be perfectly honest here, after I fell off that branch last night, I don't remember much of anything. It's all a blur besides from getting here, your daughter Neytiri, and a very grumpy man who shouted a lot."

"Tsu'tey. That is the man you remember. Now eat," she spoke firmly once again before taking a few bottles from the shelf and setting down not to far from me.

I shuffled a little closer to the basket and pick out some of the fruit that was there. Taking small bites as I watch her work on refilling the herbs that she had begun to get low on. We just sat together in silence as she did her work. Occasionally, I would interrupt her work to offer her a piece of fruit that she would take with a ghost of a smile.

Our attention is soon drawn to the entrance when Jake and Neytiri come walking in. I bit back a laugh as I take in the sight of Jake, dressed in the traditional clothing and covered in mud with a few cuts here and there.

Jake immediately stops in his tracks when he looks at me with wide eyes. "Where's your mask at?!"

"It's broken." I give him a small shrug before I look over at Neytiri. Watching as she went over to her mother and motioned for Jake to come closer and sit.

"What do you mean it's broken?! How are you not dead?!" He continued standing there in disbelief. Completely ignoring the small glare Neytiri was giving him.

"I'm special or something like that." I grab another few pieces of fruit from the basket and hold my hand out for Mo'at and Neytiri. Mo'at takes a piece before Neytiri does the same with a small nod of her head.

Jake just continues to stare in disbelief as he moves over to sit down. I pass him a piece of fruit before giving him a small pat on his shoulder.

"I see he is learning well," Mo'at comments as she passes some herbs over to Neytiri.

"He's a skxawng," she responded before she crushed the leaves into small flakes before moving to rub it into his cuts.

"What does that mean?" Jake looks at Neytiri, hoping she would explain. When she ignored him, Jake looked over to me with a confused look.

"It means you're an idiot." I give Jake a smug grin when I answer his question. Eating another piece of fruit before I glance over at the entrance. Tensing up when I see the Olo'eyktan and the man known as Tsu'tey walking towards us. Lowering my gaze, I lean towards Jake and whisper to him, "Now, try not to be an idiot and keep your mouth shut when they walk in."

Jake rolls his eyes before looking at the two warriors as they walked into the area. I glance up at the two with a small frown on my face. They both look at me and Jake for a second with guarded looks on their face. The Olo'eyktan soon shifts his gaze over to Mo'at with a knowing look on his face as he tilts his head slightly towards the entrance. She nods her head in return before standing up. Mo'at affectionately brushes some hair out of Neytiri's face with a smile. Then she turned to me and softly pats my head before walking down the tree with her mate.

Once they leave, I look back at Tsu'tey to see him already giving me a small glare. I give him an awkward smile which only makes him scowl even more. "Demon," was all he said before looking back at Jake with an even deeper scowl.

"Hey there buddy boy," Jake playfully quips back as he begins trying to wipe off some of the mud on his chest with his bare hands. Though he didn't do much other than just smear the mud around as he smiled like an idiot.

"Accident," he continued to scowl as he looked Jake over. Clearly unammused by Jake's joking attitude.

"Aw. I think he likes you Jake. You should give him a big hug to become friends." I have a grin on my face as I look between the two men. Taking notice of how Neytiri looked shocked by my suggestion one time as I glanced towards Jake.

"He raises a hand towards me, I will cut him," Tsu'tey speaks in a menacing way as he glared at me.

"I know," I laugh a little as I stare straight back at him. Biting my lip as I try not to grin like an idiot at the shocked look on Tsu'tey's face.

"Okay, (Y/n). Reel in the manic for a minute. I think you're freaking them out with your humanly sense of humor." Jake slightly pushes my head in order to bring me back to the moment.

I roll my eyes with a small pout before picking up another piece of fruit from the forgotten basket. Popping it in my mouth and slowly chewing. Looking at the woven floor as I finally mumble something pointed towards Jake, "Virgin."

"What did it call me?!" My eyes widen as Tsu'tey reaches down and grabbed ahold of the front of my shirt. A small scream coming out of my mouth as Jake and Neytiri both shoot up from their spots. Both trying their hardest to get between us and remove me from his grasp.

It had been a little over a month since Jake and I had gotten to Hometree. He had been training hard as a warrior while I learned more about the plant life from the clan healers. Everything was going well for us as time went on, despite the bad start that I had with Tsu'tey. Though he seemed to be convinced that I was in fact talking about Jake and not him after I explained a few human customs that were common among friends.

Jake even had enough approval within the clan that he was able to get Grace to be able to visit. She was shocked about the fact that I hadn't been wearing my mask since we had gotten there. But she was very happy that I was thriving in the environment like she had always wanted for me. She even told me that in another month, I might finally have a viable Avatar to use if I still wanted it even though I apparently could live without it.

But living amongst the Na'vi didn't mean that everything from my life before them stopped. Especially with my unique genetic makeup.

I went over to Jake as he ate breakfast with Neytiri and Tsu'tey. He looked over at me with a smile as I nervously sat down near the group. "Well good morning. You normally don't come and join our group until it's around time for lunch."

I fidget with my fingers as I look at the group, glancing at everyone until I focus on Jake again. "I need your help with something. And I'm only asking because your a good friend and I have to do this today."

Jake's expression becomes serious as he looks over at Neytiri and Tsu'tey. They both appear confused as well when they look at me for an explanation.

I look down at the ground as I bite my lip. My face heating up as I quickly tell them what was wrong. "I'm molting."

"That's it?" Jake seems in disbelief at what I told him. He even laughed a little as he leaned closer to try and get me to look at him again. "That's not too big of a deal. I'm sure you'll be okay."

I glare up at him as I stare him down. Taking a deep breath as I begin to further explain to him the situation. "It is a big deal. I can molt for multiple days sometimes, but I need to get as much taken care of the first day. If not, I could get infections and intense back pains that could last for months. And that's on top of the pain I can normally feel due to having wings."

The smile on his face faded away as I kept talking. His eyes becoming apologetic as he let's out a sigh. "I didn't know it was that big of a deal. Are you sure it has to be today?"

"I'm very sure. Once when I was in high school, I waited two days because I had to focus on studying for some stupid geometry final. When I finally got it taken care of, over half my feathers were gone, molted and perfectly healthy ones. It took months for them all to grow back and I couldn't even sit up in my bed without having someone help me for weeks."

Jake nods his head a little with a serious look in his eyes. "Tell me what you need help with."

"Thank you," I softly mumble as I sit with my back facing him. Slightly spreading my wings for him to have an easier time with helping me. I take a deep breath as I begin to lightly guide my fingers through the feathers. "You just basically brush them with your fingers and let the bad ones fall out. If there are any that are loose but not coming out yet, leave them be. They probably just need a little time to be ready."

It took a few moments, but I finally felt Jake start to work on the back of my wings. I could tell he was hesitant to do it because he didn't want to cause me any pain. As the time went on and I didn't tell him that it was hurting, he began to get a little more confident with each movement.

There was a decent amount of feathers laying around me when I took a small break to look around. Stopping my gaze when I noticed a group of children looking over at me from around a corner a little ways from us. Most of them a little older with what seemed to be their younger siblings. They kept pointing as they whispered to one another. But one little girl stood out as she just stared in awe while looking between the pile of feather and my face.

I smiled a little as I reached my hand out, gesturing for her to come closer. She seemed a little taken aback by my action, but soon smiled as she quickly walked over. She immediately sat down beside me, leaning against my body as she excitedly reached a hand up to touch one of my horns.

"Aen'ya!" Neytiri trys to scold the girl, but I raise my hand to let her know it was fine. Neytiri looked at me with a sympathetic like look. "She is very trusting. But she also still needs to learn to keep her space."

"She's okay. Kids back on Earth would do the same thing. I'm just glad one of the children is doing something other than just pointing from a distance." I smile at Aen'ya as I speak, happy to be a part of her child like excitement. I gently take her hand and she looks spooked by the contact. But she keeps smiling as I move her to sit on one of my legs and hand her some of my discarded feathers.

As she takes them out of my hand, I look back at the small group to see them all looking back in awe. I wave my hand at them to come join as Aen'ya starts to randomly place feathers into my hair. A few of them start to laugh as the excitedly push each other closer as a couple others run off in the opposite direction.

Soon the group comes and sits down closer by as they lightly reach out and touch my wings. They are extra gentle as they laugh with each little handful of fluff they managed to pull out. By the time they have their own little piles, the others that had run off return with their arms full of strings and a couple of baskets full of other little supplies to do whatever they had planned. Passing everything around as a few of them began to hold up a combination of beads they had to my skin with little giggles.

"Wow. You look like you got dragged into a second grade art class," Jake lightly snickered as he leaned back into his original spot once the kids took over for him to get a couple more feathers.

I make a face at him which causes the children to start laughing. But the seem to take his words as an invitation, because a couple of them grab his arms and pull him to sit on the ground. A couple even go the extra mile and do the same thing with Neytiri and Tsu'tey. Neytiri seemed happy with it as she began to help them with what they each were making. Tsu'tey most just sat there with a soft scowl on his face, but he would pay attention to any of the children if they held up something for him to look over.

We all just sit there laughing with one another as the children continue to work on their projects. But soon one of the boys grabs my arm to hold it still as two girls begin tying something around my bicep. I look at it confused until I realized that they had made me an accessory with beads and a couple of my feathers hanging down. Then a few others do the same thing as they tie an anklet on me with wide grins.

I take a look at both pieces of jewelry to see just how uniquely beautiful they were. Smiling as I open my arms out to pull each of them into a hug as a thank you. They all laugh as they begin to lean into my arms for one big hug.

A warm feeling came into my chest as I just held all the children close to me. Staring at each of them as a sense of peace washes over me. Similar to the feeling I had when I watched the movies when I was young. The feeling that I had finally found the place that I truly belong.

~~~

Hi everyone! I hope you enjoyed this little installment. I'm glad for my first request and I'm going to start working on a few other add ons for Silent Treatment and Aggressive Caregiver (I need a masterlist at some point). But have a good day and remember; We are bad bitches, and bad bitches follow boycotting to the fullest. Don't actively give any money to Disney for anything. We're smart and kind people who were raised on revolutions that Disney wrote. I'm sure we can pirate movies from someplace or have the DVDs for the movies. Do your part as best you can. I love you all and stay happy for the year to come.

[dearest-painter]

No she’s MY DAUGHTER! PT.1

Summary: Y/N Drew is the adopted daughter of Jessica drew as a 6 soccer year old girl. What she doesn’t know is that she looks a bit to familiar to her mom’s boss, in his eyes she’s the reincarnation of his dead daughter. When Y/N and her friends have to help an anomaly stay alive it reveals that more people want her as family.

TW/CW:Yandere behavior, unhealthy behavior, unhealthy relationship,abusive behavior,abusive relationship,Reader is basically Gabriella O’Hara aka Miguel’s dead daughter but you can change your looks just some things will look like Gabriella,Reader is a soccer player which is based off of my experience,Reader is 6 years old so no romance bc duh,very out of character characters,this is a series,Her mama brought her to a chase,Reader is BFFS with Pavitr,people might be out of character,tell me if I need to add more

PT.2 PT.3

You and your mama just arrived at her work, your dad couldn’t watch you as usual as he had to go into the office this time so you just went with her. You’ve only been here a few times as she tries to keep you out of this stuff, you were wearing your soccer uniform as you just finished a soccer game. “Mama can I get something to eat, I’m hungry” “Of course sweetie, let’s go to the cafeteria so you can eat plus mama is hungry herself” you giggled and nodded. You were so excited for a new sibling! You knew they’d need LOTS of attention and help so your parents would be busy but that’s fine! Your more then willing to share the love your parents give you!

You were skipping as you were happy to see your best friend soon! You two got there and got some food. “Gracias!” “Your welcome little one, on the house Jessica” “You sure?” “Mhm, your pregnant and also little one seemed extra hungry” Jessica nodded her head as you two ate then threw away your trash. She kept holding your hand the whole time as she wants to be sure your safe, you didn’t know where your mama’s motorcycle was but you knew it was somewhere.

“Mama is gonna go do some work so you stay here, okay baby?” “Okay mama! Be safe!” She kissed your forehead then went to works as you sat down and started to draw in your coloring book. You didn’t know where you were which worried your anxiety but you were calming down as you were coloring….staring..someone was staring at you..you weren’t insane and knew it so immediately you got up and looked around just to see if you could see ANYTHING that would show the thing watching you.

Miguel was looking at you surprised…his daughter is alive? Lyla saw you were getting nervous and started breathing heavy as you were scared so she appeared on your watch. “Hi there!” “AHH!” You jumped and fell as you stared at the holographic women…you blinked a bit before responding. “H-hello?” “Hi there! I’m Lyla, your Y/N drew aka Jessica Drew’s adopted daughter” you nodded your head slowly confused why this random lady knows about you. Lyla saw the worried looked on your face which she didn’t like as she was program to also care for Gabriella and you look exactly like her. “I’m an AI, I was made to do and learn about anything in any universe. I know about your family and history as a quick scan then I know everything. I know that isn’t comforting but that’s the truth”

You nodded your head feeling a bit more comfortable..sorta but you kept feeling eyes on you. Miguel was still in disbelief seeing a girl look similar to his daughter, is this the universe saying that his daughter still needs him? Recantation..that what must’ve happened, you were his daughter just in a different form! Yes that’s the answer! He just wishes he found you before Jessica did. “I-is there someone else here? I don’t like the feeling of being watched” “Just Miguel, he’s just a grumpy workaholic man. He isn’t much talkative so how about I talk to you while you color?” You felt a bit calmer knowing you weren’t going insane so you nodded your head and got back on the chair as you went back to coloring as Lyla talked…you wanted your mama and dad really bad.

[immortalmsmoon]

Hi sorry I hope I can make this make sense I was wondering if you’d be able to write some head cannons on how Yusuke, Ryuji, and Akechi (separately) would react to a reader whose love language is making and giving food. Like the reader doesn’t look like they could even boil water only to find out they not only like to cook but is pretty damn good at it. Making them something like a boxed lunch or some sweets for Valentine’s Day or a small treat just because and always asking to make sure it’s to their liking.The reader will make it a point to find out what food they like to get when they order something from a restaurant and learning how to make it to surprise them and will keep an ear out to see if they ask for anything changed or added when ordered so they’ll know to change it so it’s more suited to their crushes taste, and the reader will probably let their crush know that if there’s something they’d like them to make that they’re more than willing to try. Being willing to learn and will make anything be it different types of drinks (classic sweet tea or whipped ice coffee) to a multitude of different entrees (soups, sandwiches, pasta dishes, etc.) and a boat load of different desserts. And early on making sure to have some extra stuff made so they can say they brought something for everyone if they’re worried about seeming too weird or pushy.

Yum!

Cast Line Up: Ryuji Sakamoto, Yusuke Kitagawa, and Goro Akechi

A/N: This is so sweet!! i absolutely love it! Thank you for the request!

Warnings: None, just lots of fluff!

Let me know if i missed any warnings!

Wordcount: 1069

Ryuji Sakamoto

it means so much to him the you go out of your way to make food for him, and find out exactly what he likes.

when you invite him over for a picnic one evening, only to find that you made all of his favourties, he melts

he knows how to cook very few things, and its just the stuff that helps him with track and is high in protein.

when you guys go on coffee dates, and have his favourites memorized, he feels like he's falling in love all over again.

On white day, when he comes over to your house to visit just to see all his favourite snacks laid out for him, he feels like his stomach is filled with butterflies

It had been a long tiring day for Ryuji. He had been training like crazy, and school had been as draining as ever. of course he loved training but it really did a number on him, especially with his crippled knee.

he slowly made his way to his apartment, not wanting to go home just yet. thankfully he received a call from his favourite person, asking him to come over. He quickly changed course, not even caring that he probably still smelled like sweat. it didn't matter, right? you'd probably just be playing video games or reading manga together anyways.

he reached your house quite quickly, and knocked on the door, hearing you squeak a "come in!" from the other side. he quickly opened the door, a grin on his face.

the grin spread even wider at what he saw once he fully walked into your house.

you were running around the kitchen, a cute little apron tied around your waist. all his favourites are on the table, and soon he's smiling so hard his face hurts.

he wraps his arms around your waist, pressing a kiss to your temple.

"How'd ya know, baby? about all the stuff I liked?" he says, and you can hear the smile in his voice.

"Because. I love you" you say, rubbing his hands with one of yours, the other stirring up some food. "and i may have also asked your mom" you say, blushing slightly. he lets out a laugh, pressing another kiss to your temple.

"love ya baby. More than anything."

Yusuke Kitagawa~

As an acts of service man, there is nothing he appreciates more.

he's never really had anyone take care of him as well as you do. Madarame did, but lets be honest, he was a terrible cook.

It makes him so happy, especially on nights when his art has taken over his life, and its all he can focus on.

he's kind of busy, whether its phantom thieve business, school, or his art, so he never really has time to make himself a good healthy meal.

he really wishes he could return the gesture, but he is no where near as good at cooking as you are.

Everything in Yusuke's dorm except for the painting in front of him had disappeared into a deep blackness, like a black hole had gone through the room and sucked up everything except for himself and the painting.

in the back of his mind he sensed that tonight he would be getting no sleep. it didn't bother him though. he dabbed at his palette, filling up the canvas with colour, sighing every so often when it whatever he was painting didn't come out the way he wanted.

as he continued to paint, he started to hear a voice. he ignored it though, after all he was so close to getting his painting right! just a little longer and it would be perfect-

"Yusuke!" a soft voice called, and then a soft hand appeared out of the abyss that was his room, gently resting on his shoulder. all of a sudden the blackness that had become his surroundings disappeared, and he was in a room, his room. there was a delicious smell, something savory but soft. it smelled amazing. he turned to you, a soft smile tugging at the corners of his lips when he saw all the food you had prepared. His heart soared; no one had ever put this much effort into taking care of him, not even Madarame. he knew if it hadn't been for you, he probably wouldn't have been eating.

Goro Akechi~

Again, as an acts of service man, it means SO MUCH to him.

he's often very busy with work and school, and it's just so heart warming to come home to you in his apartment, with a cute little apron on, rushing around making him food.

definitely returns the favour, and cooks you all sorts of little goodies. he has a lot of experience due to living alone for so long.

it makes him the happiest if you stop by his work place or school to deliver him food, especially if he's working late or couldn't bring food to school due to being in a rush.

he would eat anything you give him, but will also give you pointers on how to pair flavours and what not.

the moment Akechi saw you at the reception of his work place, his heard skipped a beat. you looked adorable, your small cute face all flushed from the cold weather, a sweet looking bento in your hands.

as soon as Akechi told you he'd be working late you rushed to make him some food. the last thing you wanted was your lovely boyfriend to be stuck at work with no dinner.

to be honest, he had not expected you to come, even when his boss told him someone had come to see him. he figured it would be some unwanted fan girls again, for the 5th time that week. he was pleasantly surprised when he saw you, a little smile on your face.

you quickly walked over to him, setting the bento down on the counter, before reaching up to press a kiss to his cheek. He held your face in his hand, and even though he was usually a stickler about public affection, he was willing to let this slide due to how tired he was. you then handed him the box, giving him one more kiss, before telling to eat all of it, and call you if he was hungry for anything else. he smiled. he was truly so greatfull for you.

[kitsunefyuu]

Did you notice how some AFO fans who used to like DFO Theory started to hate it and suddenly attack the same fans? Maybe this is due to generalizing DFO as OOC? I once saw someone saying that "to respect someone else's opinion, just remember that you have also changed your opinion several times" but these people only seem to attack what they once liked for no apparent reason, other than "nooooo my beautiful AFO is not like this 😭😭"

Yes, it is a trend that I did notice when I first came into the fandom that a lot of people would say they are former DFO. Then say how they realize how 'stupid' the theory was and unrealistic. As if suddenly now they are the pinnacle of rational and totally know everything about a fictional character.

I never claim my interpretation is the canon, because I know I could end up wrong. That just how it is and I'm always willing to adjust my headcanons with the source material. But honestly I think the AFO fans that liked DFO and now hate it only changed because other people started being hostile to the theory.

Like popular writers, artist, and all kinds of people begun to sneer at that interpretation beside those in the little community. Seeing it as just trying to 'soften' AFO or as something gross to do to the MC. Or worse some people like DFO but hate AFO so when the former DFO see that they change their mind to double down on disliking DFO as they LIKE AFO. As they see it as like you said 'softening' him to make him palatable. The theory itself, however, is only parentage.

Like it still be valid to assume AFO had Izuku with Inko from a One Night stand, and Hisashi Midoriya is just the guy that stepped up for single mom Inko. We have evidence of there possibly being more aware but if don't like it then that an option too.

DFO theory is simply the theory that Izuku Midoriya is RELATED to All for One. That is the bare bones minimum, I don't care if you are OH HE LOVES HIM or HE AN EXPERIMENT or whatever you want to believe. None of that really registers much to me nor should matter, like DFO can be used in many manner of ways.

The ones that seem to hate is most... Well they tend to either want Virgin All for One (for sexual reasons) or want him to be purely asshole(for sexual or just because love assholes that can go either way) or maybe fear of being the outsider. There also many who claim that every time he does a more evil act that it PROOF he never father a child.

Like tell me you never had a mentally unstable parent that does outrageous things. Anyone can have a kid, it sure doesn't take much for a guy to one and done for various reasons. We also literally been confirmed now he can change his face, DNA, and has actually done so. Also we've seen how he is with Yoichi, literal proof of his ability to love it just dark and twisted.

It why DFO is so interesting since if is the child of AFO it an avenue to explore his character. How WOULD AFO raise a child now that we knows what happened with Yoichi? Is he aware of Izuku? Does he care? We've seen him vault family and say how precious family is.

But then, none of that matters to the former DFO fans who now are DFO hates. They just don't want to be the weirdo outsiders believing in something that isn't even 'canon' and as I've said many times. I'm not exactly going to stop writing or enjoying it even if it NOT canon.

No one can dictate what I like and enjoy. And those people projecting hatred once they loved it?

I hope they know it ok to just like different things and change your mind. They should be happy with what they like instead of just wanting to be 'right'.

[butterflydm]

wot reread: a memory of light (chapters 24-31)

spoilers for a memory of light, the final book.

Everything that Tuon thinks about her life really does sound like it's going to make Mat so miserable. All the obligatory pomp and circumstance, even in private (because you're never in private when you have slaves!). But, hey, he'll get rewarded with sex every time he saves Tuon's life, so who needs happiness? (/sarcasm)

Given how many truths about the Seanchan have been withheld from Mat in order to get him to this point, I wonder how many of those truths it would take for him to abandon ship?

Note: I am going to be questioning and interrogating Mat's actions, words, and behaviors a LOT going forward and not taking much at face value. And that kinda extends to people talking about him: what do they know and believe about him, etc? Whose PoV are we in when certain things are said or revealed, etc? This is mostly for two reasons: a. I am sussing out how much wiggle room there is for writing fic about Mat in this time period and b. I want to try to not make assumptions based on my first thoughts when I'm reading each PoV.

2. Beslan says that Mat has changed and "I don't know what to make of him any more." Beslan is all-in on the slavers now, which makes him a very great disappointment to me. I guess we can't be that surprised. He enabled his mom being a serial rapist, so I guess it shouldn't be a shock that he's willing to enable slavery as well. What Beslan says about Mat is... hmm. How well did Beslan ever know Mat, I guess is the question that immediately springs to mind. Beslan was the son of Mat's rapist, who allowed that his mom was maybe going too far with Mat but still was basically a momma's boy despite the rape. And the last time Mat saw Beslan, he was a revolutionary who was willing to stand up against the Seanchan even when his mother was not, so I suspect that he would also not be certain what to make of you, Beslan. Honestly, given that Beslan's last experience of Mat was "wants to escape Ebou Dar no matter what", the most surprising thing for him should be that Mat voluntarily returned to Ebou Dar.

But everything that Tuon thinks here about how Beslan and the Altaran people have been "properly tamed" does give me that gross feeling that she (and many of the Darkfriends in the series) gives me in her PoV chapters. If Mat could actually see her thought processes, all his fantasies about how she's Not Like the Other Seanchan would go up in smoke.

3. Selucia slightly shades Tuon on how she hasn't broken Mat to fully proper behavior yet (he's cursing at some news they've received) and Tuon immediately decides that she needs a new Truthspeaker so that Selucia can go back to being only her Voice (and not speak any opinions that aren't exactly your own, Tuon?).

An Empress must be "crafty", "strong", and "skilled" to sit on the Crystal Throne, Tuon thinks.

Ah, I guess that's why she died pretty quickly in Aviendha's alternate future. Tuon doesn't have any of those qualities. It is interesting to think about how Tuon pumps herself here up with an impossible goal: that she be strong enough to live forever (as the Empress is meant to do and yet how every single Empress has failed to do) so that she can bring 'order' to the world. Just as Fortuona is not living up to the fictional Tuon in Mat's head, she can't possibly live up to the Empress that she believes that she needs to be.

There really are hints, here and there, of the interesting character that Tuon could have been. She just needed so much more character work. I do think she's been more interesting under Sanderson so far, though, at least than she was in CoT & KoD.

4. At this moment in time, Tuon is regretting her marriage. Mat's fancy Seanchan uniform keeps snagging on everything that he passes and her other generals find him baffling. She married "chaos itself". This feels like another place where we're being told one thing and shown another. What has Mat actually DONE that is chaotic to Tuon's plans? He saved her life and advised that she not be stupid enough to actively try to sabotage Rand saving the world, but he didn't challenge her on anything or fight her on anything.

This really does show the all-or-nothing attitude of the Seanchan: Mat has bent so much to accommodate Tuon that he's practically unrecognizable to who he used to be but that's still not enough for her. Nothing but complete and eternal submission is enough for her. He can do everything she asks but if he doesn't have the right attitude about it, then she's still unhappy with him.

5. Oh, "the Prince of Ravens" thinks that they're joining the battle too late? MAYBE he shouldn't have deserted on the eve of the fucking Last Battle then? Sanderson suddenly inserting a feeling of urgency in Mat about getting to the Last Battle feels so ridiculous. Mat didn't give a shit about the Last Battle a couple of chapters ago. He ran away so that he could have some drinks in slaver town. The Last Battle has been happening for at least a week at this point.

Mat being someone who is creating urgency and rushing would make so much more sense if he'd gone to the Seanchan as a negotiator and not as a deserter.

We do get confirmation here that Mat is now the second-highest ranking member of the High Blood, after Tuon herself. And the mere fact that Tuon thinks here that he would "never be a rival" makes me feel like narrative irony would have insisted on him being the one who topples her from her throne.

6. This is when Tuon renames Mat as "bringer of destruction" (aka Knotai aka I am not using that name in this reread ever again). Mat deciding that he likes being dubbed a "bringer of destruction" is another thing that feels bizarrely out of character but I will note that this is all in Tuon PoV, so we don't know how Mat actually feels about the name (I'm pretty sure he doesn't start calling himself that in his head at any point). And we've seen that Tuon has a very difficult time reading Mat, so if he was giving off any tells that he was lying, she would certainly never pick up on it. She glares at him after the renaming and wills him not to argue with it, so his response might be Mat picking up on her cues and responding.

"The Pattern had placed [Mat] before her, had shoved him into her arms." It sure fucking did and it was so incredibly annoying to read.

Tuon also does (internally) note here that Rand was 100% correct about how fragile her rule here is.

Haha, after Selucia uses their handtalk to call Tuon out on the risks she's taking, Tuon thinks again that she needs to replace Selucia as a Truthspeaker so that Selucia can go back to being a good little parrot and stop having opinions (this is a mild paraphrase of her thoughts).

7. Ah, this moment is in Tuon's PoV but it actually does still manage to be pretty clear exactly how much she is disappointing Mat when she considers the idea of going back on her word and swooping down on the Aes Sedai to capture them all as damane rather than going to aid them as allies. That's the moment of Actual Fortuona failing to live up to the Fictional Tuon in Mat's head that I was remembering. Back during either TGS or ToM, Mat realizes that it was likely that Tuon didn't stay in CoT & KoD because she was being honorable and keeping her word but instead was staying because of the prophecy about him she'd gotten, but he kinda just ignored the implications of that realization.

The mere fact that Tuon considers the idea of breaking her word here would remind Mat that her word is meaningless (and Mat has developed, as we have established, a fey-like obsession with keeping his word). It is interesting how Tuon thinks of herself as the embodiment of order and yet so easily considers throwing away a treaty and going back on her word; yet she considers Mat the embodiment of chaos when he does his best to always live by his word no matter what the personal cost. Mat probably would push it away again here (she does make the right choice when it comes down to it) but it's another place where Actual Fortuona would be a disappointment when compared to Fictional Tuon in Mat's head.

Ultimately, when Tuon decides to keep her word, it isn't out of honor but due to the omens telling her to bet on Mat.

I will note at this point in time that Mat is still being informal and using "Tuon" freely.

8. We get a glimpse of how pressed things are on Lan's part of the battlefield before shifting over to Elayne's. Birgitte tries to keep Elayne in the command tent and Elayne finally snaps, telling her that if Birgitte can't follow her orders like all the other soldiers are willing to do, then she will release their bond. I'm sure Elayne gets hate for this, because she gets hate for everything, but I found it very cathartic after how much Birgitte has been getting on my nerves in this book. And Elayne's right that she's more useful out there doing things -- she is an extremely powerful channeler. It is a waste of her talents for her to sit in a tent.

9. Hmm, yeah, as Rand enters Shayol Ghul itself, he notes that time is affecting him differently. He can tell that one of the women that he's bonded to is in pain but he can't tell who it is and he worries over Elayne and Aviendha.

Though the knife worked to shield Rand from the Dark One's eyes, Moridin is still waiting for him there. I wonder how long he's just been kneeling there. So, yeah, before Rand can get to the Dark One, he has to take care of Moridin.

Anyway, we learned in Siuan's PoV just before this that Min was sent to the Aes Sedai camp with the message "The Seanchan fight the Shadow." You know, I like that message because it doesn't overpromise anything and it doesn't set up expectations that the Seanchan won't be absolute douchebags, as they certainly will be.

10. Luc Mantear and Isam Mandragoran's story as Slayer really could have been heartbreaking and fascinating if Jordan had ever actually leaned into the implications of it. They're both essentially collateral damage -- Isam was left behind when the Blight swallowed up Malkier; Luc was sent off into the Blight to 'seek glory' in order to help wedge an opening for the Mantears to be pushed off the throne of Andor. But the books never explore that.

As it is, Slayer is just... this disconnected assassin who shows up once in a blue moon, and there's not really any substance there to hook onto.

After a... really long battle involving Slayer and the red-veiled Aiel channelers, Perrin fails to kill Slayer and Slayer ends up escaping. Lanfear shows up to heal Perrin and she continues to seem vaguely irritated that she's interacting with him ("You can be such a child"). He sets the dreamspike up inside the cavern to protect Rand and asks the wolves to guard the outside of the cavern (this is all in TAR).

11. Egwene feels so gross as she heads towards the meeting that she is about to have with the Seanchan, because she knows that the Seanchan fighting means damane fighting, which means forcing slaves into battle.

Tuon sits on her mobile throne, with a train being held by eight slaves in transparent robes. Literally every time Tuon's lifestyle is described, it just sounds like something that is going to make Mat so incredibly miserable.

lol, the narrative tries to convince us that Tuon is "calculating" and "discerning" through Egwene's description of her eyes. I've been in the girl's head. I'll grant you "manipulative" and "can spot an obvious clue when it's shoved under her nose" but that's as far as I'll go. Egwene, you were absolutely right when you assumed that Tuon would be coddled and spoiled. I speak as someone who was forced through two long books of "a brat goes on a circus tour and throws several tantrums".

12. Anyway, both Egwene and Tuon feel contempt for each other -- Tuon for what Egwene inherently is as a person (a channeler) and Egwene for the person that Tuon chooses to be (a slaver).

Which we can see in the way they talk to each other -- Tuon calls Egwene an animal, while Egwene calls Tuon a criminal who would be at home with murderers and rapists. Tuon sees what Egwene is as the problem with her, while Egwene sees who Tuon is as the issue with her. These are not the same as each other.

13. So here on page 471 (hardback version), Mat has finally shown up to the Last Battle. Over halfway into the book! Literally makes me want to stab a wall that Mat spent half the book just fucking around with slavers instead of helping with the Last Battle. I assume we're supposed to feel like the Seanchan coming to help would be impossible without Mat, because he shamed Tuon into actually keeping her word, but there were better roads of getting Mat there that didn't make him a deserter and a defector. But I'm guessing making Mat those things was the point of his impossible teleportation logistics between books.

Just. Ugh.

14. The reason that Egwene realizes that Mat is here, among the collection of "frozen Blood in various poses" around Tuon, is because Tuon turns to berate him for not telling her that Egwene was once captured as damane and thus making her show her ass in public when she tried to argue that Egwene would understand how great being a slave is if only she'd tried it.

The question I have here is: are we supposed to believe Mat when he claims that he only didn't tell Tuon about Egwene having been captured as damane because he 'didn't think on it too long' that Egwene's captivity had happened. It's in Egwene's PoV so we are, once again, not in Mat's head. The main good quality that Mat has been able to hold onto when he's been around the Seanchan has been keeping his friends' secrets. tbh it seems more likely to me that he just didn't think it was Tuon's business (it would have been a pretty big betrayal of Egwene's privacy for him to confide that in Tuon, imo?). But, yeah, Tuon explicitly says here that she is going to have a "not pleasant" conversation with Mat about him holding back information on her. And it pretty clearly comes across as a threat.

Yikes.

15. Egwene does seem to believe here that Tuon has made a grave mistake by marrying Mat... but it's explicitly because Mat is ta'veren and Tuon has trapped herself into his web. And it amuses her because she assumes it can't mean anything good for Tuon or the Seanchan in the long term. (I mean, given that Mat has gotten hundreds of thousands of people killed on the Westlands side... yeah, it does seem like a lot of dead Seanchan are in the future on Tuon's side, and Mat might never even realize he was the enabling factor). So this is the one time that I'll allow for a character to be amused that Mat has married a slaver -- Egwene clearly sees this as Tuon having screwed herself over in the future without realizing it.

Though Mat does throw out a "may she live forever" (eyeroll), he is also still calling her 'Tuon', despite the threat of execution. And note that Mat is still of the opinion that "being ta'veren has never gotten me much" so he doesn't seem particularly happy about being married.

16. Yeah, Tuon also makes it very clear that the new clothes and the new name are deliberate attempts to separate Mat away from his past connections and make it clear that Tuon owns him now. "He serves the Seanchan, the Crystal Throne, and the Empress."

She is isolating him from his previous friends and making it clear that he belongs to her. Egwene is 100% right in her instincts that he needs to be saved from Tuon, even if Mat himself doesn't realize it (or, potentially, does realize it but isn't willing to admit to it).

17. So Egwene has to renegotiate with Tuon because now that Rand is gone, Tuon is forcing everyone to start from page one with her again, because she is a coddled and spoiled brat who wants to eke out more concessions if she can get them.

But the results of Tuon attempting to re-negotiate with Egwene now that Rand is off on his mission actually ends up backfiring on Tuon overall, I think! -- Egwene gets Tuon to agree to leave Tremalking alone (because they haven't found a compliant Sea Folk leader along the lines of Beslan to lend them legitimacy) and Egwene makes a spirited attempt to get Tuon to agree to allow women who have just been discovered but not yet collared the opportunity to choose to go the White Tower instead, leaning on Tuon's stated belief that marath'damane want to be slaves so it's no big deal to offer them the option of freedom.

But Tuon does balk at this idea, unfortunately, because she gets scared when Egwene mentions that all sul'dam are marath'damane.

18. Egwene, because she actually is discerning and calculating, picked up on what Tuon said about having trained damane herself and says, in front of the Blood, that as a sul'dam, Tuon is capable of channeling. Which Tuon already knows -- she learned this in KoD -- but she calls Egwene a liar because living in denial is the only way she can keep her power base and nothing matters more to Tuon than sucking up all the power in the world. It really does suck so much that we came up to the brink of Something Actually Happening with the Seanchan storyline and then backed away like cowards. There will never be any outriggers! Pull off the damn bandaid while the books are still running!

We don't get any mention of the Blood or the various damane & sul'dam who are around reacting to this bit of information either, but they do hear Egwene call ~their Empress~ out on being a liar, and call their Empire out on being a machine of cruelty that tortures women into fates worse than death. Will that matter? Who the fuck knows. Maybe one or two of the Blood here will feel a pang of conscience, as Leilwin née Egeanin did, and begin the slow and painful process of changing. Or maybe not.

And it is satisfying to get to see someone calling Tuon out on what a hypocrite she is -- she's all for preaching that other people should get put into the collar because they're just ~meant~ to be slaves but of course she wouldn't do it to herself. Of course she wouldn't. The idea terrifies her to death, I'm sure. Which also shows how deeply in denial she is when she claims that marath'damane just naturally want to be collared and anything other than that is a weird outlier. She knows damn well that it isn't true, because she doesn't long for the collar herself. But if she stuffs her fingers in her ears and just shouts that she's not marath'damane loudly enough, she can make herself believe it.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that Tuon did not go into this conversation looking to be publicly accused of being marath'damane herself, especially not in front of a crowd of Blood, so I feel like this one was a win for Egwene.

19. When things get to be really heated between Egwene & Tuon, with Egwene embracing the Power, Mat intercedes. What Mat says here is gross and demeaning; and I think we can all agree on that (a threat to take them over "over his knee" as if that would even be possible in this situation), but Egwene doesn't take it seriously for a second because she can see that Mat is trying to deflect her and Tuon away from each other and onto him (also frustrating though, because I really wanted something to Actually Happen with Tuon).

Also, we get a reminder that Tuon is a big ol' liar about not being jealous over Mat and other women, because she stares at where Mat's hand is touching Egwene's chest until he lowers his hand.

It also leads to another threat from Tuon about how she and Mat will have "many words" tonight, but they do both back down. But, wow, Tuon is so jealous over Egwene here, which is hilarious from the perspective of actually knowing anything about Egwene and Mat's friendship.

(sadly, I must take away Egwene's right to be amused at Mat's marriage at this point in the conversation, when she bizarrely attempts to commiserate ??? with Tuon over Mat's foul language)

Also, I will note that Egwene offers to help free him from the Seanchan, Mat doesn't tell her that he doesn't need to be freed, he tells her that he can handle it on his own. Slightly different things. Do you have an exit strategy, Mat?

Egwene is still determined to help Mat get free of the Seanchan somehow. AU idea where she does!

So, Mat leaves with Tuon and we know that she plans to have a 'not pleasant' conversation with him. So I will mark that in my notes to keep in mind the next time we see Mat.

20. As we've been going through the various battlefields, the 'great captains' have continued to make bone-headed mistakes. As we return to Elayne, it seems like this is coming to a head, as Tam confronts Bashere.

(and, no, she doesn't think about how Tam is Rand's dad and will be her kid's grandfather. Why would she, apparently?)

Tam accuses Bashere of not using scouts and falsifying scouting reports instead, saying that Bashere is to blame for the bad tactics that have happened in the recent battles. After considering how badly they've been trapped by the Shadowspawn, Elayne orders Bashere relieved from duty and has Talmanes take him away with the Band's Redarms.

And now Elayne is the one leading the army here, not Bashere.

21. Bryne gets one right for calling Tuon "that Imperial monster of a Seanchan leader". I have to admit, so far, there is less of the "let's hold hands with the Seanchan" vibe that I remembered and more "ugh, fuck, I guess we gotta hold our noses and deal with the Seanchan" vibe, at least in most chapters. It's really Mat's bizarro-world PoVs that tend to throw everything else off, and Mat has been kept ignorant of the Seanchan's recent actions under Tuon's guidance.

Bryne actually made Min do some real work by having her clerk for one of his people! Okay, Bryne has two rights. This is the first time Min has done any real work in what feels like forever. Being away from Rand is already doing her some good. But now the tent she was working in has been destroyed, so he puts her to work as a messenger (Min actually volunteers, which is definitely better than how she behaved when she was with Rand).

I kinda feel like my own opinion of the romances in WoT does hinge pretty strongly on "do they become less interesting characters when they are spending time with [love interest]?" but also on "what else do they have going on besides being [main character]'s love interest?".

ex. I liked Min best in TSR and once she starts really one-note obsessing over Rand in TFoH and onward, my interest in her nosedives because it feels like she has zero interests or drives outside of Rand. Get a hobby, Min! One that isn't about Rand (so the interest in 'philosophy' doesn't count). There's this incredibly depressing scene in, I think it was TFOH but it might have been the very start of LoC, where Elayne wants to talk to Min about something other than Rand and Min is just completely incapable of turning off the Rand-obsession long enough to think of a single good thing that doesn't revolve around Rand-Rand-Rand (the scene was not meant to be depressing but it definitely made me go 'yikes, Min, please get literally anything in your life that isn't about Rand').

22. So Min is off to the "Seanchan Empress" to tell her to send cavalry to the battlefield. Because Tuon is currently doing her best to hold back as many of her forces as she can and is negotiating them out piece-meal.

When she arrives at the Seanchan camp, Min notes how many forces are just lazing around doing nothing when they could be helping in the Last Battle. Min thinks for a moment that she wishes that she could have gone with Rand to Shayol Ghul but she has finally realized that she's only a liability to him in situations like that. Finally. I do note that apparently Rand had to 'forbid' her from going, though, so if he'd let her, she would have happily been a liability to him.

Anyway, Min was told by Rand to keep an eye on Fortuona, so I'll keep that in mind.

23. "Speak what criticism one would about the Seanchan -- and Min had a number of things she could add to that conversation -- they certainly were organized."

I really wish that Sanderson actually let Min think some of her specific criticisms about the Seanchan here rather than the narration veiling it. Because the way this is written ends up praising without critique, because the criticism remains politely unvoiced. One must always be polite about the slavers who want to dehumanize your friends and your lover, I guess.

Min was in Falme with Egwene! She actually saw Egwene being punished! She was even blamed for some of Egwene's punishments (which were all Renna's fault, of course, and not Min's) and she listened to Egwene scream and cry out in agony.

Let Min actually remember some of that in the text here rather than sweeping it all under the rug! She knows that the da'covale are slaves, for example, because she was in Falme. But instead of calling them slaves, she calls them "immodestly-dressed young women". Let Min actually have a thought here about how she disapproves of slavery! Put that on the record!

And Min thinking here that the Seanchan "couldn't possibly be as prickly as the Aiel". You... you literally listened to Egwene weeping in pain while she was being tortured for such crimes as "wanting to keep her own name" and "not wanting to be a slave" and "letting her friend visit her". wtf, Min.

24. Min has never seen Mat's hat before, but she thinks here that he has topped his new silken Seanchan outfit with his "familiar hat". I really do wonder if there was a draft of AMoL where Mat was in Merrilor, because then Min and Mat would have had a chance to meet back when Mat was in his old clothes and it would make sense for her to recognize his hat here. Because as it is, that's literally a nonsense thing for Min to think. The last time she saw Mat was at the end of book 2. Mat got his hat during book 4.

Min and Mat reunite like old buddies. They barely know each other. Let's tot up the times that they've met:

off-the-page in-between TGH and TDR, while Mat was dying from the dagger, in the handful of days that Mat was there before Verin took him & Elayne, Egwene, & Nynaeve off to the White Tower

That's it. That's the only entry. Mat didn't meet her in Baerlon -- Rand told him about her afterward. Apart from that, their only possible knowledge of each other comes from what Rand might have passed along. It is genuinely bizarre that they are behaving like old friends. They met once, almost two years ago, when one of them was dying. Mat has seen her having sex with Rand from time to time in his color swirl visions, but Min doesn't have access to that. They missed seeing each other in Caemlyn by four days, because Rand sends Mat off to Salidar before Min shows up with the embassy. They are the next best thing to complete strangers to each other, except that Mat has unintentionally seen Min naked several times.

It's Min and Perrin who have a friendship. It's funny, how Sanderson buffed up Perrin's friendships with Rand & Mat, but erased Perrin's friendship with Min. Perrin and Min, per canon, spent a lot of time talking to each other in between TGH & TDR (more time than either of them spent with Rand, who spent most of his time either brooding alone or arguing with Moiraine).

This is definitely "writing to the epilogue" convenience. But it could have made sense if Mat and Min had met back in the early chapters of the book while Mat was in Merrilor after he'd returned with Moiraine & Thom.

25. Mat tries to press Min for any new viewings about him. That's... interesting. Someone wants a new fate? I'm feeling curious about how Mat and Tuon's 'not pleasant' conversation went. Min deflects the conversation to viewings about the Seanchan general and I really don't care. Except to note that, sadly, Galgan probably won't try to kill Tuon because Mat is now the next one in the line of succession.

26. Why in the world would Min bow to Tuon? Seriously, girl, wtf. This is what I mean about how the narrative itself feels like it tiptoes around Tuon. Why would Min care so much about respecting Seanchan titles and nobility? She thinks here that she doesn't care about any other nobility but somehow the word 'Empress' triggers the worship reflex in her hindbrain or something? wtf. "It was only proper to show respect to Fortuona". Literally why? Why is the emphasis in Min's chapter about being polite to the slavers? Why is that the overriding vibe of this section -- Min's desire to make a good impression on the slavers? She didn't try this hard (or at all) with the Aiel. It's things like this that make me feel like Tuon must be ta'veren, because that feels like a thought that Tuon just plopped into Min's brain without permission.

Also, after Tuon enters literally just as Mat has mentioned her to Min, Mat then quotes "Say the name of Darkness, and his eye is upon you". Um. Yeah. So I feel like that 'not pleasant' conversation didn't go very well. (*whispers* he just compared his wife to the Dark One */whispers*).

He is also still using "Tuon" in casual conversation. And he doesn't get down on the floor, even though everyone else (including Min, for whatever reason) does.

27. And Mat is straight-up baiting Tuon in this conversation, or at least it feels that way (and using Min as a weapon while he does it). Yeah, I get the feeling that 'not pleasant' conversation went extremely poorly (was telling Tuon that Min is "the Dragon Reborn's woman" his way of trying to protect her from being poached by Tuon but Min didn't pick up on it? or was it his way of assuaging Tuon's raging jealousy issues by letting her know that Min is 'taken' and Mat doesn't plan on screwing her?)

I almost wonder if he's testing Tuon here -- seeing if her threats have any teeth? She told him that she could have him killed if he kept using the name 'Tuon' and he has not stopped, not even after the 'not pleasant' conversation. Kinda interesting that Mat seems considerably more combative with Tuon after their 'not pleasant' private discussion than he ever has been before. Wish we'd gotten to see that conversation (important moments, etc.).

Mat warns Min that Tuon snatches people up and doesn't let them go -- Min here thinks that Mat sounds "almost proud" but tbh I don't give Min much credit for her insight into people so I will take that with a grain of salt -- and yet Min (who can never resist blabbing about her viewings to everyone in sight) immediately spills about a viewing that someone is going to try to kill Tuon.

Literally why in the world would she bother to say anything? Why would she do this to herself? Rand said nothing about going out of her way to save the head slaver's life.

Min does have the habit of being swept up by people who have stronger personalities than she does -- Moiraine, then Siuan, then Rand, then Cadsuane, and now Tuon, I guess.

I do have to crack up at Min lying to herself and saying that she hasn't accidentally blabbed a viewing in years. Even if she doesn't remember blabbing Elayne's pregnancy to the entire royal palace of Caemlyn, she sleepily blabbed out Melaine's pregnancy without thinking about it too and we know she remembers that one because it was the whole basis for why the Wise Ones treated her as an ~honorary Wise One~ for, like, two books.

If Min didn't already have an established habit of constantly talking about her viewings, I would chalk this up to Tuon being ta'veren as well but... she does.

28. Tuon just goes up and touches Min's face without permission. Probably thinking about checking her teeth. Anyway, she pronounces Min a 'Doomseer' and Min has just screwed herself for the foreseeable future.

Tuon views Min as a "gift" that Mat has given her to "pay your penance" (presumably for not volunteering information about Egwene) so... yeah, that gives us some insight into the 'not pleasant' conversation. I wonder if Mat will think back to it at all in the next PoV we get from him. Probably not. I feel like I would remember that.

Tuon names Min as her new Truthspeaker, probably thrilled that she can now shove Selucia back into the box of not having any opinions that Tuon hasn't told her to have. Her emotional support slave was having too many independent thoughts and we can't have that.

Anyway, Min's viewings never really helped Rand, so she probably won't actually help Tuon much either, so I guess that's a relief.

But, yeah, not a fun situation for Min. Though I guess Mat now has company in his hellhole of a prison, so there's that.

...okay, now I've got "Two Lost Souls" from Damn Yankees in my head.

29. Just as Tam picked up on how Bashere's 'tactical mistakes' keep helping the Shadowspawn in the last section, Lan has picked out the same when it comes to his own 'great captain' -- two reserve forces were both sent to shore up the same hole in the lines, resulting in confusion and also the ranks being too thin in other places.

30. So, yeah, the set-up continues for Team Light to be forced to trust the General of the Slavers with the armies despite his recent horrible life choices. We note here that it has been 'weeks' for Lan now.

Lan countermands Agelmar's latest order, as he's realized how badly it would expose part of their army and compromise any potential retreat, so Lan has de facto taken over the army here, just as Elayne has over in the Cairhien/Caemlyn section of the battle.

31. Mat lets us know here Min has also been re-dressed in fancy Seanchan clothes. Apparently without any attempt to stick in her own clothes? She's an 'honored holy woman' per Tuon, so you would imagine means she has leverage to wear her own clothes if she wants. (of course, if it doesn't give her any leverage, then that would be useful information for the reader to have)

Anyway, we are back in Mat's head, for the first time since his disappointing reunion scene with Rand. We've seen him from the outside a few times since then -- in Tuon, Egwene, and finally Min's eyes.

Mat announces that he needs to go out and look at the actual battlefield. He thinks in his head that it's because the maps are "too simplistic" but I wonder if part of his motivation is taking a chance and getting some fresh air while his ~slaver bride~ is off doing "some empressly duty". I'm still curious about that 'not pleasant' conversation of 'many words' that they had after Tuon and Egwene met. He also yanks off part of his 'Seanchan uniform' here, leaving himself in his scarf, medallion, and breeches. He'd rather walk around shirtless than wear the fancy Seanchan duds, it seems.

(this life is going to make him so miserable)

32. Yeah, Min is now wearing a dress, with no apparent protest. Mat notes that she's pretty and then additionally notes that he needs to be careful with smiles around women now because his wife might stab him if he smiles too much at other women. So, yeah, I'm thinking part of the 'not pleasant' conversation was Tuon making her jealousy issues very very clear to Mat. But despite Mat's protests that hooking up with Rand means that Min is "practically his sister", his narration does make it clear that he's attracted to her.

(this life is going to make him so miserable)

"Mat had always considered Min on the boyish side" - you met her one time! During the foggy period of your memory when you were dying! The narration really is behaving like Perrin and Mat's friendships have been swapped around in this book -- Perrin is the one who has the stronger friendships with Rand and Elayne now; while Mat now has the stronger friendship with Min. Before this book, the opposite was true of all of those things. I guess we can assume that this is about Rand & Min screwing in the color swirls but Min would have been at least partly naked for a lot of those.

33. Anyway, Mat had his own clothes hidden away and changes into them now, when Tuon isn't here to protest, and then sneaks off to look at the battlefield before she can come back to berate him again. Lessons learned from his time with Tylin?

(Min does say here that she's tempted to strip off too, but she keeps wearing the Seanchan clothes for whatever reason)

We do also learn here the very important information that the Seanchan guards respond to bribes (Mat bribed them into keeping and hiding his clothes for him here). Though Mat also notes that it's only the free guards and not the slaves.

34. It's so sad here that Mat has to feel grateful that Tuon "understood that [Mat] needed" the foxhead medallion and returned it to him. He's grateful that he's allowed to use his own personal items and that she didn't permanently keep what she'd stolen from him.

(this life is going to make him so miserable)

...hmm. I'm going to keep an eye on the medallions. Because technically Mat has two right now (his original and a copy that Elayne made), but he hasn't mentioned the second one at all.

35. Sadly, going for Pips means that "unfortunately, someone had time to alert" Tuon that Mat was slipping away, and so she comes to confront him (so I was right about part of the reason behind him bailing on the command tent was trying to get away from Tuon).

Mat once again warns Min that it's very dangerous here: "they know how to treat a fellow, as long as they don't behead him. I'm still trying to figure out how to prevent that from happening."

Hmm, Mat gives Min the "sell" on staying with the Seanchan... he says that it would help Rand because she can attempt to mislead Tuon about her 'omens' to try to guide Tuon onto a less-awful path. I imagine that's how Mat is justifying his own choices too but we saw that when he actually had a chance to try to guide Tuon onto a better path, he froze and said nothing while Rand did all the negotiating. But Mat does make it clear here that he still disapproves of what the Seanchan are doing; he's just... sticking around and helping anyway for whatever reason.

But, yeah, "lie to Tuon to try to subtly direct her choices" being part of Mat's advice to Min is... illuminating, to be sure. Did Mat lie to/mislead Tuon during their recent 'not pleasant' private discussion?

36. Yeah, we see here very directly that Mat doesn't always mean what he says around Tuon, when he pretends to be happy that she's coming along with him to survey the battlefield while "groaning inside". This is what I was talking about back when I was questioning all of the other character's interpretations of Mat's behavior in the previous few chapters -- most of the characters in the books are not very good at reading Mat. Tuon has failed to accurately judge him on multiple occasions, Egwene will always at least partly see him as the troublemaker from her hometown, and Min barely knows him.

Also, Mat was expecting to be berated for changing his clothes but Tuon says nothing about it at this time. Hey, Min, maybe you should take the opportunity to change yours too?

It is good to see Mat attempting to push back on Tuon, even if it's on relatively minor things.

It really is the decision to make Mat a deserter that screwed his characterization over so hard in this book. If Mat had gone to Merrilor and then gone to Ebou Dar, pretty much everything would make more sense. There's only a couple of scenes so far that have 'needed' Mat to be a willing traitor in order to play out the way that they did (mostly just Egwene's shock at seeing him hanging out with the Seanchan) and almost everything else would make more sense if Mat had gone back to Ebou Dar as a negotiator on behalf of the Westlands.

37. On the minus side, we have some really weird stuff here where Mat dehumanizes one of the Seanchan generals for the crime of being a woman that he doesn't want to fuck. While Mat did start basically thinking about every woman that he met in terms of fuckability back around... A Crown of Swords, I want to say... he didn't act like 'not being fuckable' made women unpeople and he's kinda going that way here and it's super gross.

38. On her own front in the battlefield, Egwene sees a huge tactical blunder by Bryne that leaves one of their flanks wide-open to the enemy and vulnerable, and now she is also going to go question him, as it looked distinctly like he set up a trap that benefited the Shadowspawn. So that's all of the fronts except Ituralde (who is just outside of Shayol Ghul).

After questioning Agelmar, Lan suspects it is Compulsion that is behind his recent poor battle decisions, and Lan has him relieved from duty. Also, Tenobia conveniently gets killed on the battlefield and brings Faile one step closer to ruling Saldaea.

39. Back with Mat, Tuon, Min, and Selucia. Poor Selucia. She got half a book of being allowed to have her own opinions but now she's just Tuon's Voice/bodyguard again and gets to speak no words but Tuon's.

Min is obediently telling Tuon all her viewings and her interpretations of them, just like she always does when she's under the thumb of someone with a more forceful personality than her own. This is kinda why I feel like Mat's hope that she will lead Tuon onto better paths is likely not going to pan out -- because Min's viewings do not have a moral component, not that we're aware of, and she is spilling them all out indiscriminately.

And Tuon will likely continue to be her own horrible self, no matter what viewings Min has. But I guess we'll see how that relationship plays out.

Min has not only told Tuon all the viewings she had about Tuon but also her viewings about Mat, over Mat's protests. Min likes to claim that she doesn't do things like that, but wow, she does it all the time. It does feel like fandom doesn't really acknowledge that both Min & Perrin lie about themselves in their own heads just as much as Mat or Nynaeve do. Min believes that she's discreet about her viewings, when she's a blabbermouth most of the time, and Perrin believes that he thinks things through before he acts, when he's actually wildly reckless and impulsive pretty frequently.

40. It's interesting that Min and Mat greeted each other like old friends yet are now essentially working at cross-purposes -- Mat suggested to Min that ('for Rand') she mislead Tuon in order to craft a narrative that would make Tuon soften towards Aes Sedai (and also more minor things like "try to get her to stop wanting to get rid of my hat") but Min, like Galad, wants to be rigidly honest and is telling Tuon everything, not giving a care that she's telling Tuon other people's secrets (and we know she's telling real secrets, because she's now told Tuon all of Mat's old viewings that we know from before, against Mat's express wishes). So Min is essentially unintentionally teaching Mat that she is not an ally to him and that she will sell him out to Tuon if he confides in her. Which means that Mat is, once again, all alone in the middle of an enemy camp that he feels obligated to stay in (now matter how unhappy it makes him) Because Wife.

Mat and Tuon really is peak "enforced heterosexual monogamy" culture. They explicitly are married due not to their own desires but to external pressures (the prophecies) and feel obligated to stick it out even though, on Tuon's side, she feels like she has a wildly chaotic husband that she doesn't know how to control and, on Mat's side, everything about the situation is constantly making him miserable. I believe he thinks at one point (in some future chapter?) that he could be happy if it was just him and Tuon in a life far away from the Seanchan but... that really is him picturing himself and his Fictional Tuon character (not cold, not possessive, Not Like The Other Seanchan) rather than himself and Actual Fortuona. I'm sure Mat and his fake Tuon could find happiness running away from the throne, but fake Tuon doesn't exist so... yeah.

41. Mat is able to get "five minutes" by himself and rides down to talk to Perrin's slaver BFF Tylee. Much like Egwene had just realized, Mat learns here from Tylee that Bryne is making bad calls that are compromising his army.

*sigh*

Mat stuffs himself into Seanchan armor at this point. Well, he had a spine about wearing his own clothing for, like, five minutes. Maybe that's all we can hope for out of him these days. It is at least real 'on the field' armor rather than the ceremonial silk this time.

Also: Tuon's desire to constantly be keeping an eye on Mat vs Mat's desire to have some breathing room seems like a fight in their marriage that is going to reoccur a lot.

42. Anyway, Mat goes to personally take a unit out to relieve Bryne's soldiers because it looks like they've gotten very bad orders and he needs to correct them personally. I... don't have an issue with this apart from the whole "ugh, Seanchan" thing? Mat can see that the battle is going extremely poorly and wants to investigate from the inside because from what he can see, it looks like the general in charge is deliberately ordering bad tactics. That's not something that Mat can fix simply by sending contrary orders because he is not the main general of this battlefield. Bryne is. So Mat going out to take direct control of a specific part so that he can, essentially, undermine Bryne's bad orders before he goes to deal with the root of the issue makes sense because this is a time-sensitive situation.

Tylee tries to give Mat some damane slaves for the battle and he refuses.

Once again, like it did in Min's PoV, the narrative has yet another character praise the Seanchan's sense of organization while implying that the character has critiques about the Seanchan but not mentioning the specific issues that they have. Actually let Mat share his critiques about the Seanchan with the reader! Stop veiling the critiques behind "oh, I have some issues but I won't say what they are".

43. Mat is really really attracted to the enemy Sharan channeler. Until she tries to kill him but, yeah, he literally stops and stares at the channeler on the opposing side. Though that doesn't stop him from knocking her out with his spear when her weaves fail on him and he's able to get close.

*resigned sigh*

After this battle, Mat is now willing to throw damane slaves at the enemy.

Mat has also really really impressed the Ever Victorious Army. Something to keep in mind for post-canon 'Mat conducts a coup' thoughts. Between Egwene feeling like Tuon has accidentally gotten herself trapped in Mat's ta'veren web, Tuon's own "[Mat] would never be a rival" thoughts, how swiftly Mat is winning over the officers, and Mat's own words to Min about how she should craft a narrative to deceive Tuon into behaving the way she wants her to behave... there are some interesting puzzle pieces here for a post-canon "Mat deposes Tuon and takes over the Seanchan Empire" or "Mat tricks Tuon into thinking she's in charge while he's the real power in the Empire" storyline.

I really wish that Sanderson & Team Jordan hadn't made Mat a deserter at the start of the book; it really did start Mat off on such a bad foot, narratively-speaking, by weighting him so heavily on the side of the slavers without any kind of narrative justification for the choice (we still don't know how Mat got to Ebou Dar originally -- Sanderson really was like "okay, it makes no sense, so I'll just let readers fill in a reason that they can justify to themselves"). But even with that massive off-the-page weighting on the side of the slavers, Mat is listing back towards the Westlands side of things (as he has done time and time again). Over and over, Mat gets forcibly yanked over towards the Seanchan and then starts drifting away from them again (requiring another heavy-handed course-correction from the Authors).

44. Mat does change back into his "Two Rivers" coat here. ...wait, Mat's coat is a "Two Rivers" coat? When did that happen? When did Mat go back to the Two Rivers to get a coat? Or did he get it from Perrin's army? Anyway, he did change back into his own clothes after the battle.

Oh! Oh, this must be a coat that Elayne's person picked out for him (as per his request in ToM)! Elayne's person found him a Two Rivers coat? She really is magic. I love her.

Mat does realize here that the Sharan channeler that he captured is almost certainly going to end up damane. Should have just killed her.

45. Tuon is currently so pissed at Mat that she's only speaking to him through Selucia (now back in her role as Tuon's opinionless Voice). Mat notes this as a 'bad sign' but he also does keep calling her Tuon. Maybe he doesn't back down and start referring to her formally as she told him to do; maybe that was something that my memory was incorrect on, which would be nice.

"Your life is no longer your own," Tuon tells him through Selucia. I wonder if that's also part of the reason that Mat went out on the battlefield -- a way of declaring that his life is his own, even if that means potentially throwing it away.

Mat references Nynaeve here -- I'm not sure whether or not Tuon got Nynaeve's name in the conversation she had with Rand and Nynaeve back in TGS. I'll go check.

Yep, Rand says Nynaeve's name when she chastises him for trying to pretend that he doesn't care about Mat in front of Tuon. So Tuon knows that Mat is talking about a channeler here.

46. Yikes. Tuon 'gives' the Sharan channeler that Mat captured to him as his own personal damane slave. He tries to give her back to Tuon (also gross and yikes) but Tuon won't let him. Mat does refer to her as a channeler and not marath'damane but... ugh. But this is the continuation of Tuon's campaign to brainwash and integrate Mat into being fully-Seanchan, so her actions here are no surprise.

Mat is now given control of the Seanchan armies over Galgan, and they send Min back to Egwene to tell her that Bryne is helping the Shadow with how he's behaving with the army.

47. So things are incredibly dire and yet there have been no thoughts of "wow wish Mat were here to blow the Horn of Valere". It's so bizarre that everyone is just completely chill with a powerful artifact that is literally meant for the Last Battle to be just hanging out unusable!

Anyway, the Black Tower Asha'man show up here to relieve Elayne's people, who are sorely pressed.

Here's my thought: I think Sanderson was too much in love with the whole "on the very edge of being broken, the cavalry shows up" idea aka Gandalf coming to save the day at Minas Tirith. Not everything needs to be last second like that. If everything is dramatic then nothing is truly dramatic. In real life, you wouldn't wait until after the point of hope to blow the horn that brings a magic army to fight on your side. You would want to do it as soon as it looks like your own forces aren't going to be enough.

48. Min stayed dressed in all her Seanchan finery to go deliver her message to Egwene. Min's conversation with Egwene is so bizarrely tone-deaf on Min's side of things? She complains about being ~pampered~ by the Seanchan and that their rich food isn't to her taste and when Egwene ~reminds her~ that Egwene has 'enjoyed' Seanchan 'hospitality', Min is basically just "Oops, yeah, my bad, oh well, back to business."

Wow, Min's lack of empathy for the horrific trauma that she witnessed Egwene going through is kinda shocking.

For your consideration, Min in Falme:

When Min asks Egwene not to kill herself out of despair, Egwene tells her that she physically can't. That she can't use anything that she thinks of as a weapon.

She tells Min:

"A few weeks ago I considered hitting Renna over the head with that pitcher, and I could not pour wash water for three days. Once I'd thought of it that way, I not only had to stop thinking about hitting her with it, I had to convince myself I would never, under any circumstances, hit her with it before I could touch it again. She knew what had happened, told me what I had to do, and would not let me wash anywhere except with that pitcher and bowl. You are lucky it happened between your visiting days. Renna made sure I spent those days sweating from the time I woke to the time I fell asleep, exhausted. I am trying to fight them, but they are training me as surely as they’re training Pura.” She clapped a hand to her mouth, moaning through her teeth. “Her name is Ryma. I have to remember her name, not the name they've put on her. She's Ryma, and she's Yellow Ajah, and she has fought them as long and as hard as she could. It is no fault of hers that she hasn't the strength left to fight any longer. I wish I knew who the other sister is that Ryma mentioned. I wish I knew her name. Remember us both, Min. Ryma, of the Yellow Ajah, and Egwene al'Vere. Not Egwene the damane; Egwene al'Vere of Edmond's Field.' "

...

The door swung open, and Renna stepped in.

Egwene jumped to her feet and bowed sharply, as did Min. The tiny room was crowded for bowing, but Seanchan insisted on protocol before comfort.

"Your visiting day, is it?" Renna said. "I had forgotten. Well, there is training to be done even on visiting days."

...

Renna puts on the bracelet and senses that Egwene was channeling without permission:

"You have been channeling." Renna's voice was deceptively mild; there was a spark of anger in her eyes. "You know that is forbidden except when we are complete." Egwene wet her lips. "Perhaps I have been too lenient with you. Perhaps you believe that because you are valuable now, you will be allowed license. I think I made a mistake in letting you keep your old name. I had a kitten name Tuli when I was a child. From now on, your name is Tuli. You will go now, Min. Your visiting day with Tuli is ended."

Min hesitated only long enough for one anguished look at Egwene before leaving.

...

Then, in Min's PoV right after she leaves the room:

Outside in the low-ceilinged hallway, Min dug her nails into her palms at the first piercing cry from the room. She took a step towards the door before she could stop herself, and when she did stop, tears sprang up in her eyes. Light help me, all I can do is make it worse. Egwene, I'm sorry. I'm sorry.

Feeling worse than useless, she picked up her skirts and ran, and Egwene's screams pursued her. She could not make herself stay, and leaving made her feel a coward. Half blind with weeping, she found herself in the street before she knew it. She had intended to go back to her room, but now she could not do it. She could not stand the thought that Egwene was being hurt while she sat warm and safe under the next roof. Scrubbing the tears from her eyes, she swept her cloak around her shoulders and started down the street. Every time she cleared her eyes, new tears began trickling along her cheeks. She was not accustomed to weeping openly, but then she was not accustomed to feeling so helpless, so useless. She did not know where she was going, only that it had to be as far as she could reach from Egwene's cries.

Compare all that to Min right now: wearing Seanchan silks and whining about how their fanciest food isn't to her liking.

Anyway, she delivers her message from Mat, and Egwene says that she'll take it under consideration.

49. In Ituralde's PoV, we learn about the kinds of nightmares that Graendal has been putting in their heads, and the kinds of thoughts. Three separate times, Ituralde has almost given an order for his men to engage in a direct assault against the Shadowspawn but then been able to pull back again before he gave the Graendal-influenced order, so he's doing better than the other captains. I wonder if his experience in getting all those confusing messages from 'his king' (but actually Graendal) is helping him here. We see him fighting the urge to give one of those bad orders now and he's fighting it extremely hard and then Perrin shows up before he gives in and says it. And Ituralde is so relieved to give up his command because he can tell that something is wonky with his own thinking!

50. Egwene notices that Gawyn doesn't seem tired but he does seem 'strangely pale'. :-(

Thinking about Mat makes Egwene feel "strangely sick". That is such the mood when talking about post-WH Mat, yeah. We are twinsies in this feeling, Egwene. But after thinking it through and remembering the times when Mat has come through when needed, she decides that she is going to trust him, though it makes her feel like she's a fool for doing it. "Mat could be wrong. He was often wrong. But when he was right, he saved lives." and "[Mat] was a scoundrel and a fool but she trusted him. Light help her, but she did. She trusted him with her life."

Not sure Mat deserves that right now, tbh, but it's a sweet thought from Egwene.

And maybe he does.

I'm thinking about 'a ribbon that felt like a chain'. Thinking about Mat considering his father's advice for dealing with cheats during a trade. Thinking about Mat telling Min to pick and choose between her viewings to attempt to guide Tuon onto a better path. Thinking about Mat putting on a Two Rivers coat during the Last Battle.

Maybe he does.

I guess we'll see.

The ultimate factor, once Egwene realizes that Bryne was Compelled, is that she knows that Mat cannot be touched by saidar or saidin, so he is the only general they can trust not to be corrupted by the Forsaken.

[marvel-and-dc-geek]

The Labours of Alcides

The Lernaean Hydra

The next task was given to him by the one-eyed boss of the ravens. The gods had been impressed when they saw the cat’s skin, (Tho Shiva got in trouble with his wife Durga, as she was fond of lions)and a bit more by the carving the youth had made of it on his new weapon, so the Nordic chief gave him a harder task: to slay the hydra that was pestering Lerna.

She was the aunt of the lion, being a daughter of Typhon and Equidna.

Mortals would then start to say Hera was her adoptive mother, but how they conclude this is a story we shall save for later .

This creature was even more lethal than the lion: it had six heads instead of just one, and she was huge. Her breath was so deadly, that everything around her would die, which forced the people of Lerna to flee from their homes.

This, even tho it was a tragedy, helped our hero to find her, as Alcides found a caravan of women and children that were running away from the creature. He tried to ask for directions, but the women refused to tell him.

“Don’t even try it, my child. Here you see the widows and orphans from Lerna” an old women tried to warn him “our men gathered together to slay the beast, but not even a single one made it back alive. Not even our king was rival for such a beast “

“That is exactly why we should tell him where it is!” A young, twelve year old boy, who’s mom had died while she was washing clothes due to the creature’s breath, and his dad had gone to slay the creature, wanted someone who could put an end of that thing. He was riding his family’s chariot, which was carried by the the only mule he had been able to save “I shall you myself, mister, if you willing to help us”

“Enough of that, Iolaus. You know that is suicide “ one of the old women tried to argue, but he refused to hear any arguments.

“This is my chariot and I decide what to do with it “ he remained stubborn

“I appreciate your offer, Iolaus, but I would rather not have you come. Just with telling me where I can find the creature is more than enough “ Alcides didn’t want to risk anyone else.

“Oh enough of that, if I die, I shall see my parents again anyways. Hop on, mister ! Penelope is strong enough to carry us both!”he wasn’t going to take no for an answer, and wanted to avenge the rest. The young hero understood that he wouldn’t change the boy’s mind, and hoped into the chariot.

The closer they got, the more horrible the places would get, and they would see less living things. Even the trees and the birds got more scarce, until Alcides saw a couple of familiar creatures

“Huggin, Munin!” He called the crows as he spotted them. Their job was to watch over him, so usually they would leave him alone until he find the place near the creature’s lair (which, in the case he had to track it down, might be a telltale sign.

“What took you so long?” Asked the white raven

“Who is that ?”asked the black raven

“Did the crows just speak?”asked the puzzled boy.

“Ah yes, they serve the gods, and they’re nice “ the explained to his companion.

“Why did you bring a mortal?” Both of them asked

“He guided me “ that wasn’t forbidden, right ? He didn’t want any trouble.

“Bah, I guess there aren’t any rules against this “ pointed out the black one.

“Seeing you both here means we are in the right path “ observed the hero.

“Well of course, but we have no spot to stand on near the hydra’s lair” complained the white raven.

“Except its hideous cave “ complained the black raven.

“You are free to stay in my chariot “ offered the boy “hope on, a couple of ravens are nothing for Penelope “ both crows immediately got in it and the five of them (counting the mule, of course) continued their way until a place where there was absolutely nothing growing in there. As it was swamp, that shouldn’t have even been possible.

As they went on, they saw a weird snake’s head in the floor, but it was bigger than any the hero had ever seen.

“Maybe the poor thing was slayed by the hydra “ thought Alcides, tho that must have been some other monster. And if the beast could slay one of its own, it was certainly fearful.

The boy shook his head “this is a head of the hydra. I only saw it from far away, but nothing could compare to it “ tho there was a detail “ this isn’t the only one she was has, maybe the damn things is still alive with its other five horrible heads “

“They cut it with a sword “ observed the white raven

“It isn’t as resistant as the lion back in Nemea then “observed the black raven.

“You killed the Nemean lion?” Asked an astonished Iolaus.

“Yes, the gods told me to do so “ Alcides answered

“Wow mister, you are very strong!” The surprised boy smiled, tho it quickly faded as he saw something next to the head: he recognized the sword next to it the head, or at least what remained of it’s handle. “Father…” the boy said sadly. He wanted to cry as he picked it up, but refrained himself.

The handle had engraved its late owners name: Ificles, who had managed to cut off one head at the cost of his own life. There was no sight of his body anywhere: it was most likely that he had been a snack for the rest of the creature’s heads.

“His death won’t be in vain “ the hero promised “none of theirs will “ there were several weapons laying in the floor, right where the husbands, sons, uncles, fathers, grandfathers, cousins, nephews and brothers of the women and children of Lerna.

As they reached the top of a hill, they were able to see the cave. It was impossible to miss it, as the creature’s horrible, green-like breath surrounded the whole area. It was right next to a swamp that had once been full of life.

“You stay right here, I don’t want any of you to get hurt” Alcides asked them, he would try to slay the beast as quick as possible. He left his bow and arrows to the kid, along with some other torchers, so he could use them in case he had to defend themselves of any danger (tho, in the opinion of both the crows and even Iolaous himself, it wouldn’t be of much help if the hydra went against them ) and brought his club, along with a torch to lighten the entrance.

Alcides made something very dangerous, that he had only done against the Nemean lion before; he went into the lair of a pissed for creature. He heard a horrible hissing as soon as he lay a step in the cave: a horrible being with seven snake-like head, and a strange dragon-like boy came out quite pissed off: it’s body had some arrows of the last poor idiots who has attempted to slay it.

Alcides didn’t waste any time thinking as he started to hit the heads with his maze and all of his strength, making them fly out while tearing them off. At the end, where there was only one left, the hero stomped it to make sure it was completely dead. One he was done, he turned around to go meet his companions, that place was horrible he preferred not to stay for long.

“Wow, that was quick “ the white raven told the black raven

“Well, the faster we get out of here the better” answered the black one.

But Iolaus, the only human watching (or that’s what he thought at least) wasn’t celebrating: quite the opposite, as his face had turned white “MISTER ALCIDES, LOOK BACK!” Even the calm mule Penelope was aware of the issue, and the ravens turned around to see what was scaring them so much: as they did, there were suddenly two white ravens, as one of them had lost his color out of terror alone.

Alcides turned back as well Now, you human would use the expression that he saw everything in slow motion, which, between us, is the best way to describe how the hero felt he watched as the heads grow back. Except there weren’t seven anymore, now there were fourteen.

See, a detail that all of our heroes has forgotten, is that instead of showing up with five heads, the beast had seven. This is because hydras, as some of you might know, grow back two heads when they lose one. Of course, when a beast so large charges against you, you don’t stop to count its heads, which was exactly what happened to Alcides.

“Oh sh-“ he was barely able to dodge an upcoming attack. The ambrosia at least made him immune to the poison, but he didn’t know if the hydra could slay him in some other way, and it would definitely charge against the quartet that right now could simply serve as witness of the fight.

“Can that thing slay us?” Asked the white raven

“I have no idea” answered the raven that had turned whjte

Cutting heads just made things worse, but unfortunately, he couldn’t go against the body as the hydra defended it fiercely, sacrificing as many of its heads as needed. He had to climb on top of them to get to the body, as he couldn’t simply go around. Alcides had to make sure they wouldn’t bite him, but that was not exactly an easy task. His only option was to slice them off, but even then, it at times became too dark to see, forcing him to grab both his club and the torch. The first one, for some reason, seemed to scare the heads quite a bit.

“Don’t you know to do anything else but cut off their heads?” One of the crows complained.

At some point, the hydra made the worst mistake of her life: one of the heads bit Alcides with such strength that he left his torch fall, just at the exact moment as one of the heads was growing back. As soon as the flame came into contact with the maimed area, it cauterized the wound, which made the heads unable to grow back.

“FIRE, I NEED FIRE !” The hero hadn’t been slow at all, but alas, he didn’t have a way to get fire in that swamp.

Or so he thought: his young companion didn’t know how the gods’ trial worked, and wanted to get revenge against that hideous creature.

“Help me light them up !” Iolaus told the crows

“We cant help, you brat!” Exclaimed the black raven

“You will get us to three in trouble!” complained the white one

“Mister Alcides is the only one who has given it trouble, and I’m not going to let that thing win!”ugh, maybe he should give the hero the arrows by himself.

The crows sighed, but decided to cooperate. They didn’t want to be mocked if a mortal boy was braver than them. The boy put some of the same substance from the torches into the arrows to set them on fire.

Iolaus was about to use the bow, but then he saw something weird coming out of the swamp, it was…

“A crab??!?!” Exclaimed the crows, Alcides, the boy.Even the hydra and the mule seemed to have been taken a back by the appearance of such a thing

The crab, who was later believed to have been send by Hera herself, was simply just angry as, thanks to the other monster, it couldn’t sleep, eat (all his usual preys bad died thanks to the hydra) and it had even stolen his favorite cave. It wanted to get revenge against that thing, and maybe grab something to eat. He charged against the hydra and began to cut some of its heads, make things harder for the hero.

“I will distract that thing, you give the arrows to mister Alcides !” The boy ordered the crows as he lit a torch. Before going, he set his mule free so it could run in case anything happened.

“You aren’t our boss!” But they decided to do it anyways so the brat wouldn’t look braver than them.

As Alcides tried to avoid the crab’s claws and the hydra’s bites, Iolaus held his breath and hit the crab with the torch, who, angrily, began to pursue him away from the hydra: hey, maybe he could eat the daring brat.

“Get out of here !” Alcides shouted to the boy, but he was busy making the crab angry.

“Hey, lad!” The crows called for the hero so he would know they were coming up with the flaming arrows. Alcides took the chance and hit off as many heads as he could before passing them through the fire. As it lost around half its heads, the hydra began to have issues maintaining its balance, making it easier to repeat the same action with the next round of arrows that one of the crows threw. There was only one head left, and Alcides decided to dedicate it to the man who raised the brave boy who had helped him.

“FOR IPHICLES !”he shouted before smashing the head and cauterizing the wound.

The crab stopped as it realized his annoying usurper had suddenly gone quiet: he stopped his persecution to inspect the body.

“If you leave Iolaous alone, it’s all yours “ offered the tired hero. The crab gratefully accepted, a tasty hydra meat meal was worth more than a skinny Greek boy. Plus with so many heads, he could feast for days until more creatures came back to the swamp.

“You made it, mister Alcides!” Iolaous went to congratulate him.

“I wouldn’t have made it without you four “ the hero was honest, and he even gave credit to Penelope, who had carried them and all the weapons all the way there.

“I wonder what mister Odin will say about this…” mumbled the black crow to his partner

“We should started looking for news jobs…” mumbled the white one back.

With the crab’s permission, Alcides took off one of the hydra’s fangs and gave it to Iolaous, who was almost the same size as it. This would be proof that the monster was gone.

“I hope we meet again some day, mister Alcides !” The boy said as he tied Penelope again. Alcides pet the mule and the boy’s hair as well, before going to present himself to the gods.

Iolaous, on the other hand, went back with the women and children of his city, who didn’t think they’d see him alive again. They decided to go back to Lerna, to remake their lives thanks to the bravery of the two youths (and also the crows and the mule). Strangely several visitors seemed to think he was the nephew of Alcides: Iolaous decided not to correct them, seeing they’d bring gifts to his people, which helped them to prosper once again.

Now, there was another human who was in that swamp: a young man who was searching for tales to tell and sing about, who, maybe quite stupidly, thought the hydra would be a good source for horror stories. He was well hidden, and could see the hero’s fight. As he didn’t have the context, he assumed that Alcides and Iolaous were uncle and nephew, which Iphicles being the brother and father to each. He concluded this seeing that the boy didn’t resemble the hero, of course. And he left the crowd aside, as no one would believe his story if he included their role…but of course, he included the crab’s intervention.

[skylarmoon71]

Clark Kent (Smallville) Short Story - Chapter 23

The entire encounter feels unreal.

You’re gazing at the marriage license that’s framed on the wall.

Matt and Gail Morgan.

You never thought you’d have the chance to ever see them like this. You try to take it all in. The house that you literally grew up in. Not much has changed except for the furniture and some adjustments to the exterior. It’s apparent that Harry bought the house so you would have some part of your parents with you.

“So you really are my daughter.” Matt asks.

It’s going to take a moment to grasp, but he can’t deny the familiarity. It’s almost like he’d recognized you the second he saw you despite never meeting you.

You nod.

It’s impossible for this not to feel strange. You understand. You’re also surprised that they are both taking it so well. You fully expected that they would run the second you tried to tell them where you’re from.

What you’ve been through.

It’s obvious that your mother is aware of your father’s supernatural abilities.

Apparently your earlier assumption was wrong. You hadn’t just jumped to an alternate reality. This whole time it seems that you've been stepping through different points in time.

Somehow you ended up in the past.

“I..I traveled here from the future. I was trying to control it. I’ve been bouncing around the universe all week.”

Once again, just saying that out loud feels crazy, but your father smiles and your mother rubs her belly.

“You know when he told me he was a mutant I thought he was just trying to impress me. I guess you do take after your dad.” Gail says.

He smiles.

“I told you she did. My little bean is a prodigy just like her old man. It’s only been a week and she’s already time leaping.”

Your brows furrow.

“Time leaping?”

He nods.

“My abilities, our abilities.”

He corrects, gesturing with a smile.

“It allows us to move from any space in time. We alter the natural laws of the universe. It’s genetic. My great grandfather used to write notes about our powers. Where they came from. According to my dad, our family was given this as a gift for a selfless deed. A great sacrifice.”

Just the idea is remarkable.

“That’s incredible.”

He nods.

“As magical as it sounds, our powers do come with a cost. Every time I’ve heard it the story changed, but the essence of it stays the same. Our abilities are meant to help others. To heal. If it’s ever used to exploit others then the user is said to face great consequences. They’d be stripped of their abilities.”

Your expression falls, because that sounds exactly like what happened to Aaron.

They notice and Gail reaches over, taking Matt’s hand.

This entire time you’ve had these powers just waiting to be unlocked. Aaron had the same and not once did he try to bring them back. To save them. There’s a bitter feeling in the pit of your stomach. You feel like you’ve been robbed of so much.

But now, sitting there with your parents, you want nothing more than to confess it all. If this is the past, then you can change it.

You can change everything.

“Mom, Dad you-”

He took your hand, shaking his head.

“You can’t change the past.”

Fear rushes over your face.

“I-I can!! You just said that I’m supposed to help! I’m trying to help, let me help!!”

“I can’t. You’re not supposed to alter events. Every gift has a rule. I know you understand that.”

You wish you could deny it. Feign obliviousness, but you know for a fact that he’s right. Who knows what would happen. It didn’t stop you from hoping.

Looking down, you squeeze his hands.

“I’ve always wanted to meet you..both of you.”

Matt wears a broad smile.

“I always knew you’d grow into an incredible woman. You’re just as strong willed and beautiful as your mother.”

His hand moves to your cheek, and you look up, unable to truly stop the tears this time.

“No matter what happens in the future, we’re proud of you. Everything that you’ve accomplished, even if we weren’t there to see, I know that you’re destined for incredible things.”

The tears are gushing down at this point, and he wraps a hand around you, your mother doing the same. They both hug you and at that very moment, you can almost feel the extent of their love, as if they’ve been with you all this time.

“It’s time for you to go home.”

It’s a whisper.

You’d like nothing more than to stay there forever, but he’s right.

You sob, holding on tighter, because you can feel it. This time it isn’t so much a pull. It’s like you can visualize where you want to go.

Where you need to go.

“I love you both so much.” You express.

“We love you too.”

The words feel like a song, and you close your eyes, this time willing yourself forward, because you know exactly what’s on the other side. 

[thedecoy-if]

I was just going to lurk, as I do with most IF blogs, but rude anons are rude, so to make up for it, have my ecstatic joy. (And, uh. Contrary to how I type, I'm super excited about The Decoy. Also it's after midnight now and I'm slightly tipsy. Apologies. And more apologies for the novella here.)

I love the isekai premise in all forms, and the premise you've come up with of being S's doppelganger is great! I've never seen it done before, so I'm really looking forward to plot.

I'm going to have so. much. fun. tormenting Azriel. Like, I usually wouldn't, but he just seems to be the sort of person others derive joy from fucking with. (Might I ask if MC could have pepper spray or a tazer? Might just be me, but I was always more comfortable with my pepper spray when working night shifts.)

Jonathan! We had some similar issues with one of my siblings years ago (thankfully never got to juvie type issues), so I felt for MC there. How involved is Peter in daily life of the family? Is he checking in on his middle sibling to make sure they're coping well with being the Responsible Adult? How long has their mom been "checked out"?

I love Clementine and Kenji. Even if they never reappear in the story (and I hope they do), they solidify MC's place in the world, outside of Family And Job.

And the time skip! I like how you did that, gives the reader a sense of the hours going by.

Azriel and that reaction to the sour candies... I love it. It's the imagery of a startled dog that gets me.

0/10 hospitality. You want a favor from MC, so you lock them in a dungeon? Great planning and foresight there.

I love Drenwin and Azriel's back and forth. I think that we'll get along just fine - when it comes to needling Azriel, anyway.

I also love that their capital is called Helena - it's my middle name, and given that I usually play as a fictional version of myself, it's very funny to me.

Okay, attacking Azriel is now my favorite choice. But - how would he deal with pepper spray?

I did the walk with Drenwin and Theoden, and with Namara and Theoden. It was funnier with Drenwin, but Namara's was more comfortable. The vibe I'm getting is that she's not willing to pretend to be MC's friend, or to be nice so that MC will help - that when she is kind to MC, it'll be because of the relationship built over time.

And yes, I did go back and replay the demo for this novella that I now present to you. You deserve it, Mae. Ignore the idiot anons, do what you do, go forth and prosper.

Also - I saw that this IF - or at least Drenwin, Azriel and Namara - are based on a novel you wrote? Any chance we could get snippets of that at some point? I love source material...

TL;DR Excitement! Good writing! World building! Love the ROs! Idiot anons are idiots!

Firstly, thank you so much for this! Your interest is so sweet and I'm glad you liked the demo ahhhh and don't apologize for the novella, I'm so glad you liked it enough to be interested!

(Might I ask if MC could have pepper spray or a tazer? Might just be me, but I was always more comfortable with my pepper spray when working night shifts.)

I didn't think of that (which seems wild in hindsight) but maybe in the next update I can add something of that sort and instead of the shard of glass scene, the flavor text can change!

How involved is Peter in daily life of the family? Is he checking in on his middle sibling to make sure they're coping well with being the Responsible Adult? How long has their mom been "checked out"?

We get more into this as the story progresses, but Peter has pretty much checked out in his own way. He drops by on the occasion, but he never checks up on MC in the way it matters. Part of is it guilt for leaving home and leaving MC behind to deal with everything, and part of it is just fear. He doesn't want to end up like their mother. He can barely stand to look at her. The probem is that he's become exactly what he feared. He shields it with layers of overprotection and care.

Their mom has been checked out since their father remarried. He's been absent for a long time but when he propped up with a wife, that's when she went full spiral. She never got over him. It's been about a year or so now. Her kids remind her too much of him and she's bitter she had to do the parenting alone. She sort of resents her kids (and they all know it.)

Okay, attacking Azriel is now my favorite choice. But - how would he deal with pepper spray?

Azriel isn't exactly, ahem, human so the pepper spray won't do much damage, I fear. Maybe just bit a brief nuisance haha. Also he's dealt with worse injuries, the stinging won't bother him much.

And yes, I did go back and replay the demo for this novella that I now present to you. You deserve it, Mae. Ignore the idiot anons, do what you do, go forth and prosper.

Thank you so much, this is so nice of you. I'll go currently cry happy tears in the corner now.

Also - I saw that this IF - or at least Drenwin, Azriel and Namara - are based on a novel you wrote? Any chance we could get snippets of that at some point? I love source material...

Yes! For now, a bit of tidbit:

In the source material, there's a character named General Hode who is actually the head of the operation and Azriel, Drenwin, Namara are under his direct command. Azriel is more demure in the story, a bit more of a push over. S In the game, General Hode was killed and Azriel is a bit tougher. Azriel was much more likeable in the novel hahaha but that's in part because he didn't have to have Eterna on his shoulders.

Your comments on the characters are so spot on, especially Namara's. I'm so glad you liked it and I can't wait for you to see more! Thank you <33

[local-lesboy]

i was six when I really loved dresses. i had a beautiful pre-school teacher and told my mom i wanted to look exactly like her. she used to have to fight me to put on pants and even asked my teacher to wear pants so I would want to. i had no concept of femininity or masculinity, all i knew was i saw someone who looked nice and i wanted the same

i was eight and wrestled with my older brother. i played his video games and action figures while he was gone, hoping to gain common interests. i wanted to be a cool boy like him. though, i wouldn’t have said i wanted to be a boy. i wasn’t too sure of the concept of gender

i was ten when i started growing. i started developing features that i didn’t see in my peers. the clothes made for kids like me didn’t fit quite right and i started noticing something was wrong. i couldn’t tell you what, but i started to get insecure. i wore hoodies more often so my body was less noticeable. getting my hair cut short for the first time was a freeing moment i’ll never forget

i was thirteen when i fully felt disconnected from my body. i stopped wearing dresses as often and when i did it felt painful to be called beautiful. i tried looking up ways to hide my chest and found tips on using ACE bandages. i was told it could hurt me but i was willing to take the risk. in the bathroom late at night i would go just to see myself with a flatter chest for a couple minutes. i never told my parents and i’m lucky i didn’t cause any damage

i was fourteen when I learned what gender fluidity was. the joy i felt when i found out there was a whole community full of people who felt the same way. my middle school friends helped me practice a new name and pronouns and i felt so comfortable i went to the adults in my life. the school decided they wouldn’t help me socially transition and i had to learn to hold my bladder until I got home. i couldn’t use the restroom at school unless it was the one in the nurse’s office. my parents laughed at me and asked if i was “sometimes an alien.”

i was fifteen when i found the umbrella term ‘transgender’. i learned that the rain of feelings about myself were covered by this umbrella. i later learned that nonbinary felt even better than calling myself trans. i had come to my parents with this new information, hoping it would go easier, and they asked if i considered how they felt about having a trans child. they did not support my transition and they would not refer to me the way i wanted. i got my first real binder using my holiday money and started attending a support group for LGBTQ+ youth.

i was seventeen when i got my gender dysphoria diagnosis. my supportive place away from home pointed me in the right direction of help and it felt good to be told by a doctor what I could do to fix what I knew to be wrong. she tried to educate my parents, who started calling me the name I liked, but still couldn’t get on board with anything changing. my mother said “you will always be [deadname] to me.” at this point, hormones wouldn’t fix everything and surgical intervention was going to be needed

i was eighteen when i started my transition. my doctor taught me how to properly give myself injections and i began to document everything. my voice changed, my facial hair started to develop, and I was…sweaty. all the time. my doctor warned my of the side effects, but they were nothing compared to the joy i would feel knowing i could fix things. getting gendered properly was easier now and i had more people rooting for my success. nothing could go wrong for me in that moment.

i’ve since made it most of the way through my journey. i’ve been on hormones for five years and received top surgery before my twenty-first birthday. my parents don’t hear from me and maybe it’s for the better. this is what happens when you don’t give a child the language for their feelings. this is what happens when you alienate a child. they will learn to chase their own happiness and it won’t involve you. they will find people to accept them the way you were supposed to.

[bylerschmyler]

Still a delusional idiot here, but if the difference between the time on the show and the time on Lucas On The Line actually means something. There's something to point out, may be nothing but i can't stop thinking about it. LOTL makes the point that both Dustin and Lucas are trying to move on, on the first day of school they both try "new looks" while Mike it's just his old self. This is also commented on the show, because Eddie remembers seeing Mike in the clothes his mom bought for him. Now, if we look at Mike. If we look at Lucas, Dustin and Will - Lucas is trying to move on, meet new people, he doesn't want to be the freak anymore ans that annoys both Mike and Dustin. Dustin has been on a very different path than the rest of the party since he got paired with Steve. Looking at Dustin, he usually hangs with older people, he is teamed up with Robin, Steve, Eddie, while not trying to be some he isn't he is growing up. Will is, as said by many of the viewers, still stuck in the time when they party was still the four boys, when times were "easier" (if he ever got an easy moment really) and he doesn't wanna grow up. Some people ignore the fact that he is gay and call him "a late bloomer".

Now let me present you what i see happening to Mike Wheeler because yes, this boy.

Mike followed the progression of time along side with Dustin and Lucas until the epilogue of season 3. He tried to be 'normal' (still does), he got a girlfriend, and he even fought with Will because "what did [he] think? That [they] would never grow up?". Here's the thing. As a total metaphor - time has always been ticking for Mike, he is late every start of season, because he is the late bloomer. While Will, Dustin and Lucas know what they like, Mike only gets there at the end of s3, and then? HOP'S LETTER saying he wants to turn back the clock. To stop everything from changing. So, from s3 to s4 Mike stops his moving forward, he goes back to the stuff he likes, d&d and videogames. Lucas says that's all he is being doing after the Byers left. But what makes Mike want to stop time and not grow up? How come in these two parallel timelines we are avoiding the birthdays of the both characters who don't want to grow up? They don't have a problem with discussing Dustin's birthday with HIS GIRLFRIEND because he is moving forward into adulthood, so no problem there. But Will and Mike? If they keep getting older, there will be a moment when they are going to have to face their truths. Maybe Will is getting there already, we don't really know much about what Will's being doing aside of working on the painting so i'm not really sure if he still plays videogames and such just by himself, but the moment he is with Mike all he wants is to be exactly where Mike is waiting (probably for him). Mike has gone back to how things were for him at the begining of s1 (aprox.). Only this time he doesn't have Will there. And you know, Max and Lucas and Dustin are great (even though when you think about it, he and Dustin were mad at Lucas and were hanging out that much anymore) and Max distancieted herself from everyone after that summer. But what makes Hawkins not the same is not having Will there.

So, yes, this delusional Byler anon thinks they didn't forget Will's birthday, they based Mike's monologue in s4 on Mike monologue in s2, yes, i do believe he just changed his words ao it would fit E*. Even the i love you in your good days and in your bad days? Are you sure about that Mike? Because i never saw you loving her in her bad days, you loathe her in those days... however there was someone you loved and cared about in his worsts and in his bests.

Does any of this makes any sense? I don't know, but i tried my best.

Hey nonny!

I think I get what you mean. And yes I agree mostly.

Mike being late/running out of time at the start of every season.

The time running out for the victims when they are cursed.

Wills Birthday being forgotten in the show and Mike's being forgotten in extended canon adds up (Mike's birthday is only mentioned in extended canon and Will's only mentioned in the show. So forgetting Will's birthday in the show and Mike's in extended canon makes sense).

There is something up with it. But I am not 100% sure what it will be because the show did suprise me in the past with the path it took storywise so I hope that after analysing this show I haven't figured out everything and spoilered myself. Because as much as I want a "I KNEW IT MOMENT" for some stuff (#victimgate) I want to stare at my Screen, jaw dropped, thinking "They didn't actually do that?!" (in a good way). But Currently I am very positive that it will be like that.

[pixeletinha]

I slowly opened the bedroom door and stood still in front of her. "No way" she said and then she held and caressed her little belly. "I know right" I said while I was slightly turning to the sides to check myself. "You look like me" she laughed "You mean we look alike" No, since i am 3 years older you look LIKE me" she said sarcastically and I was laughing.  "T, even if I despise the guy. How the hell should I do it?" Well, firstly you need to have your voice less deep." Wouldn't it be more accurate if I use this voice? He must have noticed that you are not going to work and you sound completely like me when you are sick." You do have a point” she nodded while she was tucking one of the extensions behind my ear. “You should also change your language. I don’t use the same jargon” What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I said while tapping my nails on the wardrobe, my will to smoke began to build up. “Exactly, this” she pointed at me while I was trying to bite my nails. “Am I not proper enough, sister?” Just be more.. Down the earth?” I scoffed sarcastically “Do you even know what that means? I am not the one who has sex with clothes on” Come on, Sash I didn’t mean to insult you” Well, you certainly did, you want me to act in this bullshit because you don’t have the balls to tell your boyfriend to go fuck himself. Instead you are going to your other boyfriend to tell him you love him and that you are carrying his child.” I started yelling.

I was getting hot and all the stress from work and my sister willing me to this craziness, my body was ventilating. I did not understand why I got so mad at her, she was looking at me with her eyes wide open and her pregnancy hormones kicking in. I slightly gasped and shook my head “Excuse me” I ran into the garden and went behind my mom’s cabinet with booze. I put up a glass and poured myself a bit of a rum and then lit up a cigarette. I took deep breaths while inhaling the smoke, I saw Thea appearing behind the glassdoor, she slowly opened the door and stood in its frame, I looked at her and took a deep breath and about to apologize but she was faster "You gotta lose this too" she pointed at the drink and the cigarette "He knows i am considered" I scoffed "And I was about to apologize" I said while putting out the cigarette in a glass ashtray. "I am sorry, Sasha for putting you up to this. For overreacting." I am sorry for yelling at you, I am just so overwhelmed with my work. Hannah gave me this new project that will finally push me up, but I don't know where or how to start. And I just.. bursted out." I am sorry, but I know you can do this! You can do both!! You are a Wilkins woman!"

[knightsarmor]

@moiraxknight

Oliver looked up from the book he was reading, noticing movement from the corner of his eyes. Yael had zipped by at a lightning speed pace. Which he knew meant that she was trying to avoid being seen. Oliver took off his reading glasses. “Hey, come over here,” he called out to his daughter. 

She was a teenager and she was turning out to be a mildly rebellious one at that. She wasn’t as bad as some. Oliver could only be grateful she wasn’t a terror like he knew many of them could be. She wasn’t exactly drinking and partying and doing hard drugs as far as he knew (and he was certain he would know if she had ever shown up wasted or high), but that didn’t mean Yael certainly liked to push the limits of what she could and couldn’t do. She tried his patience plenty.

“Yes?” said Yael as she peeked out from the doorway, just her head floating there. 

“Come here,” he said as he tilted his head. 

“Dad,” she said impatiently. “I’m trying to go. I’m meeting Athena in the city with the boys. And I’m meeting the boys, like, now.” 

Oliver knew by boys she met Haki and Jonah. 

“And what? You don’t have two fucking seconds to get over here?” he asked. Yes, Oliver had eventually lost the battle with trying not to swear around his kids. Considering they were both teenagers, he wasn’t going to pretend like they didn’t already hear that language in movies and from their classmates. 

Yael stepped into the doorway, revealing exactly why she had been so hesitant to reveal herself. She had on a crop top that was almost precariously short and a little too tight for Oliver’s liking. “Oh, you’re not going anywhere dressed like that. Go to your room to fucking change.” 

“Dad, dad. Abba,” said Yael, smiling and rocking on her feet. Her curls bounce with the movement. Her curls outdid either of her parents and were big and voluminous as well as tightly coiled. “I’m not changing. Mom said I could go like this.” 

“Well, mom is fucking insane. Has she seen you?” he asked. “Don’t you lie to me. Or did you show her another outfit and then change?” 

“No, she saw me,” said Yael, rolling her eyes. “She is just way more reasonable than you,” she huffed. 

“Yeah, and considering you’re going into the city and that you’re going into the city with two boys, I think you need to fucking change into a shirt that you can tuck into those pants,” Oliver went on. “Does she know all that?”

“Of course she knows all that,” said Yael. “Ohmygod, I am not going to wear a shirt I can tuck into my pants. That is so gross.” 

“I don’t give a fuck if you think it’s gross. You know what? How about I go up there and choose the damn shirt myself?” asked Oliver. 

“Please don’t,” Yael cringed. “You literally wear the same shirt and shoes every day. You cannot choose my outfit for me.” 

“Alright, well, if you don’t want me to do it, then you have to go do it,” said Oliver. “Otherwise, you’re not leaving this house. I don’t give a fuck.” 

“Ugh, you’re so unreasonable.” Yael stomped off yelling. 

“I cannot believe you’re making her change,” said Moira rolling her eyes. 

“Have you seen this fucking shit she’s wearing? And you told her she could go out like that?” asked Oliver. 

“Would you rather she change, stuff the shirt into her purse or pockets and then change after she’s left the house? Because I guarantee you that’s what she’s going to do,” Moira said as she sat down on the couch, folding her legs underneath herself. 

“Oh, not on my fucking watch. I’ll check her purse and pockets myself if I have to,” said Oliver as he got up as if he was going to go do that just now. 

Moira quickly caught Oliver’s wrist. “Babe, we’ve talked about this. There are some battles you have to be willing to lose. If you want her to be smart about drinking and drugs, then we have to let up in other places. She’s going to do what she wants to do. However, if we come off as reasonable, she’s more willing to listen to us about the more serious issues rather because we didn’t come off as the parents who were too strict. She’s not going out in a thong and a bra. Be thankful for that.” 

Oliver ran a hand over his face. “I was a goddamn menace as a teenager, you know.” 

“I know, and compared to you, she’s an angel,” said Moira as she gave Oliver a chaste peck. 

Yael came stomping back down. Now she had switched out from her crop top, to a Slipknot tank top. It was a bit loose in places, but Oliver was willing to accept it. “Have a good night, sweetheart,” he nodded to her. 

“Ugh, mom, tell dad he’s being the worst,” said Yael. 

“I already did. You have a good time out. Remember, you have to be back by eleven, otherwise you call us and let us know where you are. At least before your father decides to file a missing persons report on you and I don’t think you want that, do you?” Moira raised an eyebrow at her.

“No,” she mumbled. “Bye. Love you,” she said as she left through the front door, slamming it shut. 

“She totally put the shirt into her bag,” said Yehuda as he popped up from behind the couch where his parents sat. 

“Yeah, yeah,” sighed Oliver as he waved his hand at his son, clearly having lost that battle. 

“Can we have pizza for dinner?” he asked now.

“Sure, buddy,” said Oliver. “You can order it.” 

“Yes,” grinned Yehuda as he then sped off to do just that. 

“Just remember how happy you were when you wanted them both,” smiled Moira, this time giving him a real kiss, her arms wrapped around him. 

[theautisticbarbie]

A Brewing of Sinister Shennanigans

Word count: 3,929

Yeah it’s a doozy I know, but it’s worth it. I promise.

Anyway, middleschool!Eddie is a little shit and takes Halloween pranks way too fucking far and it ends up hurting Tara way worse than he intended and he ends up in a shit ton of trouble.

Content warnings: hinting at medical trauma, medical procedures (spinal tap and blood draw), implied medical racism, Eddie is a 13 year old little shit, mentions of fearmomgering, original characters

Let me know if I missed anything!

Tara Newman, the prissy snob who would cry “Teacher teacher!” if she saw kissing in the halls. 10 years old and already she’s become the biggest tattle tale in Hawkins. Maybe in all of Indiana. And Eddie was often the victim of her snitching. And he was sick of it. Sick of the praise she got. The little trinket rewards that were given to her for being so “vigilant” and whatnot. The one time that Tara was selected as hall monitor (a selection that is made entirely at random but still Tara believed her merits influenced it) Eddie’s life was a living hell. He had a habit of ditching class quite frequently. The upside of that was he got a workout in everytime Tara accosted him demanding to see his hall pass. But now, it was payback time and was gonna knock her down a few pegs. The high and mighty Tara Newman would be a crying, sobbing mess when he was through with her.

Tara had made her Halloween plans. She told her mother that she wanted to be Cinderella. Her mother looked at various blue dresses at Goodwill before Tara stopped her, adamantly insisting that Cinderella’s dress wasn’t blue. She had already plucked a white flower girl dress about her size.

“Grandmother and I are going to change this one,” Tara declared.

“Did you ask her?” asked Eleanor, raising an eyebrow.

There was a pause hanging in the air. “Grandmother!” Tara called, running to her.

Kathryn Fox-Newman insisted on coming along every year when it was time for Tara to get her Halloween costume. The bold Englishwoman simply insisted that she never gets to spend enough time with her grandchild. Never mind that Daniel was also just as much her grandchild. She never quite seized the opportunity to spend time with him as aggressively. And seeing as how Tara got more motherly affection from her than her own mother, she was always willing to spend time with her.

Tara presented the white dress to Kathryn, who examined it and compared it with a Betamax tape she was holding. “Ah yes! This will do perfectly!” she declared.

“See, mom?” Tara said, pointing to the Betamax tape. “THIS is Cinderella!” she declared, matter-of-factly, pointing at an image of Lesley Ann Warren on the packaging. Her dress was very decidedly off-white and not blue, with gold detailing and an ermine collar.

This was the 1965 version of the fairytale, given to the world by Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein II. It was the version that Tara watched with her grandmother every time she came to visit and it was her favourite version of the tale.

Daniel had picked out the various elements for his costume but insisted it was a surprise exactly who he was going to be. When the pair approached the register to get rung up, Tara proudly laid the dress on the counter as though it were a fish that she had caught. “I’m gonna be Cinderella for Halloween!” she declared proudly.

The teenager ringing her up couldn’t care less. “11.50.”

After their adventures at Goodwill, they went to the local craft store, where Kathryn and Tara purchased the notions to finish the dress.

Whilst they were having lunch at Denny’s, Kathryn was looking through the paper, tsking at the headline.

“West Nile Virus is on the rise again,” she declared with a sigh.

“What’s Wess Denial Virus?” Tara asked.

“West Nile Virus,” Eleanor corrected, matter-of-factly, “and it’s nothing you need to concern yourself over because your chances of catching it are not high enough to think about it.”

Time moved onwards and it was the weekend before Halloween when Kathryn decided to take the twins to see a movie at the drive in. They had gone to go see “The Wiz” with their favourite snacks in tow.

The running gag of taxi cabs going “off duty” and driving off flew completely over the two 10 year old heads.

Throughout the film, mosquitoes kept taking bites out of Tara. By the film’s end, she was covered in bug bites practically from head to toe.

The following next couple of days school were rough. It was, of course, a given that she was teased relentlessly for her unsightly appearance caused by the bug bites. Eddie, whom she expected to make the worst fuss and have the most heinous insults, was uncharacteristically quiet. The buzz-haired boy had strangely been leaving her alone that week. Little did she know it was because he had seen John Carpenter’s spooky thriller and was concocting something of sinister proportions. All he needed was the mask. He acquired that at Melvald’s by way of the five finger discount.

His initial plan was to hide in Tara’s locker, jump out and scare her that way. Unfortunately, the day before Halloween, Tara had to be sent home sick. So Eddie decided that if she wouldn’t come to his prank, he would bring the prank to her. He was gonna knock the tattletale down a few pegs come hell or high water.

If only he knew that Tara’s reason for being sent home wasn’t anything frivolous like a few sniffles. She had fallen seriously ill. She was vomiting, had flu like symptoms and was running a fever of 102 and had Tachycardic episodes. The final straw in which she was sent home was when she had a seizure during her spelling exam. Tara was sent to the nurses office, where the teacher delegated Nancy Wheeler to escort her to ensure that she got there in one piece.

“Stop clinging to me like that!” she complained. “You’ll trip me!”

As though Tara could help it. She was struggling to keep her balance.

“Maybe you wouldn’t be so sick if you didn’t eat so much junk food all the time,” the 10 year old added, annoyed.

Nancy practically dumped Tara off at the nurses office before returning to class.

When Eleanor arrived, she took one look at her daughter and determined that she needed to go to the hospital.

When they arrived at the emergency room, she checked in and sat down. “I’m thirsty,” Tara whined weakly.

“No, you’re not. Just wait for the doctor,” Eleanor said, rolling her eyes in annoyance.

When the doctor finally saw Tara, the first thing he noticed was all of the bug bites. “What happened here?” he asked.

“My mother took her and her brother to the drive in and a bunch of mosquitoes bit her.”

“Okay, well, after having examined your chart and knowing that these are mosquito bites, I think the best course of action is to be absolutely certain that we’re not dealing with West Nile Virus.”

What the doctor didn’t tell Tara was that doing that entailed a spinal tap and a blood draw.

During both, Tara was in absolute distress. No effort was made to comfort or console her. In fact, they only made it worse for her.

And the irony of it was that her spinal fluid was clear and showed no signs of infection. Her blood work, however, indicated that that she had yellow fever.

She was sent home on bedrest and all though her symptoms had greatly improved the next day, on Halloween, it seemed like trick or treating was out of the question.

At least until Kathryn showed up with her completed dress and told her that she had a surprise for her.

After helping her get into her costume and doing her hair and makeup, she gave Tara a pair of jelly shoes (meant to be her glass slippers) and the two went downstairs. There, her brother was dressed as Superman and his friends were dressed as different members of the justice league from the ‘60s comics. The Byers kids were there as well, with Jonathan as Batman and Will as Robin from the 1966 show.

“Hold on!” Kathryn said, rushing down the stairs to grab her video camera. “And go!” she said, pointing the lens at the staircase.

Tara descended the stairs as the camera followed. “Now the world will forever remember when Cinderella graced the citizens of Hawkins with her presence,” Kathryn declared proudly.

“And how is she expected to go trick-or-treating in her state? What happens if she gets tired, mom? Are you, a 63 year old woman, going to carry her?” Eleanor asked, raising a brow.

“Oh, poo. You were always the most serious of the bunch,” Kathryn said, dismissively waving her hand.

“Well, I’m the only one left alive, so there’s that part.”

Kathryn ignored Eleanor’s snide remark and ushered Tara outside, where she saw her neighbour, Mr. Callahan, with a child’s wheelchair that he had used his welding and prop building skills to fashion into a moving golden carriage. The same wheelchair his daughter used before sadly succumbing to leukaemia. Truthfully, he has happy to see it being given new life with Tara.

“A golden carriage!” The 10 year old declared, overjoyed.

“Hop on!” Mr. Callahan urged. Tara didn’t need to be told twice.

“Wow! I’m just like Cinderella!”

“You ARE going to the ball!” Kathryn declared.

“Mom,” Eleanor interjected. “The MOMENT she gets tired, you bring her straight back home.”

She then stringently turned to her children. “Don’t eat ANY candy until after I’ve checked it thoroughly once I get home from work!”

After about an hour, Tara was exhausted. She had filled her bucket to the brim and decided to call it a night.

Daniel and company decided, after pleading with Kathryn that they were old enough to do so, to stay out longer.

After wheeling Tara back home and tucking her in on the couch with her blanket and popping Cinderella into the Betamax, Kathryn decided to shoot the breeze with the neighbours whose children were still out and about.

“Very nice weather we’re having this time of year!” Barbara Runswick declared on the colour television screen. Before Jo Van Fleet could chime in with her disgust, telling her daughter to think of something more “personal” to tell the prince (which Tara could never quite figure out what that meant) the phone rang.

The 10 year old went over to pick up the line. “Newman residence!”

Silence.

“Hello?”

Click.

Tara held the phone quizzically as the dial tone buzzed before placing it back on the receiver with a shrug, assuming it was merely a wrong number situation.

“His highness is in tolerable good health!” Pat Caroll declared as Tara assumed her original spot on the sofa and resuming her snacking on the candy, disobeying her mother’s earlier wishes. Tara had a lot of things, but willpower to wait until her mother got home from her concierge shift at a hotel all the way in Indianapolis was a tall order.

“Something personal, you said?” Pat clarified on the screen as Tara adjusted her blanket and got in a comfortable position that was JUST right.

And then the phone rang again.

Tara rolled her eyes and groaned as she went to go answer it again.

“Newman residence,” she answered with a hint of agitation in her voice.

Again it was total silence.

“I think your phone is broken! Fix it before you call ba—“

Click.

Upon hearing the dial tone, Tara placed the phone on the receiver with an annoyed huff.

“Please, your highness. I would like to be your bride,” Tara heard Lesley Ann Warren plead on her television screen, unable to resume her position before the phone rang again.

“What??” Tara answered the phone, now highly irate.

Click.

Tara was now fed up and decided to dial *69 and find out what this was all about.

Once the line connected, the other phone in the house started to ring.

A confused Tara ended the call and decided to call the operator and find out what exactly that meant.

“Operator. How can I help you?”

“Hi… um… I have a question,” Tara started.

“How can I help you, sugar?”

“So I’ve been getting this call. But when I answer the phone, nobody is there and the line gets cut.”

Suddenly there was a small click in the line as though another phone was being picked up, but Tara continued.

“So I pressed *69 to see who it was and the other phone in my house rang.”

“Well, sweetheart, that means the call is coming from inside the house.”

Suddenly everything went black. The television was off, the lights were out and the phone was emitting a dial tone.

Tara was terrified of the dark. She frantically headed to her room in search of her flashlight.

Once she got it, she attempted to turn it on. After a few frantic clicks, she examined it and realised the batteries had been removed.

Tara’s breath caught in her throat when she realised she was not alone in the house. She heard slow and heavy footsteps. Frozen like a deer in headlights, the footsteps drew closer and closer. Eventually, Tara came to her senses enough to have the presence of mind to close and lock her door. After doing that, she fled to a corner on her bed, huddled by her stuffed animals for sanctuary.

The doorknob jiggled and the door pounded. After a moment, it subsided and Tara sighed, waiting anxiously for the power to return.

And then the lock disengaged.

Tara’s eyes locked on the doorknob, transfixed with fear as it turned. The door swung open and the very first thing she saw was the Michael Meyers mask. Instead of a navy jumpsuit, the figure was wearing an all black outfit, but that was hardly the first thing that registered in Tara’s mind. The figure raised a kitchen knife above his head. Tara cowered in fear as the blade glittered in the moonlight.

Tara had seen a glimpse of Michael Meyers in action at the drive-in when she went to the bathroom. On her way back, she saw him slash Annie Brackett’s throat on a giant screen while the vehicle containing her grandmother and brother were still out of sight. That was all she needed to know to understand the level of danger she was in.

As he advanced 2 or 3 paces towards the frightened 10 year old, she bolted out of her room with a blood curdling scream and made a beeline for the front door, crying out for her grandmother as she blindly ran down the street, hiccuping and sobbing.

Back at the house, Eddie, Gareth, Jeff and Daniel were loudly guffawing at the success of their prank. Daniel let them into the house and guided the team around where need be, Jeff manned the phone and made the heavy footsteps, Gareth switched off the breaker box, and of course Eddie had the honour of being Michael Meyers, with some help from Daniel who gave him a key to the room he and Tara share. Daniel then took the batteries that he removed from Tara’s flashlight and placed them on the desk while Gareth turned the power back on.

“Gentlemen, we got her!” Eddie proudly declared waving around his mask.

“All the detentions, ISS, demerits and Saturday school sessions we got because of her tattling were not in vain!” Gareth cheered.

Daniel sat on the bed he and Tara were forced to share by their mother and smirked wickedly. “Sucker!” he chortled.

Tara, meanwhile, had run aimlessly in a panicked frenzy and didn’t have the slightest idea where she was going.

Back at the house, Daniel and his cohorts were all laughter and guffaws until they heard lights and sirens outside.

When Daniel peered out of his window, he saw an ambulance and a fire truck.

Upon closer investigation, the paramedics appeared to be tending to his sister.

The four immediately rushed out of the house to see to what was going on.

Tara was on the gurney face as white as a sheet with an oxygen mask over her little face. Tara had run so much that in her fragile state of already having yellow fever, she collapsed.

Eddie took the fall for the entire prank to spare his friends from having the law on them. He was in serious trouble. The 13 year old was forced to spend the night in a Juvenile Detention Centre and make a VERY EMBARRASSING phone call to his uncle come morning. From there, he had 2 choices. Stay in juvi for the next 3 months or, since this was his first offence and he had no priors, return the stolen mask, apologise to everyone whom was victimised by his actions, and attend a reform programme for at-risk youth.

Wayne, who was definitely not pleased to come home after working all night to a phone call that his nephew had been arrested, told Eddie that if he wanted to continue living in his trailer, that he only had one choice. Not that he ever would have kicked him out of course.

Eddie took all of the tongue lashings and verbal beatings. Every word he just took it. He didn’t argue against a single thing his uncle said. Eventually, though, it became too much and he just couldn’t take it anymore and broke down crying.

Now, if Eddie were having this conversation with his dad and not his uncle, his dad would have simply yelled at him more.

But I think it occurred to Wayne that being a grown adult and cussing out a 13 year old boy was accomplishing absolutely nothing. Especially when it was clear that Eddie already felt bad enough about how things ended up. The man took a deep breath and decided to collect himself and approach the situation from a different perspective.

“I know,” Eddie hiccuped and sobbed. “I messed up so bad! They had to take Tara to the hospital! What if she’s dead? What if I killed her?”

Wayne let out a heavy sigh and put a hand on Eddie’s buzzed head. “I’m sure she’s fine. I mean, you didn’t mean to hurt her that badly, did you?”

“No!” Eddie sobbed.

“Well,” Wayne sighed, kneeling down to Eddie’s level. “Why don’t we start with returning the stuff you stole and while we do that, you can think about what you want to say to her.”

After returning the stolen mask to Melvald’s and apologising to the owner (who didn’t even notice it had gone missing and had likely had 10 times the shrinkage just in that week alone), Eddie began drafting his apology letter to Tara.

After about 3 hours of not hearing a peep out of his nephew, Wayne decided to poke his head into the boy’s room. “Eddie?”

Wayne saw the floor absolutely littered with crumpled papers. Out of curiosity, he picked one up and tried to read it.

He sadly didn’t succeed, as it was entirely illegible and had several words crossed out.

A few other papers he glanced at were all much of the same. He looked over at his nephew, who was very clearly frustrated.

“Son, it doesn’t have to be a Pulitzer Prize winner. She just needs to know that you’re sorry.”

“No, Uncle Wayne! If I say the wrong thing, it’ll mess up everything!”

“Maybe you should take a break and come back to it.”

“No! I have to do this!”

“Well…” Wayne started with a sigh, “I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

Wayne had nodded off on the couch when he was awoken by the sounds of Eddie’s footsteps.

“I finished,” he said meekly.

Wayne looked at the clock. It was past 1 am.

“Well, ain’t no point in going down there now at this hour. We’ll head down there in the morning before I go to work, but you gotta get up, understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

Tara was at home on bedrest when Wayne’s pickup truck pulled up. Between having the life scared out of her, having to be calmed down and assured that Michael Meyers wasn’t real and that it was only Eddie in a mask being his usual meanie self and being scolded by her mother for disobeying instructions regarding her Halloween candy, all while she was still recovering from yellow fever, Tara was exhausted.

Which is why when she saw Wayne and Eddie hop out of the vehicle, she immediately hid under her bedsheets.

The knock on the front door, though quite distant from her, made her stomach rumble. The lock disengaging, while exceptionally quiet from anyone else’s perspective, was deafeningly loud. The sound of the front door opening made her heart drop.

“Mr. Munson,” Eleanor greeted with a somewhat hostile inflection. “I presume your nephew is here to apologise to my daughter?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Eddie interjected.

“You know, she’s very upset about having to come out and speak to you after what you did,” Eleanor said, matter-of-factly.

“I understand, ma’am,” Eddie said apologetically, avoiding eye contact with the older woman.

“Can’t you see the boy is sorry? Why kick him while he’s down?” Wayne admonished.

“Let’s get this over with,” Eleanor said, rolling her eyes.

Eleanor trailed upstairs, leaving Eddie and Wayne to listen to the ensuing argument. Sadly, Daniel was nowhere to be found. The boy had Saturday school for leaving gummy spiders all over the cafeteria floor for the lunch lady to clean up.

“Tara, stop dragging this out and get your butt down there!” Eleanor boomed.

Eddie winced at the sound of the 10 year old crying. He decided to set the apology letter down on the coffee table and walked back out to the pickup truck.

Wayne followed him outside. “Boy, where do you think you’re going?”

“I think it would be better if we left,” Eddie said, defeated.

Wayne could tell his nephew was emotionally exhausted. Between what had already happened with his parents, the constant emotional turmoil that he endured in family court during his entire pre-adolescence and now this, it was very clear that Eddie was fed up with constantly being seen as a criminal when he was usually the victim.

“Can we please go home now?” he practically begged.

Wayne sighed and opened the car door. “All right. I guess the letter gets it across well enough.”

The two got in the truck and drove back to the trailer park, leaving Tara with the letter.

That aforementioned letter which she didn’t care to read and immediately stuck into her desk drawer never to see the light of day again.

Tara had decided 2 things that day.

One, she was never going to interact with Eddie ever again unless she absolutely had to and avoid him whenever possible. And two, she was NEVER going to trust him EVER again.