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steve0discusses · 3 years

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S5 Ep6: Joey Wheeler is on Fire, Yet Again

Came down with a little sickness-not the biggie, just a little sly guy. But I took some meds, I’m a little floaty, I’ve only been listening to baroque music all morning for some reason? And I hate baroque music usually? But I’ll leave it to bro to tell me if this is fluid enough.

Just so you know, these caps were kind of a hot mess for a while and some of them read like that Garfield in of hot eat the food comic until...today. So pls don’t judge me, Judge my damn DMV where no one was following Covid regulations because I’m pretty sure that’s where I got this damn cold.

We start off with Roland getting more attention than he ever has in his entire life. Like honestly, I don’t know what Roland’s job really is...but he’s got a very diverse set of very useless skills. One of which, is knowing how to announce sports games that aren’t really a sport, while those games he’s announcing slowly fall into chaos.

Anyway, Roland’s taking so long cherishing his sweet time before everything goes to hell, that he’s boring Joey, who’s kinda turned into a ball of stress in the waiting room.

A lot of this episode is us watching them watching Joey having a break down moment by moment, TBH.

(read more under the cut)

Yugi telling Joey to study his cards and straight up--what?

Like at this point they know what’s on the cards, right? Like there comes a point where even Yugioh cards have a finite amount of words and I’m just going to assume that like...Joey probably knows them all in his own deck, right?

(bro note: they have no limit on what they will put on a card)

Then again, maybe Yugi doesn’t know what “study” means?

Also, appreciate how some artist crosshatched the hell on Joey’s nose there and I zoomed out and ruined it.

Now for some reason every duelist is hanging out in the duel lodge, including our current arch-villain guy who’s brought a book. I want to know what book this guy even reads so no one could suspect he’s actually a hacker who uses computers. He’s reading romance, right? And I don’t think he’d even be into Twilight, I think he’s straight up into hard core Mom romance like a lame ass Nicholas Sparks over there reading “Dear John” for the millionth time because he is completely un-phased by anything else happening in this room.

Joey, our hero, just out there being an asshole for no reason.

After Tea is pushed into a locker or something screaming about her need for female friends (which she screamed in earshot of Rebecca again, who I figured was on friends terms with her after last episode...but I guess not) Leon hops up to remind us that we should be caring about the fact that his character exists.

And like, I love Leon’s hair color--that’s a good choice, and legit that is the color I tried to dye my hair at the beginning of the epidemic (it didn’t work PS, my hair cannot take dye for the life of it) but also like...he just kinda feels like a weak Rebecca as far as characters go. He’s young, he’s good at cards...I think he goes to a private school? That’s all I can think of about Leon.

He mostly just reminds us that the big prize of this tourney is to duel Yugi, who anyone could have dueled at any point even without the tournament.

On the way out of the...duel room? lounge? Area? Joey decides to like...make peace with Zigfried, and I gotta tell you, I kinda have to side with Zigfried, because Joey spent the last ten minutes being a freak in the dressing room/lounge/bathroom and at one point looked like he was going to hold the entire locker room in a stranglehold.

I would also want some space from Joey Wheeler, is what I’m saying.

After insulting Joey’s style (which honestly, Joey...has a style? He pops his collar, that’s his entire style.) Zigfried assures us that Joey’s gonna lose and like...

...probably, right? Just looking at the plausible direction this season will go.

Anyway, Joey is such a mess (which is the theme of the episode, that Joey needs to learn to chill in order to win at card games) that Rebecca is like “I understand if all of you leave me to go help our poor baby Joey.” And no one felt bad for her.

Mokuba comes over to tell everyone all of the Kaiba family secrets because Mokuba has no filter.

Seto has devoted himself to staring at a computer screen for the rest of this episode. I guess he’ll put their names into Google, realize that social media hasn’t been invented yet, and then just lie his head down on the desk and take a power nap until the tournament is over. Much like I did after taking Dayquil this afternoon.

I like how Seto dressed for success and then locked himself in the server room for most of this arc so far. Maybe he’s just...really tired, I dunno. I don’t really blame the guy, he’s had a hard time.

And then Yugi was like “DAMN IT MOKUBA, JUST ONCE CAN YOU NOT INVITE THE ILLUMINATI???”

And we had a weird scene where Yugi just started talking to the ghost and it was while he was talking to everyone else, and the show didn’t treat it like that’s a weird thing to do...but it was a weird thing to do.

This show does that sometimes, where I guess they imply that Yugi’s Pharaoh conversations are split second conversations but...they’re not, right?

Also this chick ain’t gone yet, and Mokuba is just failing at his entire job for not zeroing in on vibes coming off this chick like stinky cheeseman.

So listen.

Did the Kaibas make like 3 types of Blue Eyes Caboose to one up Noah? Because Noah made one choo choo dragon, and then Mokuba and Seto were like “how dare” and then made sure that everyone ride every single version of the blue eyes caboose just to see how proud of them they were.

How many months of troubleshooting was the train? Like how long in development did Seto and Mokuba spend on these? A lot right? Like most of the time?

I did not check the subs to see if Roland said Jumping or Champion but I like to believe that Roland thought it was a cool new name he gave him.

Then these guys all showed up.

Hey so...can we talk seating arrangements?

Tea decided not to sit next to Yugi after complaining about not spending time with him for like how many episodes? Or was it too awkward to sit on top of what was probably Pharaoh?

Or did Mokuba go like “please, Tea, I cannot sit next to the others because I’m pretty sure one is a mole that is about to go cray” and was Tea like “Good, I need female friends, these ones are driving me crazy!” and then was Mokuba like peering desperately over the edge of his self made dragon train prison realizing he has to listen to Tea complain about boys for the rest of his ride across molten lava?

Headcanons abound about this weird seating arrangement that the animators drew for the reasons they did...but reasons I cannot fully understand. That and the Dayquil is making me overfixate on random stuff.

And also, Tea is kind of the Kaiba’s security’s understudy. Just there to always protect Mokuba with her ass because she’s the strongest woman alive.

PS I missed the tumblr wars because at the time I was trying to like...run a proper business on blogger. When Blogger died and I jumped over here it was like a weird ruin where everyone was like “tumblr is the most toxic place alive” and...I’ve had a really nice time here, actually. Completely missed that civil war period and I have no regrets.

Now I was there for the Petz wars (warz, I guess) where people were very militant about Petz abuse (abuze?) where apparently people were using the spray bottle on their catz too much and people were very, very upset about it to the point that they were like campaigning about it on their angelfire websites with the most bizarre grassroots campaigns that I still recall, to this day because they were like...well they looked like this:

PLAPA. Not only am I 100% positive that only this one guy ever called this movement PLAPA, but I’m 100% positive that not only are Catz not real people, but also this wasn’t actually happening and we never had any proof that it was. Either way, if people knew or suspected that you hadn’t deleted the spray bottle from your game (which at the time I had no idea how to do because I was a wee child) they would basically assume you were on a one way road to being a mass murderer in real life.

In real life we were 7 years old so like...thanks?

But that’s the closest I got to toxicity and at the time I was too young to make an email account and actually converse with these people. I was just there to download their Petz hexes, and I already made a post about how wonderful and incredible Petz Hexing was.

And y’all, I heard, just now after a little deep dive into the Petz Abuse debacle (which yes, is on the wiki), that apparently, like gardening, Petz Hexing came back in a big way during the epidemic--and I have found an active Petz forum in this the year 2021. The only problem is that I no longer remember how to use old timey forums...and I think I’m locked out of seeing most of these threads (and like this forum is so old I think I have to send them a letter in the physical mail to apply). But, I’m pretty sure they’re hosting a picture contest for who’s dogz poses the best. And I’m pretty sure someone created a hexxed Pickle Rick. Or it’s a photoshop that was made to look like a hexxed Pickle Rick.

Dammit why did it have to be Pickle Rick? That’s not worth re-installing Petz and getting it to run on Windows 10...

Guys is this the Dayquil? Is this really happening? I feel like I’m losing my mind for so many reasons...

Anyway, speaking about useless hexing it’s about time that our villain did something that was actually dangerous, so Zigfried decided to install a new virus that does more than turn off the lights. (it still turns off lights)

the Spreadsheet Virus!

Confounded by the spreadsheet software, it...um...it does this:

Straight up how does Excel make a volcano erupt? Is that why I have to pay for Microsoft office now?

All this because Joey made fun of Zigfried’s naturally pink hair? Which is the most normal hair on this series outside of like...Tristan?

Hey guys...Joey’s fine, right? Like how many times has Joey been on fire? And once in an iron cage next to like...a Fire Golem?

Joey’s fine.

MAN I miss Fire Golem. He had a good mug.

And then we just kinda watch chaos go across the park, chaos that includes: Too many ghosts in the haunted mansion (which honestly--you’ll get your money’s worth, sounds great!), the Ferris wheel goes kinda fast and thus might accidentally be fun, the lights turn off at some concert stage that only had 2 people on it (so it might just be motion detector lights and not even a virus), and um...literal fire and magma are going to set Joey Wheeler on fire.

Just...one of these events does not seem like the others. In fact most of these things sound like good improvements to the park and they should just hire Zigfried at this point.

Roland puts down his microphone and jogs across the stage, about a mile through the audience bleachers, and into the staff lounge, to go and bother Seto Kaiba, who is in a room that has a hi-def classical painting copy-pasted on the wall and I can’t look away from it.

I almost did a Google search on this painting but then thought better about it. There’s like...a billion classical paintings that look exactly like this, and they wouldn’t use like a Monet, they would have to do something that’s harder to catch to avoid copyright issues (because yes, even old ass paintings have copyright issues, but no one tell NFT’s which are going to be so freakin screwed and was such a bad idea, that I can’t even start).

Anyway, I have no idea who it is and it is legitimately driving me up a wall, but I’m on too much meds to do the effort of putting it in a reverse google image search.

Plus, a reverse google image search would only pull up Seto Kaiba.

So Kaiba takes us on a little flashback to his weird ass past, a weird ass past that just...doesn’t follow any of the established timelines, but I assume was shortly after adoption but before Seto got into a phase where he wore his school outfit everywhere and tried to shove his MMO off onto his Dad as a business model.

Seto is like 8 for some reason. I don’t know why, they kinda drew him younger this season anyway, like maybe they got a lot of fan mail and realized “Hey I think we made the 16 yo boy too sexy?” And they just toned Seto the hell down. That, and it’s a different animation team, and maybe they looked at Seto’s character design and were like “we don’t get paid enough to draw this well.” So...since Seto actually looks like a teen again, I guess his 12 year old self has to look like he’s in Elementary school.

Also, I only recognized this, because at some point in S3 as I was roasting Noah Kaiba’s weird fashion:

I remember distinctly roasting that little bow tie. I don’t remember when I wrote it, I think there was a version of this outfit that was in color...but I don’t remember where.

Anyway, it’s not the same jacket...but man that’s kind of awkward, ya? Like the maid who dressed Mokuba deffo got fired?

He um.

Turned the lights off a little bit.

Guys this villain is like...

...why does he think lights are scary? Like look at little Seto here. The boy is already bored. Seto duels on the edges of cliffs...he doesn’t care about the freakin dark.

We had a guy who killed everyone on the planet last season, and this season we have a little fashion gremlin standing in the corner and flicking the light switch going “wooooo you never catch me!” and it’s like...

...I’m starting to think this guy isn’t a witch.

Like we’re at Episode 6, there’s still time for this guy to be a witch...but I really am starting to think this guy is just...straight up not a witch. It’s everything Seto wanted, a rival who isn’t a freakin magic person...and sets Joey only fake on fire instead literally on fire like last time...

and Seto is just completely unhinged by it.

Anyway, I’m off to go drink a bowl of soup and pass out. If you’re new here, this is a link to read these in chrono order.

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/yugioh/chrono

#yugioh #yu gi oh #ygo #S5 #Ep6 #Yugi Muto #Seto Kaiba #Joey Wheeler #Tea Gardner #Tristan Taylor #Mokuba Kaiba #zigfried von schroeder #rebecca hawkins #I talked about catz again #leon #but not the kings of leon guy #I mean he could be

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crossbows-and-moonshine · 4 years

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Screaming Salvation (Part two)

Was supposed to upload one a day of these until I run out and totally forgot lmaoooo

Let me know what you guys are thinking of this so far. This story may be somewhat darker than my usual. I don't know if dark is the right word for it but there is a lot of hurt and healing and shit involved.

Fun fact! The name of the fic was originally ‘The Hurt, The Hope’. Which is another As It Is song from the same album. I think it's self-explanatory why. The hurt is all they've been through, the hope is the kids. Carl, Judith and the new baby are the future of this new world. But I thought the other song fit it better so I changed it.

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It had been a few hours since they’d found Rosalie, and they'd done nothing but walk. Her already tired body and sore feet were screaming at her, and the cut on her arm was throbbing. Rick had said once they found shelter someone would stitch it for her. They didn't have time to stop and do it out in the open, it was too dangerous and it was getting dark. Some people had tried to introduce themselves. A woman named Maggie and her husband Glenn finding it their job to be the welcome party. Maggie pointed to everyone in the group and told her their names but she found it hard to care. She doubted she would be staying long. Once the woman realised the new girl didn't want to speak, only nodding or shaking her head and staring off at nothing, she decided it was best to leave her be. Maggie wondered if she was always like this or if it was the trauma of the day.

Rosalie noticed the crossbow guy, Daryl apparently, walking next to her the whole time. He seemed to do this thing where it felt like he projected outwards, like a protective shell that encompassed her and the baby. She wasn't sure if she was imagining it or just delirious from lack of blood and food. He never strayed far from her, and when they had to stop for a small break if someone got too tired, he seemed to hover close to her. Always alert and tense as he watched out for threats. He never seemed to let his guard down, and Rosalie knew that feeling. She had to be that way surviving on her own. If it wasn't for the fact she was injured and stupidly fucking tired, she would be the same way in that moment. The only reason she had some semblance of not being wound so tightly was the fact that she was with people, strength in numbers. She felt his gaze on her every so often but didn't care, keeping her eyes ahead. She had felt from the get-go that Daryl could easily suss people out. She just figured maybe that's what he was doing. She couldn't bring herself to care if he was. She wasn't a threat to his people, not unless they were a threat to her.

When they finally found shelter, she almost fell to the floor and kissed it out of desperation. She was beyond tired and she really didn't want to be out late in the dark with the baby. It was a run-down cabin in the woods, and after clearing it, they all filled in. They sat in the living space, a fire going to keep them warm, and the red-headed man and Latina woman took watch at the windows. When Rick handed her a bottle of formula like he promised, Rosalie felt like someone had cracked open all of her ribs. The pain and guilt were eating her alive. Even though she wasn't thrilled to be hanging with a group, she was grateful and she wanted to thank him. The words wouldn't come out though but Rick could see it in her eyes, how touched she was. He just gave her a warm smile and a pat to the shoulder. It was strange to her, ever since she relented to his request to join them, he’d acted like she was one of them. Part of the group. His words from earlier echoed in her mind. We look out for our own. She didn't feel like part of the group though. She didn't feel like one of them, and she didn’t want to. She felt like an outsider. A mere travel companion until she got her shit together enough to trust that she could look after the baby outside, or leave the baby with them. She was sitting near the fire for warmth, near the group but not directly next to anyone, clearly keeping her distance. And as soon as the boy greedily drank the formula, he happily nuzzled into her and fell asleep in her arms in his dirty blue onesie.

“How old is he?” Maggie asked from across the fire, her eyes on the sleeping boy with a caring smile. Rosalie nibbled her lip a little, avoiding all the eyes that seemed to fall on her. She never liked being the centre of attention. It felt like being the new girl in school all over again.

“I don't know,” was her blunt reply, causing a few raised eyebrows and some frowns.

“You don’t know?” Carol asked her, looking almost incredulously at her. Like how can someone not know how old their baby was, the idea was absurd.

“He’s not mine, I found him two months ago,” she said tensely, her hands protectively tightening around the boy as she glanced up, shooting a glare to the older woman. She noticed Carol's eyes widen a little, and something akin to pity or sadness crossing her features. She presumed most of the others did the same.

“You found him?” Rick asked her curiously. He was sitting off to her right, next to his son Carl and Daryl. Judith on Carl's lap. Rosalie chewed the inside of her cheek trying not to get agitated by the people that had helped her. It was natural they were curious, but she didn't want to talk about it. When she talked about it, it meant it was real and that she was in fact the sole carer of a baby that wasn't hers. She felt that crushing weight of pressure in her chest again.

“He was in the woods alone outside. I heard him crying and went to look… His mom wasn't too far away getting made into a snack,” she muttered with a dark glare at Rick, making it obvious this wasn't something she wanted to talk about. She saw the man swallow thickly and glance to the sleeping boy. She knew too well what he was thinking. How if she hadn't turned up the baby would have been next, and that was a dark thought indeed. But to the group, it also spoke volumes about what kind of person she was. To save the baby, to raise him as her own. A baby in this world was no easy feat. It was like an alarm bell for dinner for the dead, and it made it so much harder to survive. Yet she had done it, no hesitation.

A dark silence took over the group, grim thoughts swirling around their mind. Most of them thinking about baby Judith and how lucky she was not to be in that situation.

“Have you named him?” Carl spoke up, his eyes looked upon her kindly. She didn't know how she felt about that. She tensed a little, the archer next to Rick noticing. He’d noticed everything about her, observant as ever.

“I just call him Tiny,” she shrugged, making Carl snort a little. The adults didn’t find it amusing though because they knew. They knew why the boy had no name. Rosalie was terrified of naming the boy, terrified of forming an attachment other than keeping him alive for fear that something would happen. To her or the baby, none of which mattered. But ultimately the girl knew deep in her bones that one way or another, they would be separated, and she was scared to become attached to him.

Her eyes drifted to the little boy sleeping soundly curled into her. Despite every effort to not get attached to him, the girl who held no hope long before the turn had gotten very attached to him. She fucking hated herself for it, for making herself so weak and vulnerable.

“I think he looks like a Jacob,” Carol mused softly, a smile directed at the baby in Rosalie's arms.

“I like that name for him, suits him,” Maggie grinned, making Rosalie clench her jaw at people trying to name the baby that was her responsibility and hers alone. Again that conflicting feeling. She had thought about leaving the boy with them, she shouldn't be getting angry at them for naming him. What the fuck did she care? But she did, she fucking cared and it made her mad.

Much to her relief the focus soon turned from her and the boy, to people just talking to each other. She kept feeling eyes on her and when she glanced up, she noticed Daryl looking right at her through his hair as he chewed his thumb. He didn't look away, the both of them just looking at each other for a moment before Rosalie looked down at the baby. She wasn't sure what was going on with the man. She couldn't figure out if he wanted to protect her or put a bolt through her heart at the first chance he’d get. She was struggling to get a read on him now with his stoic gaze.

She felt her stomach grumble and she couldn't remember the last time she ate. She grabbed her pack and looked around, finding what she was looking for; squirrel meat wrapped in cloth. She’d caught it herself with the bow the ugly assholes from earlier had taken from her. Lucky for her, it was the only thing they had taken. But it was still a big blow as she didn't know how else to hunt for food. She had prepped it, rationing it and storing it in her bag. She didn't have much, yet for just her and the baby, it would have lasted about a week. Her eyes looked around at the others, noticing they too hadn’t eaten since they found her. She growled inwardly at the niggling feeling inside of her, telling her to share her food, to do the right thing. She wouldn't have to deal with this shit if she was alone. But they had helped her, and Rick had given her formula for the baby without any fuss or hesitation. She couldn't ignore that. She sighed a little as she took the meat wrapped in cloth, reaching over to Rick next to her and silently handing it to him. She heard the soft murmur of conversion stop around her, once more being the focus of attention she’d rather not have.

Rick looked at her confused before he unwrapped it, his stomach partially growling when he saw the meat. He knew it wasn't much for their group, but it was more than enough. More than what they currently had, which was nothing. And what's more, it was obvious this was precious to her. This was hers and would have kept her going for quite a bit. He looked a little surprised at the gesture and looked at her. She felt the heat creeping its way up her chest to her cheeks. She really hated people noticing her existence. She wasn't used to it. To Rick, although the gesture was a simple one, it carried a lot of weight to him. She could have easily not told them about it, or even just cooked it for herself. But she chose to share it with him, with his group. It was yet another thing that spoke volumes to him of what kind of person she was.

“Are you sure?” he asked hesitantly. Of course he fucking wanted the food, he needed it, they all did. Daryl had not been able to find anything when he’d gone hunting earlier that day and they were all starved. But he also didn't want her to feel like she had no choice but to hand it over to them. She just gave him a nod before looking back at the boy, stroking his dark hair a little as if to ground her. She felt uncomfortable being around this many people. All these eyes watching her and judging her. It made her skin crawl.

“Thank you,” Rick smiled. A real genuine smile that he couldn't remember the last time was on his face. The others murmured the same as they looked at her, grateful for her help, but she didn't want any of it. She wanted them to stop looking at her. Carol took the meat and started cooking it as everyone fell into conversation again, making her relax just slightly. She chanced a glance up again only to see Daryl's eyes once again on hers. But this time he gave her a little nod of thanks, seeming to take note of how uncomfortable she was with everyone looking at her and making it into a big deal. He knew that feeling all too well, he was the same. He remembered back in the prison, how people acted like he was some sort of hero for going out hunting and he hated that shit. She returned the nod and glanced back down. She really didn't know how she felt about this group yet. It wasn't long after that the meat was cooked due to how small she had cut it up, and they all ate in companionable silence. Grateful for the food in their bellies, even if it wasn't that much.

She sighed and tried to get comfortable and winced at her arm again. It hadn't been stitched. She had been adamant the baby needed food first and then he’d fallen asleep. It had stopped bleeding, the blood coagulating and starting to form a scab, but it was still hurting and pulled every time she moved it.

“Let's get you stitched up,” Rick said softly, noticing her reaction to moving her arm. He didn't want the girl's arm to get infected and it didn't take a genius to see how little she seemed to care for her own well being over the boy’s. Rather letting him sleep comfortably than get her arm seen to. Daryl got up without prompting and rummaged through a duffel, getting out a first aid kit and walking over to her. He sat beside her, glancing at the baby. He couldn't do this when she was holding him, but he wasn’t sure just how to voice it. Not when he’d observed how protective she was over him. She looked at the man, knowing what he was thinking, and Maggie picked up on it too.

“I can take him for you,” she offered with a warm smile. Rosalie tensed a little, her arm holding the boy tighter, something else that Daryl observed. He could see the war inside of herself. To trust a stranger to hold the boy, and he watched her carefully as she finally relented. He knew it was a hard decision for her to make, and he knew if the shoe was on the other foot and it was Judith, he would have been the same. Maggie gently took the sleeping baby, grinning as she looked down upon him as she held him close. Rosalie looked at her, Maggie looked like a doting mother. It made her heart hurt and she swallowed thickly. Maybe Maggie would be a good person to trust the boy with. She felt eyes on her and glanced to see Daryl, still sat next to her watching her with careful eyes. It was almost like he knew just what she was thinking. That she was going to leave the baby with them because she felt useless and inadequate to do the job herself. She looked down from his gaze, it made her feel stripped bare.

“Let me see it,” his voice was gruff but his tone was soft. It was a strange combination but she gave in anyway, lifting her arm to him with a wince. He took it in his large hands, examining it, furrowing his brow a little as he did and sucking through his teeth. It was bad, she was already aware of that. The man didn't know how she was acting so put together about it, like it was a tiny scratch. He grabbed a cloth and some alcohol to clean the wound before glancing at her through his long hair.

“S’gon’ hurt like a bitch,” he warned, his tone apologetic. He felt like the poor girl had already been through enough for one day, but if he didn't stitch her up it wouldn't end well for her. She looked at him and just gave a curt nod. She was well aware it would hurt, it wasn't the first time she’d been through this.

He looked at her a little apprehensive for a moment, almost like he didn't want to do it. Up close like this he could see her very clearly. She was pretty and looked young, no older than 25. It was an odd combination with her fierce nature he had seen when she almost chopped off that pricks head right off his skinny ass shoulders. He saw the rage that took over her, he fucking felt the same rage when the asshole had muttered those vile fucking words that made him feel like he was going to throw up everywhere. He’d heard her growl and snarl like a wild wolf protecting her pup. And now seeing her up close, he was almost startled by how soft her face was. Her dark brown hair was matted and caked in blood and grime. He noticed it was chopped crudely to just above her shoulders, almost like she had taken a knife to it and hacked at it herself. Her eyes were wide, a light blue. Yet despite their colour, they looked dull, jaded at the things she had endured. Even through the layers of dirt and blood that covered her skin, he could see she was pale as can be, but it suited her. He could also see just how tired she was, and he wondered how the fuck this tiny little thing had not only managed to keep herself alive for so long, but the boy too.

He was shocked when she had said the baby wasn't hers, that she had found him. From how protective she was of the boy, he never would have guessed she had been with him for only two months. That she wasn't his blood. He found himself grateful. Not only for the fact the baby was found at all before he endured something so horrific, but that it was Rosalie who had found him. How she had taken it upon herself to keep him alive no matter the cost. He was glad when Rick had made the decision to invite her to join them. He knew some others were a little apprehensive at first, but he knew why Rick had done so. And the reason was Judith. Daryl felt the same ache deep in his chest the second he heard the baby who was strapped to the scared girl. He felt like his stomach dropped right out of his ass and he couldn't possibly harm the girl when she was with a baby. Not unless she was a complete threat to them, which he knew she wasn't. He was ready to shoot if needed, but he could tell straight off the bat she wasn't a threat to him or the group unless they struck first. She had been desperate and wild-looking. He dreaded to think the hell she had been through to have that jaded look in her eyes, and he found an intense need to protect her and the boy. Gravitating towards them as they walked and keeping alert. He could see when she walked how tired she was. How she winced and limped a little and he knew her feet were hurting her. He couldn't imagine how she ever got any damn rest when it was just her and the boy. No one to take watch shifts with, to ever feel somewhat safe to sleep or stop for a rest. So he’d found himself by her side, protective and guarding, hoping she could sense that she could at least not be so alert and have some kind of rest. To know someone had her back for once.

He realised he’d been staring at her arm for a moment deep in thought, and as much as he didn't want to hurt her, feeling the guilt bubbling inside of his chest. He knew he’d feel a fuck tonne more guilty if she died from infection and left the baby without his guardian. He’d noticed the look Rosalie gave Maggie, and he hoped he was fucking wrong about it. He couldn't shake the feeling the girl might up and leave, leaving the boy with them. He wasn't even angry about it. He knew why she would do such a thing, he saw it as clear as day in her eyes the moment she watched the boy with Maggie. She felt like she wasn't good enough, wasn't able to keep him alive. Guilty for not being able to look after him on her own as well as a group could have. But he didn't want her to leave. He wanted her to stay, for her and the baby to become part of the group. And he really hoped he was fucking wrong about what he thought.

He got the thread ready with a needle, dowsing the needle in the alcohol to sterilize it. With one hand firmly gripping her arm, the other deftly started sewing the awful wound closed. She clenched her jaw, exhaling hard through her nose as she breathed through the pain without making a peep. It unsettled Daryl. It was almost like she'd experienced pain all too much in her life that she was used to it. No one else would have been able to act like that under the circumstances. He tried to work quickly and when he was done, he gave it another wipe with alcohol. He looked down at his work as did she, it wasn't perfect by any means but it was closed and that's what mattered. It would scar though, and the thought made Daryl angry. Angry that she would have a permanent reminder of those assholes and the things they said. The things they could have done to her and the boy before they even came across them. He wrapped her arm in a bandage, his rough hands surprisingly delicate as he undertook his task.

“Thanks,” she muttered, her voice quiet and raw sounding. He’d noticed the only few times she had spoken that her voice was quiet, and sounded so tired he wondered how she hadn’t just lay down and conked right out. He gave her a little nod and put the stuff back in the first aid kit, but he didn’t move back to his spot beside Rick. Instead he stayed next to her, leaning against the wall. She felt it again, the weird projection thing he seemed to do, and she wondered if he even knew he was doing it. She grabbed her pack and took out some dirty clothes, laying them on the floor next to her. She looked at Maggie expectantly, and Maggie gave her a sheepish smile as she handed the baby back over. Rosalie lay the baby down on the pile of clothes like a tiny makeshift mattress, before draping the blanket she used to carry him over him gently. Then she curled up next to him, protectively, her back to Daryl and the rest of them. She needed sleep so she felt better in the morning when they would head out again.

Despite the fact she was still slightly wary of the group, they'd done nothing but help her and the baby, and she was grateful. She was grateful to have a roof over their heads, for the baby to have food in his belly that he needed so desperately. To have some respite from being alone. For the fact she would be able to sleep for once. The strange projection that Daryl omitted made her feel safe. Like somehow without words, by staying next to her, giving off that vibe, he was saying to her to get some rest and she didn't need to worry. That her and the baby were safe and he wouldn't let anything happen to them. And she didn't need telling twice. Her exhausted body fell asleep instantly, her hand on the infant's tummy like she needed reassurance he was still there with her.

#daryl dixon #daryl dixon fanfiction #daryl dixon fanfic #twd #twd fanfiction #twd fanfic #The Walking Dead #the walking dead fanfic

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rixxy8173571m3w1p3 · 6 years

Note

DWC prompt: Zeta-7 using the language of flowers to send you a bouquet.

( @ricksanchezdwc A DWC prompt I wasn’t able to get to last week. I had a lot of of research to do, but it was a worth it. Why, the research was half the fun. By the way @hoodoo12 I made a reference to one of your fics. Can you find it?)

______________________

Moonlit evenings came and went, and you followed the usual routine you had unconsciously set for yourself. Usually, you’d be out with Zeta-7, snuggled up together on the couch, or exploring alien planets and the like, but not tonight. On his latest assignment, you had only seen him a handful of times because of the major time differences, as well as to certain travel restrictions. Sometimes he’d be dressed in ways which made him unrecognizable, other times, he’d come by with his clothing torn to shreds, hanging on literally by the threads, but all the same you’d be happy to see him, even if for a couple of seconds at a time. Really it was fine, you told yourself, it was all good, and you wouldn’t bother him more then you had to, but the time seemed to stretch on without him around. A week, two weeks, three weeks passed, agonizingly, and painfully slow.

When was he gonna come back home? And fill the expanse of your house? To stretch himself out on the couch when you were finishing your work? To interrupt your disconcerting thoughts with the brightness of his wit and charm? Oh, what have you become?

Sometimes it made you wonder if that’s what The Doctors companions felt after their perception of the universe was expanded. Their small, colorless lives, suddenly blooming with color. Did that make Zeta-7 the Doctor in your universe? Perhaps, it did.

During the quiet moments, when you found yourself at a loss as to how you’d spend the day, you’d call him to see if he’d need anything, or if his plants needed tending to. Or he’d call you, and if he found a few minutes, he’d just come in person, and hold you. And you barely had enough time to take in his presence, before he was gone again. Whether you were up, or asleep, you’d dream about him, of his house, of him cooking, of the usual activities you two did together. Sometimes, in the night, you’d even sense his comforting presence, but you’d open your eyes and find no one there; perhaps that was the most unpleasant part about it all.

Still, life went on as it did.

You worked on your latest rough draft, a bit stumped as to how you were going to end it. You thought of plot twists, killing off a character, or the good ol’ cliffhanger, but none of those solutions seemed good enough. You rubbed at your tired eyes, and decided this was probably a good time for some tea. There was a loose hibiscus tea mix in the rounded tin, sitting in the third cabinet if your memory serves correctly. Shuffling into the kitchen, you yawned, lazily opening cabinets, until you spotted the bouquet.

It was massive, every petal and leaf impossibly perfect, and it would be a good five minutes before you believed they could actually be for you. Made up of pink and red camellias, red asters, red rosebuds, light red carnations, deep red carnations, and pink daisies, you wondered if there was a theme involved in Ricks choice. Red and pink flowers in themselves seemed romantic enough, but you turned the vase, searched for a note, but you only found a book. Hmm, The Language Of Flowers by Kate Greenaway. Passing your hands over the cover, you could tell there was some age to it, and inside there was a lovely collection of illustrations, as well as poems, and Zeta-7s distinctive footnotes in the margins.

You held the book tightly to your chest, as though someone would dare come take it from you. Page after page, there was precise notes, pertaining to their care, availability, as well as personal thoughts to their beauty. You were touched by the volume of handwriting; this book must have been a personal favorite of his, but what did this mean? If he entrusted it to you, did that mean you were supposed to decode their meaning? Knowing him, it seemed like something he would do, and the book was somehow a clue.

You flipped through a few pages until you found a list of flower names, and next to them familiar looking flower illustrations.

First was the Pink camellias which meant longing for you, while the red camellias meant You’re a flame in my heart. You blushed, eager to see what the other flowers meant. Asters were known as a talisman of love and a symbol of patience, red rosebuds meant pure and lovely, while light red carnations meant admiration. Deep red carnations meant deep love and affection, and finally pink daisies meant youth, innocence and joy, while all together the daisy meant gentleness, purity and loyalty.

“Oh Rick.” you sighed.

So, you weren’t the only one missing the other. Tears bit at your eyes, your insides an ooey gooey mess. For quite some time you had suspected that his feelings were more deeply felt then yours, but did that mean you had been taking it for granted? Or for granite as he would say.

They were beautiful, and no doubt they were expensive. Perhaps they were from the Citadel Flower Shop, which had some of the freshest flowers in the multiverse. You had only seen it once, but you remembered it’s loveliness very clearly. Outside it’s entrance were dozens of bouquets, of the typical sort of flowers one might see in any ol’ flower shop, but inside there were the largest, freshest, and bizarre variety of plants and flowers you had ever seen. Displayed in the window were blooming orchids, behind them were sunflowers as tall as you were. There was a section of carnivorous plants, an enclosed section of the beautiful, but deadly, the sentient, and other bizarre categories which gave you the creeps. Zeta-7 had been so excited to show you the place, of the species which were exclusive to the Citadel, and overall seemed confident in his plant knowledge, much to Florist Ricks annoyance. You remembered Florist Rick, and his Mort of the Valley, how attentive he had been to you, and his indifference to your Rick. While you weren’t fond of him, his Morty was fascinating, even if deadly. It had been one of the highlights of the visit, and there was no doubt that at least some these flowers were from there.

In your mind’s eye, the apples of his cheeks were dusted with a blush. Happy to be surrounded by his plant friends, he’d greet them with gentle affection, though be flustered if one questioned his motives. Perhaps, in a voice reserved only for them, the flowers were blessed to spread their charm upon the soul, and return from whence they came with a different shading they might not remember. And all the same, Zeta-7 would face Florist Rick with a glowing, misunderstood resilience which he had learned from the stems and branches of his youth, of the dust, of every sunlit corner which knew him by name.

Hmm, but even so you would rather have Rick.

His wonderful, dorky, smiling self, who caused tiny miracles, as well as erupt tiny disasters. For now, you had these living reminders, that he cared for you, more than you could possibly know.___________________For the rest of the day, you cleaned, worked a little more on your story, and made a nice dinner. Well, edible enough to eat sort of dinner. By the time you went to bed, you were so tired, that in less than five minutes, you fell asleep. At some point during the night, you felt a familiar comforting presence, which made you stir. You tried to open your eyes, but they were so heavy.

“Ri…Rick?” you called out in a sleep laced voice.

Now, you had not expected results, but as your humble servant, you heard his footsteps, followed by the rustling of clothes; he was there, somewhere in the darkness. You groaned, trying the fight the sedative effects of your meds. Zeta-7 gasped, rushed over, and kneeled beside your bed. Caressing your hair, he said in a low, calm voice.“Shhh, it’s okay, I’m - I’m here.”

“Rick?” you asked, more confident in your questioning.

“Mhm,” he cooed. “it’s okay, go back t-t-to sleep.”No, you screamed in the recesses of your mind. You made a sound of refusal, and he chuckled. “Gosh, I can’t - I-I can’t refuse you can I?”

Even as drowsy as you were, you held your arms open, waiting for him. His rough, calloused hands brushed hair away from your cheeks, and leaning closer, his breath feathered your ears. “I doubt I-I-I-I ever could.”

Mystified, you whispered his name a third, and final time, as though he would disappear if you managed to forget his name. Yet, unlike the fairy stories, he remained, reassuring you with his light touches. Oh, there was a charm to the night, romantic, intimate, but with Rick, it was comforting. At last, you felt the warmth of his lanky body, so familiar with the way it moved, the smell of vanilla and something so him, the sound of his heart beating, and all of it felt so right.

“I missed you Rick,” Came your small, vulnerable, girlish voice. “It’s been a little lonely without you around.”Pressing a kiss on your forehead, he replied.“I-I missed you too.”Lazily you passed your fingers through his hair, which was pressed to the sides of his head. “Why is your hair wet? Did you go swimming?”“No, I ugh, I had just taken a shower.”“No wonder.”“No wonder w-w-what?”“Why you smell so good.” you giggled, which made you feel like a dork, and you covered your face to try and hide your embarrassment.“Thank you,” he replied in his good natured way. “I’m ugh - I’m glad you think so.” “I'm sorry Rick,” you yawned. “I’m really sleepy, and I can’t think of anything interesting to say. Literally, the only thing that really comes to mind is ‘Soylent Green is people!’, which is weird isn’t it?”

“I’m the one who should be sorry. It’s late, and I know it was selfish of me t-t-to show up w-w-without warning, out of the blue. I-I-I probably woke you, and I should - I should go and let you sleep.”It might have been your half delirious mind at work, or the side effects of your medication, but you were afraid to let go. What if this was the last time you saw him? You held him a fraction tighter, a little more alert, but still very drowsy. “But I don’t want you to go. Couldn’t you stay a little longer?”The soft light of the moon cast shadows across his face, and exaggerated his displeasure.“I-I-I-I wish I could mi corazón.”“Please?”“I-I can’t.”

Reluctantly you acquiesced, and loosened your grip, but before leaving he captured your mouth in desperation, like a man without air, lips parted, breaths mingled, his words muffled by his urgency, but all too soon he was gone, and you were left wondering if you had merely dreamed it._________________In the morning, there was another bouquet. The first bouquet had been unexpected enough, but now wasn’t he just spoiling you? Nonetheless, the feeling of intense, happy aliveness was overwhelming as you searched for the meaning of today’s flowers. This time there was yarrow which meant Cure for heartache, forget me nots which meant true love, sweet alyssum which meant Worth beyond beauty, Pyramidal Bell Flower which meant Constancy, globe amaranth which meant Unfading Love, blue salvia which meant I think of you, red salvia meant forever mine, surrounded by cedar leaves which meant I live but for thee and Think of me. So, you didn’t dream it after all.

There were times when you questioned half of your memories, some which were clouded, others which were clear, and you could hardly decipher between reality and a dream. Why, you had taken to just believing it was so, and you’d need Rick to remind you, but this time you were sure. Rick had been visiting, even if briefly just to see you, and to deliver the flowers. Thinking back to last night, when you could hear his heart beating, in the quiet of the room, felt his arms, and heard his calm voice, you felt more at home, than the place you slept at each night.

That’s it! You were determined to stay up, so that you would see him. You drank coffee, despite knowing it aggravated your anxiety, and had a rom-com movie marathon, and you weren’t sure when, but you had closed your eyes, and fallen asleep. When you woke, you found yourself in bed. It was three in the morning, and you knew it was well past his break time. Damn it. ________________You took an early morning walk, finding an excuse to visit to the drug store when you ran out of pens. As you would, you glanced at the new books, magazines, and bought some candy. You usually kept a bowl of chocolate, or hard candy around for Rick to snack on, and you were fortunate to find there was a buy one get one sale. In the end, you realized that half way on your way home, you had forgotten to buy pens. When you got home, there was a another bouquet, this time on the side table closest to the door.

You set the groceries down, and fetched the book to decrypt today’s group of flowers.

Red Columbine meant Anxious and trembling, Pink Convolvulus meant Worth sustained by judicious and tender affection, American cowslip meant Divine beauty and You are my divinity, white clovers meant Think of me, Laurestina meant I die if neglected, and fennel meant Worthy of all praise and Strength. Oh dear, today he must have been having one of those days. You tried calling, but it went straight to voicemail. All you could do was leave a message, and see if that helped.___________Of course, the flowers didn’t come every day, but nearly every day. You admired his perseverance, it must have been difficult to find the running back and forth, delivering your flowers, and handling whichever duties they had him do. To find the time, to even pick them out must have been tiring, but you appreciated every bit of it.

One day you received a gooseberry bush which meant Anticipation, and found a sketch of hemlock which meant You will be the death of me, and a sketch of Love in a Mist which meant You perplex me. Another day you found a pot of Lupine flowers which meant Imagination, and rose of Sharon which meant Consumed by Love. Another day it was Mezereon flowers which meant Desire to please, and another day Milkvetch which meant Your presence softens my pains. The flowers did all the talking for him and almost acted like a mood ring; some days were better, others worse. They also seemed to act as his subtle flirtations; how Victorian of him.

Another day there were peach blossoms which meant I am your captive, and another day was baby’s breath which meant Innocence and Pure of Heart, another day Dog roses which meant Pleasure and Pain, and maiden blush roses which meant If you love me, you will find it out, then Scarlet Lychnis which meant Sunbeaming eyes, spindle trees which meant Your charms are engraven on my heart, Swallow-wort which meant Cure for heartache, and Venice Sumach meant Intellectual excellence and Splendour.

These flowers soon became living responsibilities, which you cared for according to your research. Yet, for some reason they seemed to be more resilient than the usual blooms they sold in shops around town. At first it annoyed you to bits, being forgetful as you were, but after a week, it came to be an activity you enjoyed. You’d talk to them, and while they were but ornamental friends which would not mind if you paid more attention to one then the other, you somehow hoped they were affected. And little by little, it seemed you were learning about Rick, and how his sadate activities were not to be reckoned with.__________________________One evening, three weeks after you had received the first bouquet, you saw the familiar green glow, and stopped what you were doing to stare at the man and the bouquet that threatened to swallow him. “Rick?”

As ever, he was all smiles and delightfulness. “I was given leave for a few hours and I-l-I brought you these.”“Protea flowers?”With raised brow, he seemed genuinely shocked, stunned almost. “Y-y-you’ve heard of them?” his voice above a whisper.

“Well, after receiving all the flowers, and reading the book you left, I started doing research, and let’s say I know a lot more about flowers now then I did three weeks ago. You know, I think I have more than enough flowers to open up a shop. Isn’t that a neat idea? Oh, but everything I touch dies so that probably won’t work. However, I am curious as to why all these flowers you brought me haven’t died yet. It’s probably science right? Or magic, maybe both. Either way, I honestly never thought I would receive so many.”

“I’m sorry, I know it’s - I’ve probably over did it again.”

“Hmm,” you smiled up at him. “I wouldn’t say that. I’d say it was more like everyday there was a new mystery I had to solve, and I’d find a secret message intended just for me. Almost like mission impossible, minus the explosions.”

The wheels of his mind were turning, and he studied you. “Why - why are you like this?” “What do you mean Rick?”

“You put up with so much. I know it’s not - it’s not easy being with me. You might not complain, about how I-I-I sometimes put you in danger, cause small fires, and come over, just to - just to fall asleep on the couch.”“That doesn’t bother me.”

The lines of his forehead deepened. “I-I know, but it - I think about the age differences sometimes. I’m old,” he sniffled. “so much older then you, and I know that sometimes you’d - you’d rather do youthful activities, but y-y-you like me despite all that. That’s why,” he softened.“I-I-I-I brought you Protea flowers, which mean diversity, courage and strength. It takes certain kinds of people to deal with Ricks, let alone me and I - I appreciate you. You are priceless to me, and I-I-I wanted you to know that.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about. Just, thank you for all the flowers, I love them, and what they mean. Hopefully, Florist Rick wasn’t too hard on you.”“Not at all.”“Oh, that reminds me, I got something for you.”From in between the pages of the book, you took out the pressed four leaf clover. “I know it isn’t a flower, but I was able to find this, and it’s an answer to your cryptic flowers.”

Setting his bouquet down on the counter, he accepted it, and pressed it to his heart. After a couple minutes, you began to worry since he hadn’t said anything. You waved your hand in front of him, seeing as he was short circuiting or something. “Rick? Are you okay?”Placing it inside his breast pocket, he held you by the shoulders “Can I?”“Yes.”Bending down, he captured your mouth in a firm kiss. Wrapping your arms around him, you leaned into him. God, you had missed this man, but all too soon, he backed away. “I really wish I could stay.”“Couldn’t you?”Looking at his watch, he smiled. “No, but I have enough time t-to take you somewhere.”________________Waves washed away the footsteps in the sand, and for once forgetting your shoes worked in your favor, for you could enjoy the feeling of sand between your toes. Seagulls cried in the distance, and and the wind had your hair whipping about your face. Despite the warmer temperatures, you still found yourself shivering, but Zeta-7 placed his lab coat about your shoulders, and continued to lead you to his favorite spot. A few times along the way, you stopped to pick up shells you found interesting, and with his permission you placed them in his coat pockets. This was new for you, considering you had never gone to the beach before; it was nice, since the sandy shore seemed to stretch out as far as the eye could see, going somewhere and nowhere.

Finally, you two come up to a large flat rock among a group of larger, rounded rocks, and took a seat. In silence, you two watched as the sky took the on the hues of burnt reds, oranges, pinks, and violet, like a symphony of color, until it was night. “I have never seen a sunset like that before,” you beamed. “is it like that all the time?”“I-I-I don’t know, but what I do know is that in the - in the winter time, Florida skies are clear, and I know how much y-y-you despise the cold temperatures, so I thought this would be a-a-a pleasant change.”You slipped your hand impulsively into his as you sometimes did. “I see why seniors come here to retire. By the way, where is everyone?”“This isn’t a-a-a popular beach,” he shrugged. “so it’s usually secluded.”“Do you like secluded places Rick? It seems to be a trend with you, and I worry about it sometimes.”“I’m not - I’m not trying to seclude myself,” he sighed. Observing the Sanderlings, he quieted for a bit, ruminating on what to say. Kissing your hand, he found the courage to look back at you. “though it sort of looks that way doesn’t it? I ugh - I guess it’s because there aren’t that many places where I feel comfortable, but when I find them they’re a treasure. When I’m alone, sometimes I think about where I belong, if what I do matters,” giving your hand a squeeze, his voice became happier, light, and tender, his gaze more serious than ever. “but then I remember you, and my plants, and it - it sort of goes away.”“But you do matter, and everything you have done matters, because if something has meaning to you, then that’s all that matters. You taught me that.”“Hohoho, then I’m - I’m probably forgetting. Oh, that’s - that’s what happens when y-y-you get old.”“I like your age Rick, it’s one of your best qualities. Though, when you said that you thought about the age difference between us, it reminded me of a question I’ve had for a while. Does it ever make you think about your mortality?”

Again he was quiet, and watched the push and pull of the waves. And when he seemed satisfied as to what he would say, he let go of your hand and wrapped an arm around your shoulders. “I try not to think about it.”

“Hmm, that’s probably a good thing. Either way, let’s try to enjoy our time together while we can. Okay?”_________________“Uh oh, I-I-I have to go soon.”“Well, let’s go home then. I wouldn’t want you to forget your shoes.”“Wait, there’s something else I wanted to give you. It’s ugh - it’s in my inner, left lab coat pocket.”You felt around, laughing when you found pieces of candy, and took hold of the lightweight chain. “A necklace,” you gasped. “it looks just like a crystal, but it isn’t is it?”Scratching the back of his neck, he nodded. “Yeah, it ugh, disguises the circuitry. If you’re ever in any danger, just squeeze it, and it will transport you t-t-to a safe room. I’m hoping nothing ever comes up, but it’s - it’s a precaution.”Right away you put it on, and admired its loveliness. “I’ll cherish it.”

“The case I’m working on will be over soon, and then we’ll go on - on all sorts of adventures.”

“I’d like that, but until then please come see me, anytime, even if I’m sleeping.”“You knew?”Staring off into the moonlit night, you were comforted in knowing that after today, this would be another treasured memory. “I always knew, but it didn’t bother me, because you’re not the kind of person who intrudes, and I did tell you you’re welcome to come by anytime. So, don’t hold back. You know where I am, and I’ll be waiting.”“O-okay.”“And when your case is over, I was wondering if you’d teach me something?”“About what?”

Smiling up at him, you sighed. “Everything.”This time it was his turn to gasp, worry passed over his face, but he nodded. Later, when you got home, you finally found a way to end the story, which in its own right seemed like beginning of something bigger, mysterious, but bright.

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gimmetheheadcanons · 6 years

Text

Sinners & Scapegoats 1/?

A/N: This is a multi part Richonne fic. It is an AU mystery drama (with romance) and I began a while ago but decided to come back to only recently (and finally post). I will be posting maybe twice a month until it’s done - so heads up there. Let me know if it is worth continuing. (Trigger warnings, contains violence and racial slurs).

1. Prying eyes

Rick Grimes’s job was a job.

It was supposed to be a career, something with a purpose beyond the practical nature of a pay check. Protect and serve the community, there was no greater honor for a man of his caliber than being a deputy sheriff in a county full of fools apparently. Nothing more satisfying than chasing petty bike thieves all over town. Or breaking up a ‘salacious’ Sweet Sixteen Birthday Party that was misidentified as an ‘illegal kegger’ by a preachy passer-by. And to finish of this day of dunces, the most dignified activity of all! Once again, calling in at the request of anonymous white folk, unaware that the phrase ‘suspicious activity’ was not an umbrella term for any and all things any person with a ‘darker complexion’ may be doing.

In this case it was the nefarious action of a thirty something years old black woman in a casual, loose white blouse, ripped denim jeans and brown open toed sandals, putting up a couple of posters which needed immediate police attention. Thank the Lord for the ever vigilant residents of Winter Oaks Avenue!

“Oh for Pete’s sake.” Rick muttered under his breath, furious with himself for even taking the call from Diane at dispatch when he should have known better. Had he not been on his way out of the office he wouldn’t have. But here he was, once again at the beck and call of small-minded racists, trying to work out how best to handle this situation without offending this probably innocent woman or enraging the majority of the town’s voting pool in an election year. The Powers that Be at King’s County Sherriff’s Department would undoubtedly fail to thank him for once again “pandering to the so called PC culture of ill-informed progressives instead of serving the good folk of this county, the ones with real concerns about the increasing crime rates”.

Ah yes, the things that go bump in the night. Rick grimaced to himself as he looked at the well lit and virtually empty street. There was no mistaking this woman for a dangerous trespasser and yet somehow, in this community – with that head full of dark dreads at least, she was. Rick glanced down at his wrist watch, it has just gone a little past seven. The sun would be gone in an hour or so and Rick wondered where this woman lived and if he could be so lucky as to have caught her just as she was about to finish up putting up the last of her posters before retiring for the day – none the wiser about the nastiness of her neighbors.

Fifteen minutes had passed and Rick just sat in his vehicle with the key still in the ignition. He simply observed the situation, each moment toying with the idea of just driving off. Just give it another minute, he told himself, then he could finally get his ass home to his family – and on time for dinner for once. It was another ten minutes into his ‘minute’ when Rick realized he had been caught by the woman. She was peering back at him from across the street, a curious frown visible on her face, even from this distance and Rick knew had no choice but to get out and face her.

Even if it was just for the purpose of damage control.

Be the change you wanna see.

After a long, tired sigh, Rick put on his wide brimmed sheriff’s hat and made his approach adopting a casual non-threatening strut which hopefully would signal his intent to talk and not escalate the situation. As expected, there was a flicker of blinds from several of the homes he passed. The skin on the back of his neck, accustomed to the fieriest of Georgia’s summers, burned with intense dislike and discomfort. He ignored the rows of narrowed eyes peering from behind the slits, instead firmly keeping his gaze on the perplexed woman he was about to approach.

“Evening ma’am.” He greeted her with a friendly yet still somewhat carefully crafted smile.

She wouldn’t grace him with the same, her response was firm, respectable yet wary. “How can I help you officer?”

Rick maintained his smile, upholding it against the scrutiny of her heavily lashed dark eyes. “Actually, I was hoping I could help you.”

If she could roll her eyes, Rick knew she would have. Scoff at him and rightfully tell him to state his real intent. But this was King’s County and Rick could sense the tension in the air as she carefully contemplated her next move. Rick wanted to make it easier on her, feeling the burden of the situation and knowing he was responsible for it.

A little less forced and a lot more friendly, he attempted to disarm her cautiousness with old fashioned, gentlemanly charm, the kind his dear grandmother taught him to embrace. “I was just on my way home when I saw you and thought; Hey now Rick, what better way to earn them shiny stars pinned to your shirt so handsomely than to assist this young lady on this fine evening.”

He was careful to introduce himself using his Christian name, trying to distance his true self from the uniform he wore. Yet he could do nothing to shield her from the truth. Her expression, still every bit as guarded signaled to him the realities of the world she lived him. She was tall, taut and terribly beautiful even in her indignation.

The woman replied almost instantly in a Northern accent betraying her as a newcomer. “I’m almost done so no need to bother yourself. Thank you for your time Officer.”

Dismissed but not defeated, Rick pushed forward. “You sure?” He asked because he knew he couldn’t walk away. Not with an audience as enthralled as Romans spectators, ready to rate this performance with a devastating signalling of their thumb. No, he could not leave her, not to the lions.

“Am I under arrest?”

“Excuse me?” Her bluntness surprised him.

“If not, I’d like to be on my way.” She was smart enough not to move until he gave the okay. Rick felt increasingly uncomfortable with the choices he was being presented him.

“Look, there is no need to worry. Like I said, I was on my way home when – ”

“I heard you.”

Again, Rick was surprised. She cut him off mid excuse – mid lie. Despite her disinterest in his self-serving speech, Rick still foolishly believed he could walk away from this interaction smelling like roses. Sincerely and softly, he made his final mistake. “Then what’s the problem ma’am.”

Then, finally, came the scoff he deserved.

“I could ask you the exact same thing. Which one called you.”

It was enough to render Rick speechless. The jig is up, the measured tone she spoke with could not hide the fury behind her words.

“Which of those disrespectful racists, cowardly peeking from behind their blinds called you.”

Rick did his best not to flinch at her use of what would be deemed the real hard R in these parts. He swallowed hard, truly hating this place and the people in it.

“I just wanna know how I can help with these posters.” He tried again, wanting to so desperately distance himself from the truth. He was their tool, but he could also be here for her. If he could just stop her from tarring him with the same brush. “Maybe even show a taxpayer like yourself that I take my job seriously.”

She wasn’t the problem, Rick wanted to tell her but at the last minute deciding to keep his mouth shut.

She hesitated for a moment, not speaking again but Rick got the message loud and clear.

You expect me to buy this bull?

Please do, Rick’s eyes begged.

The desperate look in his eyes may have done the job as she sighed and shrugged her shoulders. “Fine you’re gonna protect them. I get it. But I need to know for real, am I being arrested?”

It was a sincere worry and Rick knew he could no longer disrespect her by dodging the question. He shook his head and continued to offer further clarifications on his part. He took a step closer, careful not to spook her but also trying his best to create some privacy before confessing his truth.

“It’s an election year.” He whispered.

“Honestly it’s a pain in the behind trying to be that extra police presence.”

“An election year.” She repeated, a frown forming on her face as she processed the meaning of his words.

“Yep. The bosses got a burr in their saddle about it. So unless you have a baby I can kiss or a hand I can shake – I’d like to do my job and help with those posters, if you don’t mind that is.” Rick’s charm finally worked, he could tell by the relaxed look on her face as she nodded in agreement.

Grateful for the reprieve, Rick nodded courteously before helping her gather her bags, papers, and stapler to move onto the next row of bare lampposts. She had every reason to continue to hold him at arms length for what almost transpired this evening, yet past experiences and perhaps a kindness in her heart had told her that Rick was one of the good ones.

Or at least he was trying to be, her slightly raised eyebrow revealed as they walked, side by side, still somewhat uncomfortably.

“So, what are we dealing with, a runaway pup or –

“A ‘fly out of the window of a speeding car’ teddy bear.”

“Ah an exotic pet.”

She managed to crack a smile for him and Rick’s heart fluttered slightly.

They decided to set up at the first of the lampposts, the joke acting as a much needed ice-breaker and allowing them to work quickly in perfect coordination; Rick passing her the sheets of paper and her carefully using the staplegun.

The teddy bear photo was printed in black in white, a small scruffy looking thing being held in arms of a toddler with big eyes and an even bigger grin on his face. Underneath, a description typed out with love and desperation – Help Mr. Bear come home to Andre.

“He belongs to my son. He’s three and I really need it back.” There was a real grief behind her words, her dark eyes not watery but not very far from it.

“I get it.” Rick said staring at the side of her face as she turned away from him. “I really do.” He repeated, careful to just be expressing empathy from one parent to another and internally reminding himself of his own commitment as a father and husband. “He can’t sleep without it right?”

“Something like that.”

“Right. Well let’s get this street and the next done, so you can get back home in time for tuck in time.”

“Thank you, Officer.”

“You’re welcome Ma’am.”

Things were going well and soon this watchful stranger was replaced by incredibly interesting company.

Pulling a face of mock disgust at the proper way he continued to call her Ma’am, the woman finally just told him her name. It was one he’d never heard before but liked the sound of anyway. Michonne from Manhattan. An art teacher and painter looking to find new inspiration in the Deep South. A mother. The new owner of the Old Kent Farmhouse, self-renovating the crumbling place after the death of the owner and looking to make a home here in this town. Rick listened to her talk and was surprised to see how animated and easy going she was. Deep within him, he felt the shame rising up again from their initial introduction. Her hostility had been understandable, his behavior had not. Still, he was glad he took the call and glad it was him that got the chance to meet this charming woman with the most infectious smile.

She asked him about this town and Rick told her that despite all its faults, it was home and he hoped it could be hers to. She responded optimistically and Rick fought back the urge to apologize for what he knew she had already figured out about the people that lived here. Instead he told her tales about his own son Carl, now twelve years old but still somewhat sentimental about his favorite childhood toy – a dusty blue, stuffed elephant called Frump. He made sure not to tell her about his wife Lori, who had won the stuffed toy at the summer fair when they were seventeen and still in love.

If his job was just a job these days, then his marriage was one too. It was exhausting knowing what waited for him when he arrived home later. For weeks now, his wedding band pinched at his finger uncomfortably, from the weight gained from the drive-thru burgers he ate in his car as he agonized over the state of his marriage with his bachelor pal and partner Shane Walsh. Today, however, he had made plans to make it home for dinner and face the problems head on. Instead here he was, cherishing a few moments of casual conversation about his day that dazzled Michonne but would’ve drained Lori.

And to Rick Grimes, Christian, Father, Husband – this was was devastating.

Still, they got talking and Rick had almost gotten away with it.

That was until reality came crushing down in the form of the always delightful Ed Peletier, marching up the street like a bull. Red in the face and practically foaming at the mouth, Ed did what Ed always did.

“Sheriff Grimes.”

Rick managed a curt nod in response for a man he so openly despised. “How can I help Ed?”

“I’d like a word.”

“Sure thing, as soon as I finish up with Michonne here. She’s new to town. Michonne, this is Ed Peletier – local entrepreneur of sorts.”

Read between the lines you redneck asshole. Rick begged, hoping that by revealing Michonne’s status as a homeowner and a part of this community, the information would be enough to put a muzzle on Ed.

Ed however was predictably impatient, after darting a brief but filthy look at the hand Michonne had courteously extended, the gruff man continued to completely ignore her and keep his wild eyes on Rick, whose own hands were itching to punch the man.

With a resigned expression and a quick apology, Rick handed back the posters and followed Ed across the street to the front of his house. There they were met by Carol Peletier, Ed’s patient wife, standing at an open door with a concerned expression on her face.

“Evenin’ Carol.” Rick called out, a genuine warm smile on his face. As much as he despised Ed, he pitied Carol. A small, fragile looking woman with graying hair beyond her years.

“Hello Rick.”

Pleasantries aside and out of Michonne’s earshot, Rick turned to the man who dragged him away from her. “What do you want Ed.”

He dropped the friendly act in favor of a venomous look, bearing no good will for Ed Peletier and the company he kept in this town.

“I wanna know what you’re playing at Grimes.”

“Families live here. Children.”

Rick could barely maintain his composure, his head tilting at the implication of Ed’s words.

“You have a job to do. Get rid of her.”

“Now on what grounds would that be Ed?” Rick asked. His voice now a low, menacing growl. Ed’s blue eyes were bulging out of their sockets at the audacity of Rick’s question. All too familiar with her husband’s temper, Carol Peletier, placed her hands bravely onto Ed’s arm, holding him back for his own sake.

Rick scowled, frustrated at the woman’s gesture. Carol had no business protecting a man who put her in the hospital on more than one occasion. Despite their struggles, Rick couldn’t even imagine ever laying a hand on his wife. Still, despite the help offered to her, for a reason only known to her – Carol Peletier remained the dutiful wife.

It was a heartbreaking reality Rick had come to accept.

Carol’s actions worked, the brutish looking man was reminded that Rick Grimes was not a friend of his and if given the excuse, would be more than happily fire six warning shots into the thick head wearing that Braves’ baseball cap. Breathing heavily and polluting the air with whiskey fumes, Ed made his next move.

“She don’t belong here.” Ed finally spat out, unable to put things anymore delicately than that.

“She’s passing through.” Rick said firmly, his eyes unblinking and angry. He remained as calm as possible, knowing he wouldn’t have to do much when it came to Ed Peletier. Sooner or later, he’d be hauling his fat ass into that patrol car and back to the station. It was a dance that was all too familiar to the three figures standing at the doorway of the Peletier residence.

Ed was never a measured man and Rick’s challenge made him foolish enough to continue shooting his mouth off. “She’s loitering! Her and that garbage she’s pinning to our lampposts.”

Ed’s bellowing was drawing an audience from his young daughter, Sophia. The girl was the same age as Carl but with a sadness in her eyes that aged her the same way it did her mother. The shouting was enough for a curious and concerned Michonne to abandon her things, cross the street and walk towards the Peletier’s house.

“Is everything okay?” Michonne asked, politely leaning in over the fence stopping at her waist.

It was an innocent enough query and the woman never entered the property but as far as Ed was concerned she had crossed a line.

“It’s your job to do something about shit like this. Fucking negroes encroaching upon our domicile like this! Disturbing the peace! It’s not decent I tell you!”

Rick snapped at the slur. “Decent? Like your wife-beating, racist, drunken ass would know the meaning of the word!”

And that was all it took.

The situation escalated in mere minutes. Ed, ready to swing a fist at Rick, only to be intercepted by his quick thinking, self-sacrificing wife. The small woman clung onto her husband’ ham of an arm for dear life, causing him to explode in further fury and her at the receiving end of a closefisted hit from the free hand. It would have been enough to stop there, for Ed to realize he made his point as Carol fell back toward the open door, into their hallway and onto the hardwood floor – taking their poor daughter down with her. But in the eyes of Ed Peletier, any act against him was unforgivable insubordination, something he could not let go unaddressed.

Rick and Michonne were no longer on his radar.

Within seconds, he began shamelessly pounding on his wife with everything he had, completely disregarding the fact there were witnesses standing a few feet away, one of them being an officer of the law.

In between a flurry of violent, merciless kicks and punches, Ed managed to call his blameless wife a stream of obscenities, ignoring the desperate screams coming from his terrified young daughter and the shout to desist from Rick.

It took a full minute for Rick to finally pull Ed off of Carol and away from Sophia. Furious at how much damage Ed managed to inflict, Rick didn’t hold back when he had the chance, roughly shoving the bastard’s face into the gravel of the footpath outside the house. Ed struggled under Rick’s weight, choking on the stones and dirt he was getting a mouth full of. Still full of rage, he continued to make threats against his wife who was covered in red welts and bleeding from a bust lip and cut eyebrow.

Rick expected to see Michonne still standing at the gate, shell shocked at what just occurred before her or at least in angry tears at the racial slurs that were being hurled in her direction. Instead, Rick was surprised to see, she was knelt by his side, stone faced and strong – helping secure Ed as he put on the handcuffs.

She had his back during the struggle. Leaping into action the way only a trained protector would. She told him she was an art teacher, Rick thought briefly, curious to know the rest of her story once all of this was over.

Ed, unlike Rick, did not appreciate Michonne’s proximity to his sweaty, dirt covered body. Despite being cuffed and beaten, he managed to turn his head just enough to spit violently at Michonne’s chest and face.

In that moment, all Rick saw was red. His weapon was drawn in an instance and threateningly pressed against the back of Ed’s neck.

Michonne jumped up and away from Rick but he could barely register the look of shock on her face at the way events escalated. It was Sophia and Carol’s screaming, however, that he found harder to ignore.

The mother and daughter were pleading with Rick – for Ed’s life. Tears streaming from their face and their anguished cries of “Please, please, please! Jesus Christ – oh God, no please” drawing a crowd. Suddenly, the street was flooded with residents. Curious murmurs turning quickly into panic. But Rick couldn’t see the faces of the community he swore to protect. He could only hear their voices.

“Someone do something!”

“Someone call the police.”

“He is the police.”

“What is happening Honey?”

“Who is she?”

“Rick.”

Her voice, in a sea of buzzing white noise, it cut through to him and for a brief enough moment, Michonne brought him back.

Suddenly, Rick was surprised more by his own actions than the reaction of the people around him. Ed was scum but he was handcuffs. This wouldn’t be self-defense but a coldblooded murder.

“Rick.” Her voice again but this time in his own mind, gently trying to remind him of what had promised her.

He was one of the good ones.

That thought was enough to finally sober Rick’s mind. The deafening drumming inside his skull stopped, rage no longer pumping blood and adrenaline to his trigger finger. In between deep breaths he managed to calm himself enough to place the gun into its holder.

Ed, who had been as stiff as a corpse finally relaxed as Rick stood up. Carol threw herself onto her husband’s cuffed body, sobbing still, her eyes never leaving Rick – more afraid of the man protecting her than she was of the man who hurt her for years.

For a while, no one spoke. They stood there, processing what just nearly happened.

Finally, Sophia stepped forward.

“Leave.” She said looking Rick in the eye. “Before I call the police again.”

Again.

Rick couldn’t hide the surprise on his face. So it wasn’t any of the people gawking or some ignorant prejudicial neighbor from across the street who had called the station; it wasn’t even Ed, an out and proud white supremacist – it was this small, fragile, eleven years old girl.

“Please.”

She wasn’t begging him. Trembling slightly, she straightened her shoulders to face down a man with a gun, a man she admits to having called in the first place.

But why?

Rick wanted to ask, but it took a quick look at the deep purple older bruises on Carol Peletier’s exposed shoulders and the evil the mere presence Michonne had brought out in Sophia’s father, for Rick to realize the answer for himself.

She was trying to protect them, including Michonne.

The crowd was growing, neighbors having knocked on other neighbors doors regarding the drama Rick knew they deep down had been expecting – but probably with Michonne as a tragic player not a baffled bystander.

Distracted by the righteous anger beginning to bubble up inside him, Rick decided to address the prying eyes.

“Alright folks, now that Ed here’s calmed down a bit I’m sure you can all agree there are more interesting things that await you inside your own homes.”

“I think we’d just like to know what all this commotion is about Sheriff Grimes.” A familiar voice asked.

Rick felt a twitch in his neck, but replied as calmly as possible to the elderly man with questioning eyes sitting under a dark set of eyebrows and sunhat. “Ah I’m sure you all already do, Dale.”

Dale let out a sad sigh, showing some humility and awareness. Rick had run into him on previous call outs to this neighborhood. He knew the retired educator to be a good man, taking it upon himself to help out Carol on occasion - administering First Aid or giving her a car ride to the hospital. That said, the same couldn’t be said for the rest of these vultures.

“You heard me first time people. I won’t say it again. Clear out. NOW!”

Rick stared down the residents, knowing very well this would find a way of getting back to his superiors but frankly not giving a shit.

“Right now, let the officer do his job. Come now, time to get out of this heat and back to our couches.” Dale’s mild waves had the power to disperse a crowd far quicker than a water canon and Rick was grateful for the powers of the former school principal.

The elderly man was about to make his exit when Ed piped up again.

“Where you going you old Jew bastard?” He cried out, flailing on the floor like a sea lion. “You all saw what he did, he’s not a cop. He’s a thug. You’re my witness!”

“Oh Edward, you were a bully in school and you’re just a bigger one now. Don’t make things worse for yourself.” With a disapproving glare and a sigh of disgust, Dale Horvath returned to his own home, a couple doors down from the Peletiers.

Relieved the excitement was drawing to an end, Rick let out of a sigh, he turned to Michonne, who during the uproar had returned to the guarded state he met her in. She was however gently tending to Sophia, her arms protectively around the girl’s shoulders.

“You okay?” He asked and she relaxed, reassuring him with a small smile.

“You okay?” She asked him back and he did the same.

Rick then turned to the little girl in Michonne’s arms, knowing he too needed to somehow comfort her. “I’m sorry.” He told Sophia, truly meaning the words. “But I’m taking your father in. I have to and I think you agree.”

The girl glanced down at her mother’s battered body, lain over a man who continued to curse under his breath about being betrayed by his own blood.

“Mom.” She said weakly. “Please.”

When Rick began to approach Ed, Carol didn’t start up her screams in defense of her husband. Her daughter’s plea had rendered her speechless. Michonne stepped forward, carefully placing her arms around Carol’s shoulders and with gentle words coaxed her away from the toxic man she had married, instead steering her toward the daughter that needed her. The three women, then stood by, letting Rick do his job. Neither his daughter nor wife were treating Michonne with the same revulsion Ed had, instead grateful for the cover and calm she provided them with.

Rick knew it was a sight that in the future would cause daily bitterness to the prick he had just dragged up from the ground and that warmed his own heart significantly.

Heading to back to his police cruiser with Ed Peletier in tow, Rick Grimes felt a burst of optimism. Maybe things could be different in this small town full of stone throwers. Perhaps some honest to God good could be done, by those willing to commit to acting on their conscience. Something to shock the small minded, their stale sermons and suspicious stares.

Rick took one last look at the trio of women in his rear view window. The sun was almost gone, but as he drove away the white of Michonne’s blouse remained visible in the amber rays. Striking as a knight’s armor, Rick thought, affectionately thinking back to her noble quest for a lost bear.

“That bitch made the mistake of her life tonight.”

Ed Peletier said from the back of the car, spewing his hate like the last rings of smoke coming from a defeated dragon. His intoxicated, blood shot eyes reflected back at Rick’s calm blue ones but there was no need for a response as Ed slunk back into the seat looking smaller and more wretched than he’d ever looked before. Nothing but a pain parasite, severed from its source of strength.

It had finally happened.

He was finally done counting the times he had to let this man go back to hurting that family all over again.

Rick told himself this lie with little else to fear.

But with all things concerning this town of his, this job of his and this frequently disappointing life he was committed to – Rick Grimes’s optimistic outlook would be a premature one. Just over the horizon there waited the all too familiar failure of busted jaws, and broken promises.

In a month’s time they’d end up in back in this place.

And the month after that, Rick would be praying to be back here once. Back to a time where things weren’t all that bad – dealing with bruises instead of a bloated, lifeless body.

#richonne #twd #fanfiction #michonne #rick grimes

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richonnejustdesserts · 7 years

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Teacher’s Pet : A Richonne Round Robin Fanfic

A small town sheriff and preschool teacher find love thanks to the cutest little matchmaker around. [RATED: T]

Chapter 9 (written by @reciprocityfic)

Fridays were quickly becoming Rick’s favorite day of the week.

There was, of course, the ubiquitous appeal of Friday bringing the end of a long week at work, giving Rick the freedom to focus on Carl and Judith. And when the kids were with Lori, Fridays signaled the start of some often much-needed alone time.

Of course, his alone time wasn’t quite alone anymore. And Carl and Judith weren’t the only two people he got to spend extended time with over a weekend that always felt too short.

Michonne was there now, fitting into his family and his life like she was always meant to be there. And he couldn’t have been happier.

Fridays were good for many reasons, but his absolute favorite one was that Fridays always ended with Michonne.

They’d started a tradition together, even though their relationship was still relatively new. After dinner in and spending quality time with the kids playing board games or hanging out in the backyard before sending them off to bed, or going out to eat and exploring more of King County so Michonne could continue to learn more about her home on weekends they were alone, Fridays always ended with the two of them curled up on his couch watching movies.

It was easy, it was simple, and it was one of the best things in his life.

They usually only got through one movie before one or both of them couldn’t keep their eyes open anymore, but tonight they had made it to a second one. Still, Rick was having trouble focusing on the television screen, but it wasn’t because he was tired.

He couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off the woman pressed into his side.

Her hair was pulled into a high ponytail, and she’d changed out of the outfit she wore to dinner and slipped on one of his spare t-shirts and a pair of sweatpants she’d started keeping at his house for lazy nights spent in. She’d taken her contacts out and perched her glasses on her nose, and was intently concentrating on the movie before her.

He loved the gorgeous, sexy outfits she always put together for dates, but he couldn’t overstate how beautiful he found her whenever she was like this: casual, relaxed, so comfortable in his home and there with him.

It made his heart swell in his chest, and he was so lost in his thoughts that he didn’t even notice that her gaze had shifted from the movie to him.

“Are you not enjoying my movie?”

He blinked and laughed lightly when he registered the disapproving look on her face, and he wrapped his arm around her more tightly as he looked towards the television and saw a scene from The Proposal playing out onscreen.

“Romantic comedies aren’t really my thing.”

“Well, it’s what I picked. So don’t you even think about falling asleep on me. You’re going to watch it till the end even if it kills you,” she warned, turning back towards the television.

He chuckled again.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And maybe I would’ve been more open to picking something we both would’ve liked,” she continued, eyes never leaving the screen, “if you hadn’t made me watch a movie about the ghost of a dead witch chase around and kill college kids in the woods beforehand.”

“Hey, The Blair Witch Project was a defining moment for the horror genre. The found-footage filming style would’ve never caught on like it did if it wasn’t for that movie.”

“Yeah, I know, Mr. Scary Movie Aficionado. That’s the third time you’ve told me.”

He could tell she was trying to sound stern, but he could see the smile she was trying to hold back just turning up the corners of her lips.

“I’m just trying to educate you,” he defended.

“Something tells me you’re trying to use the old ‘Watch a Horror Movie With a Girl So She’ll Cuddle With You’ move.”

He let out a short laugh. He couldn’t deny that.

“Would it be so bad if I was?” he asked her.

“Nah,” she answered immediately, turning back towards him, letting her grin light up her entire face now. “I like that reason a lot.”

“Good,” he murmured, smiling at her softly before leaning down and pressing a kiss to her forehead. They both refocused their attention on the screen.

But, again, the movie couldn’t hold his thoughts for long. Barely a few minutes had passed before his eyes wandered and found her beautiful face.

He was always in awe of her, and had been since the day they’d met. Since he saw her smiling face, heard her smooth voice as she stood and addressed Judith’s classmates and their parents. But tonight, as he watched light from the tv flicker across her skin in the dim room, something overwhelmed him. Her presence filled the air around them and enveloped him in the best way. His heart pounded in his chest, and he felt words bubble to his lips.

He had the urge to swallow them down, as he had always tended to do in the past. Lori had often accused him of being too quiet, and in many instances, she was right.

He would learn from past mistakes. This was different. Michonne was different. He was determined to make it different.

“Chonne?”

“Yeah?” she murmured, eyes still trained on the tv.

He sat up and reached down to the coffee table in front of him, grabbing the remote and pausing the movie.

“Hey!” she protested immediately. “What the hell? I told you, you’re not getting out of this.”

She turned her whole body towards him, her arms crossed and her lips pressed together in a small pout. She was so adorable he almost couldn’t stifle his laugh, so he leaned in and pressed a quick kiss to her lips.

“I know,” he assured her, “and we’ll finish it. I promise. I just wanted to…talk to you about something for a little bit.”

He saw her face fall the tiniest bit, but she recovered quickly, and quirked an eyebrow at him.

“Okay, but make it quick, Grimes. We’re just getting to the good part.”

He laughed again, and his breath caught as he took her in. Once again, he was overcome. He got lost in her, so much so that he nearly forgot what he wanted to tell her.

“Rick?”

Her cautious voice pulled him from his thoughts, and when he refocused, he found that the hint of worry that had flashed across her face a few minutes ago was there again. He reached his hand out and cupped her cheek, running his thumb over her cheekbone in an attempt to reassure her.

“I like you,” he said, finally.

Her eyes warmed, and she smiled, leaning into his palm.

“I like you, too.”

A grin that matched hers took over his face automatically when he heard her words, and he took a deep breath to steady himself. To try and temper his happiness and slow his hammering heart so he could focus on what he wanted to say.

“I really like you, Michonne.”

Her smile grew, but she didn’t answer him this time. Instead, she grabbed the hand that caressed her face and brought it to rest in her lap, intertwining their fingers. She nodded gently for him to continue. She could tell that he had more.

That feeling of shyness that had always stopped him from speaking before came over him all at once, and he dropped his gaze from her face to their clasped hands. He swallowed once, and tightened his grip on her.

“I really like you. And I know it hasn’t been that long, but you fit so well here. Having you, and getting closer to you has been so natural. And I’m not just talking about Carl and Judith adjusting. I mean, they adore you, which is amazing, of course. But with me, too. I know that seems obvious, but sometimes with kids people can get so hung up on making sure they’re alright, that they can forget about the relationship they’re building. And I don’t want that to ever happen with us. I want you to know that when I say how good this is, and how happy I am, I’m not just talking about how it is with them. I’m happy with you.”

He lifted his head and captured her gaze again. Her eyes shined, and she shifted until she was on her knees. Then, she leaned forward, resting her hands on his thighs. She nodded again, urging him on.

“After Lori and I ended things, I was afraid,” he admitted. “She was all I knew, since I was a kid. And I was afraid that I’d never find anything like it again. That I didn’t know how to anymore. I wouldn’t say the right thing or look the right way or do what I was supposed to. But then I met you, and everything was so easy. Like I said, everything just fit so well.”

He paused, and brought his hands to rest on her hips, his thumb finding the hem of her shirt and dipping below it to stroke her smooth skin.

“I didn’t find what I had with Lori. It’s different than it was with her. It’s different than everything else before, but it’s a good different. And I’m not even sure I can pinpoint what exactly that difference is. I just know that it’s there. And it’s us.”

He pulled her closer to him, until she was practically sitting in his lap. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and her fingers began to fiddle with the ends of his hair.

“Rick,” she breathed.

“This is different,” he told her earnestly. “And it’s real, and it’s good, and it’s ours.”

She brought her forehead to his, resting them against each other and closing her eyes.

“It is,” she agreed.

“I’m guess what I’m trying to say is, I want this,” he told her, trying to resist the urge to kiss her. He wanted desperately to get the rest of his words out. “I know it hasn’t been that long, and it all happened kinda fast, but you’re here. And now that you’re here, I can’t imagine you not being here. I want you here, for a long time. I’ll work for it. I’ll put the time in. I’m in this, one hundred percent.”

He trailed off, his words lingering in the air. He laughed once, self-consciously.

“I just hoping you are, too.”

And she laughed this time, a sweet, soft sound that filled him from his head to his feet.

“Holy shit, Rick Grimes, do you have a way with words.”

“Well, they’re not usually my strong suit. Or so I’ve been told.”

“You must’ve picked up some skills somewhere, then,” she surmised, leaning back and running her fingers through his brown hair. A expression came over her face that almost seemed sentimental.

“You surprised me, you know.”

“Yeah?” he asked curiously.

“Yeah. Before I moved here, I had a breakup that was not fun, to say the least. It’s kind of what encouraged me to check out King County in the first place. I was going to move to the country, swear off men, and find myself. Or something like that. Then Judith Grimes walked into my classroom, and she brought you with her, and I was pretty much a goner at that point.”

He smirked, and brought his hand up to tuck a lock of her hair that had fallen out of her ponytail behind her ear.

“And to answer your question - yes, I’m in. Totally and completely. I want what you want. And I promise that someday I’ll tell you in a way that’s as beautiful as what you just told me, but right now I just want to curl up next to you and…bask in everything, if that’s alright.”

“I’d like that. Plus, we have to finish our movie,” he told her, and then leaned forward to press a slow, lingering kiss to her smiling lips. After a few, small, follow-up pecks, she shifted off of him, and returned to her original position, curled into his side and underneath his arm. He picked up the remote, but before he pressed play, he spoke.

“I’ve been meaning to ask you - how have you been feeling about King County lately? Still have that potential you were hoping for?”

He felt her laughter shake her body against his.

“I think it has a lot more than potential at this point.”

He chuckled, and pulled her closer to him as he started the movie back up.

“I do, too.”

And as the characters and stories played out on the screen before them, he savored her presence beside him. The calm and joy she’d brought to his heart and his life.

Eventually, his eyelids grew heavy, as he was lulled by the comfort of being with her. When they started to close, he snapped them open and blinked heavily a few times before glancing sideways to see if she’d caught him.

He found her fast asleep as she leaned her head against his shoulder.

He smiled, stifling his laugh so he didn’t wake her. He took in her endearing, gorgeous, sleeping form and let it fill his heart, before plucking her glasses off her face. He placed them on the table in front of them and then grabbed the blanket resting on the arm of the couch, draping it over them. He stopped the movie, and turned off the television.

Darkness engulfed the room, and he closed his eyes, leaning his head against the back of the couch and falling asleep with Michonne in his arms.

Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 |

#author: reciprocityfic #richonne #richonne fanfiction #richonne round robin #teacher's pet #rjd writing network #rick grimes #michonne #carl grimes #judith grimes #grimes family 2.0

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ellana-ravenwood · 7 years

Text

Dating Daryl Dixon would include...

As I’m broadening my horizon beyond Marvel and DC stuffs, here’s some “The Walking Dead” things ! Daryl Dixon’s relationship headcanons, hope you’ll like it, and if you want more, don’t hesitate to ask yo :

You can find my masterlist here : @ella-ravenwood-archives

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How you met, falling in love, and the first “I love you” :

✶ You were in Atlanta with your family when the zombie outbreak truly started, and barely managed to leave the center of the city in one piece, loosing everyone you ever loved...But at the time, you were too shocked to realize it.

✶ You ended up in a forrest nearby...and that’s when you met him.

✶ He was hunting with his brother, and at first, thought you were completely nuts. “Zombies ? This gal’s crazy or something”.

✶ Quickly though, the reality of what’s happening reaches the three of you, and you end up tagging along with them.

✶ It helps that you know how to fend for yourself, how to shoot a gun/crossbow/bow with great accuracy (your father used to take you on hunting trips often). You’re pretty sure they would have left you behind if you were completely useless.

✶ You’re wrong though, it’s not like Daryl to abandon people behind. Not like him at all. And though Merle is a rough man, it’s not actually his thing either, though he’d never admit it.

✶ When they ask about who taught you to shoot, you talk about your father, and even though you try to hold your tears in...You break down. Finally realizing you lost all your family in Atlanta.

✶ “What about friends ? / I don’t have friends”, you tell him. He understands. Besides his brother, he has no one. As your tears run freely, he comforts you the best he can. Not good with words. So he awkwardly pats you on your back, until you burry yourself in his arms. And he lets you do it.

✶ He doesn’t speak much at first. But whenever Merle is away, he’s more open, and conversation always seem to flow easily between the two of you.

✶ He feels weird. He never felt the way he feels when he’s around you before. It was easy to become your friend. It’s easy to talk to you. He doesn’t mind spending hours just sitting next to you, not saying anything. It’s just weird for him, to get attach so fast to someone he knows since only a few weeks.

✶ He knows he’s screwed because the weird feelings he’s been having is love when you, him and his brother meet a group of survivors lead by a certain “Shane”, and he doesn’t like the way that guy looks at you.

✶ His brother teases him about you, not thinking he’s actually right. Until he realizes that yes, his little brother has a thing for you. More than a thing. And then he teases him even more.

✶ You’re too afraid to tell him you feel the same thing about him because...well, sometimes he’s just kind of an asshole to you, so he can’t possibly like you back ? You didn’t realized that he was an ass only when Merle was around.

✶ The day his brother dies, you give him a shoulder to cry on, and comfort him just like he comforted you months ago when you realized your entire family was dead. Only, you’re good with words, and thanks to you, for the first time in his life, he feels completely free, relieved, of any pain and suffering.

✶ That night, he tells you about the abuse he suffered from when he was a kid, from his parents, and the one from his brother though he loved the damn fucker...and you suddenly understand. You understand everything.

✶ “I’m here for you Daryl, and I don’t intend on going anywhere and I”...You don’t even have time to finish your sentence that his lips are on yours.

✶ Never did he do something that felt so right. Kissing you just seemed so natural, as if he was made to do it.

✶ For a second, you don’t respond and his heart drops...until your tongue demands passage in his mouth and oh damn is he dead too, and is he in Heaven right now ? It surely feels like it.

✶ You guys don’t say “I love you” just yet though. You’re already both freaked out that you got attached so fast...Besides, the World you’re living in now doesn’t really give much time for romantic shit.

✶ From that time and on, you guys stick around each other, and everyone know you’re together, but Hell they wouldn’t ever talk about it. They ignore you slipping in his tent at night when you think they’re all asleep, or him rushing out of yours early in the morning, before anyone is awake (or so he thinks). You guys want to keep it private ? Then so be it.

✶ He finally tells you “I love you” after his desperate search for Sophia, Carol’s daughter. Because he realized, when that little girl walked out of Hershel’s farm zombified (dead), that there was no time to waste. Life was too short, even more now in that fucked up world. So : “I love you (Y/N)”, he says, over and over again, as you hug his tired and wounded self. “I love you (Y/N)” he says, over and over again, not letting you go, kissing you all over. There’s no time to waste indeed, and if you guys love each other, why keep it a secret ? “I love you too Daryl”.

Actual Relationship headcanons :

✶ When you’re cold, you can be sure that his leather jacket is gonna end up on your shoulder. He can’t have you get cold. If you’re in public and he’s in a good mood, he’ll let you cuddle against him for more warmth, but more often than not, will just throw his jacket over your shoulders, and wait until you two are alone to cuddle.

✶ Not a fan of PDA, at all, as stated before. But there’s some occasions, when one of you almost died, or when a friend of yours die, where you’ll stay closer from each other. Where he’ll kiss you sweetly not caring about wether people watch or not. It’s rare, but it happens.

✶ Going on random (and dangerous really) motorcycle rides. You two always use the “we’ll go look for more supplies” as an excuse to go...And end up making love to each other in a place Daryl deems “safe” (he’d never put your life in danger).

✶ He’s incredibly jealous, especially towards Rick, even though he’s clearly just a friend, someone you consider your brother.

✶ It’s ok though, because sometimes, you’re jealous of Carol, whom he’s been close to ever since he looked for Sophia. Even though there’s nothing between them but brotherly/sisterly love too.

✶ He’ll always stick up for you, even if you’re wrong. He’ll defend you to the death.

✶ Him getting “pissed” when you make stupid jokes and puns, acting as if he’s annoyed when you’re cheery even though you’re all in a shit situation...but deep down, loving the way you brighten up his world.

✶ He’ll die for you. And hates when you take stupid risks.

✶Literally all your arguments start because you did something stupidly risky to save a friend or something, and he can’t loose you.

✶ Make-up sex.

✶ You two can hold a conversation by just waving your hands around, and looking at each other. Comes in handy when you need to be stealthy. Freaks everyone else out because “How ?!”.

✶ Him loving when you run your hand through his hair. But hating when you tie said hair in a bun. He looks ridiculous, with a bun...

✶ Pet names that are both cute, but also kinda rude “Love you, asshat”, “Love you too jerkbucket” and other “fartface” or “douchetruck”...it seems weird to others, but you guys like that better than “princess” “babe”, “handsome”...it’s like your inside joke, but also, it’s actually really loving. Pet names.

✶ Being the only person he ever loved. So much it hurts.

✶ Stupid arguments sometimes, because he’s emotionally retarded and doesn't know how to tell you certain things, which frustrates you.

✶ When he does talk to you though, your heart sings. For him to trust you that much...it means a lot. You gotta be careful in moments like this though, he can be open one time, and then if you say or do something “wrong”, close himself completely for a long time.

✶ Knuckle, forehead, neck, cheek kisses. So much of it.

✶ You almost dying of cuteness when he harshly shoves some flowers in your face. “Picked them up on my way when I was hunting. They made me think of you”. Oh my God. So. Damn. Cute.

✶ Making sure you feel safe. And you feeling actually safe only when he’s around. You hate to be separated, even though sometimes it needs to be done.

✶ Sharing a cigarett or a beer, just the two of you, somewhere far from any of your friends. You guys need some times alone, some privacy...and don’t mind being “alone together”.

✶ Sweet and/or rough sex, depends on the mood, but it happens whenever you get some time alone. It’s difficult to find time to actually have sex in this zombie outbreak world, so when you guys do, you make it count. Oh yes.

✶ “A little foreplay goes a long way”.

✶ He’s bad with words, and rarely says “I love you” (that one night after trying to save Sophia being the only exception)...but every single of his action conveys all his emotions. Conveys what he feels for you. Wether it’s a hug, a kiss, or making love. He tries to make sure you know what you mean to him, but really, he doesn’t have to try hard, just looking into his eyes proves to you how much he loves you. There’s that tint in it whenever you’re around...

✶ He always gives you the best piece of food he brings home. But you always end up giving it to someone else, because “they need it more than you”. Bullshit. No one deserves the best but you...

✶ Always watches over you, even when you think you’re alone. Just in case a walker would surprise you you know ? Or something worst : an ill intentioned man. There’s a lot of those nowadays.

✶ Since he admitted his feelings to you, he cannot fall asleep without you around. Without touching you in some way. You can’t either.

✶ His abused past-self sometimes coming back in moments of doubts, sadness and fear, and him letting his tears go just with you.

✶ “Daryl will be fine, just let me talk to him guys” you tell your friends, as you join your boyfriend who hid somewhere, and you find him curled up in a foetus position, shaking...Only you can bring him back.

✶ At some points, he realizes he cannot live without you anymore, and that freaks him out...but then you snuggle against him, you’re in his arms, and he forgets all his worries. You’re not going anywhere, you already told him.

✶ Him often wishing the World didn’t go that much to shit, because otherwise, he would marry the hell out of you. But you guys don’t have time for a stupid wedding...

✶ He also wants children, but cannot bring himself to “force” a kid to live a life where he’ll have to survive more than just live...Maybe one day, if things get better ?

✶ He almost thought things would get better at the prison. There was a life being built there, maybe one where children would have their place. But then the Governor had to come and fuck everything up. So he fucked his tank up.

✶ You and him talking about this impossible future. Marriage, children, a house, dogs, living in a peaceful countryside...

✶ It makes you sad sometimes, to know all of this is impossible...But as long as he’s with you, it doesn’t even matter that it probably will never happen. As long as he’s with you, everything’s good. He’s enough for your happiness, and your enough for his. Just you. Just him.

If you die (which is likely in a zombie filled world) :

✶ He’s devastated. Even more if you turn into a zombie, because he feels like he HAS TO give you the kill shot...

✶ He buries you in a nice place, a place he knows you’d love. Makes sure nothing can ever disturb your peace.

✶ Leaves the group for a while, walks aimlessly around, killing any zombies or whatever hostile in his way.

✶ Thinks about ending his life...But then he realizes that’s not what you’d want him to do.

✶ You’d want him to fight. To keep living. To move on.

✶ Eventually, he does move on, but never loves one like you. In fact, he never have another relationship. Friends, yes. But love is gone in the tomb with you.

✶ Him burning candles on each anniversary of your death. He cannot forget you, and actually fully “moving on” is impossible. He’s always sad when he wakes up from a dream where you were in...

✶ He’ll forever feel guilty that he wasn’t able to protect you.

✶ You believed in an afterlife, and every day, he wishes that, the day he’ll die to, you’ll be there, waiting for him...

#Daryl Dixon x reader #daryl dixon x you #Daryl Dixon imagine #The Walking Dead imagine #The Walking Dead reader insert #Daryl Dixon reader insert #TDW imagine #The Walking Dead fanfic #TDW fanfiction #Daryl Dixon headcanon #Daryl Dixon headcanons #TDW headcanon #TDW headcanons #The Walking Dead headcanon #The Walking Dead headcanons

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false-majesty · 7 years

Text

So I’ve seen this one certain meme floating around on my dash, and I thought I might respond to it in one big post and tag all the people who reblogged it (and a few who didn’t).

And so, without further adieu, here’s Aku’s reactions to the deaths of a few people he knows...

Cut for length, graphic violence, and disturbing content. I listened to x x and x while writing this. ;)

Ashi | @tigersteeth

He’d think he could have been there sooner and how he could have protected her; about how he knew Ashi hated him at the start but then eventually came to love him back. And most of all he would think about how she had been right to be wary of him; first he had bitten her, and then he had let her get killed.

And of course, with these thoughts he’d soon be filled with cold fury and determination to set things right. And naturally, with his logic, what else should that entail but a killing spree.

He’d kill the murderer’s loved ones methodically and slowly, and perhaps might even go so far as to present little ‘keepsakes’ of the loved ones—a body part or piece of jewelry, perhaps—for each one that he killed; pushing the murderer ever closer to the brink of insanity just to show them how it felt to lose someone important in their life. And depending on how successful he is at getting them to lose their mind, he might or might not kill them last, making sure they get to see the look in his eyes when he does it...

But when things have finally been paid for in blood, Aku would likely be very cold and professional for a while afterward--years even.

He would be more foul tempered, impatient, callous, and withdrawn; deliberately not letting anyone see how his daughter’s death has affected him. He’d pour his anger into conquering planets and broadening his empire, crushing innocents beneath his heel and curbing revolutions before they even have a chance to start.

To outsiders, this would appear to be something of a reawakening—like watching a dormant monster rise from its own ashes or perhaps a very long slumber only to wreak havoc on an unsuspecting world that had grown fat and sloven with peace.

But when he’s alone, when the nights are cold and long, Aku would probably catch himself thinking about her more often than he’d care to admit.

There would be a statue in her likeness erected alongside his own in the gardens of his citadel and in a few of his major cities.

Rick | @therealricksanchezpleasestandup

If Rick were to die at this particular moment in their canon relationship, when he and Aku are only just now starting to get close to one another:

He would be numb for all of a few seconds as he knelt beside the body and tried to grasp at the fact that Rick was really dead. He’d probably nudge him, trying to make him get up, would check all his vitals, and would yell at him. Anything to get him to wake up.

But when all that fails, he would stand slowly, agonizingly, and turn to face the murderer—madness and revenge burning hot and unmistakable in his eyes as he rounded upon them and would then utterly obliterate them in a tornado of fury—painting their gore on the walls, on the ceiling, and on himself, yet not stopping even when they were obviously dead.

After the fact, he would make suitable arrangements for Rick’s funeral in Aku’s dimension or would probably find some way to contact C-137 Earth to tell his family the news that Rick was dead. Might even be so considerate as to ask about Rick’s friends and deliver the news to them if he could.

But after that, Aku would likely back out of the proceedings; choosing instead to isolate himself—either in his quarters or some other scenic location where he might be able to think—so he could come to better terms with what had happened.

He would alternate between bouts of anger and grief in equal intensity for some time afterward; just thinking about how he not-so-secretly liked him—(could probably have come to love him, if they had been given more time together)—and how Rick was just starting to show signs that he was equally interested. Would probably think about their history as friends (and how Rick was the only real friend he’d probably ever had in his life) and all the time they had spent with one another...

...Would think about saving Rick from himself that one night he had found him on the brink of alcohol poisoning. Would think about sitting beside Rick on the couch watching tv and laughing. Would think about their first adventure when he had saved Rick from the falling rubble of a foreign empire they had worked to destroy...

And at that point he’d likely start to blame himself for Rick’s death and would start to think that his (Aku’s) being hated by the universe had somehow doomed his best friend to a premature death because of mere association. He’d reflect on the fact that bad things always seem to befall those who would get close to him. Especially those that he cares about.

Probably thinks to himself that he might have loved him after all.

He’d be numb and professional for a few years afterward. Not letting himself talk to anyone outside of a professional setting and definitely not letting himself EVER become fond of anyone else the way he had with Rick. He would probably even push away his own daughter for the most part, as he wouldn’t want her to see him so weak and he definitely doesn’t want her to befall the same fate as Rick. Hell, he might even push away Morty and Beth and Summer too if they should try and speak to him about all that happened.

After he’s had some time to come to terms with his grief, he’s probably only a shell of his former self. All kindness and light that knowing Rick had nurtured in him would be dulled so much it’s pretty much nonexistent. At which point he would resume his role as a tyrannical overlord with renewed fervor—conquering planets that had previously given him a hard time simply out of sheer blind frustration.

And why not? He has no other purpose. Nothing else to distract him from the cold reality of what happened.

Visitors to his citadel would ask around about the statue of the scientist erected in the courtyard alongside Aku’s own, and legends would begin to circulate that long ago the tyrant had once felt kindness and love for another...

If Rick were to die during our Fourth Wall Verse (a skype exclusive event, in which Rick and Aku react to the events of canon and love on each other behind the scenes—or are married already):

( We’ve already talked about what would happen, but I’ll pretty much recap a modified version of our conversation since the others don’t know. )

He would go on a blitzkrieg of worlds in his grief, probably annihilating over half of his quadrant before the other gods finally got tired of his senseless violence and would lock him away in the Godly equivalent of a padded room.

After a while of suffering with his memories of Rick, Aku would probably try to beg death from the other gods if only so he could see Rick again and tell him he loved him at least one last time. But the other gods would likely see a better punishment in keeping him alive, to let him think about what he’s done and to let him experience loss like the people who had lost their loved ones through Aku’s actions. However, this plan would backfire because Aku would probably sleep himself into oblivion rather than stay awake and deal with the presence and torment of the other Gods-- as he sees no other reason to be awake, yet alone alive.

At which point he’d have vivid nightmares of Rick’s death and how he hadn’t been there in time to save him; he would dream of Ashi and how she would die a mortal’s death without Aku there to augment her lifespan using his magic; and finally, he might even dream of the sword coming back from wherever it had been hidden and finishing its purpose killing him off.

But instead of shying away from this last dream, he would welcome it; because death would be preferable to living without Rick.

Other than that, he’d probably sleep himself until the end of time.

And why not? He doesn’t have a reason to be awake anymore.

Azura | @curioosity

At the news of her death he’d probably get really quiet, and would ask anyone in the room to leave. At which point he would take out that puppet that Azura gave him and he’d stare at it long and hard, trying to figure out what this strange feeling is that’s trying to creep into his mood (hint, it’s sadness) but he’d probably furrow his brow and incinerate the puppet then and there so he wouldn’t think about her anymore as he recognized the feeling as being something mortal and therefore malignant to his very nature.

He would then dismiss her and her memory from his mind—lest he should become fond of her in her absence--and life would continue as usual as if nothing had changed.

And for Aku? It’s true. Nothing changed at all.

Ryou | @sonxflight

He knows he should be relieved when he finally hears word of his prince’s death, for this not only explains the piercing pain he felt shooting through his chest out of the blue some hours ago-- Ryou’s presence and blood magic leaving him-- but this also means that he can safely go about destroying worlds and empires as he had been meaning to for centuries.

But instead all he feels is numb. He finds himself thinking that he misses him despite their many differences, and that Ryou was his only friend. The only one who understood what it was like to live for so long and watch the world turn around you while you remained unaffected.

Thus, long after the funeral is over and everyone else has moved on, the demon would find himself kneeling at the gravesite just staring at his beloved’s tombstone. Probably lays a hand on it and finally his restraint just snaps and he bows his head and weeps because yes he did love him in life, that although Ryou may have held him to mortal limitations by summoning him out of the darkness the way he had, but he was still his husband-- had still shown him love and compassion when no one else would...

And although he can safely allow Ryou’s empire to spiral into ruin, he keeps it safe anyway. In loving memory of his husband.

Jack | @alwaysfindaway

Before they come to have feelings for one another (ie. their relationship in canon):

Aku would make an example out of the samurai’s death. Posting video and picture evidence of it across all his social media regardless of what women or children might see it as he plastered graphic images of it on billboards and advertisements worldwide; leaving no doubt that this world is once more doomed to the jaws of the beast.

He’d be filled with a curious sense of peace, knowing he doesn’t have anything to worry about anymore as he (undoubtedly) would have hid the sword away in the core of some planet (or sun) whose location was known only to him.

Slowly, rebellion leaders would be picked off and assassinated without the samurai there to defend them, and uprisings would gradually trickle to a standstill while the demon’s scourge slowly siezed the cosmos in terror.

Every year on the anniversary of the samurai’s death--a national holiday--the world grieves for their fallen hero less and less as the years go by, until eventually his memory is regarded akin to a fairy tale.

And still the demon lives on, growing lazy and arrogant and careless as the world withers beneath his claws...

After they come to have feelings for one another:

For a while all he feels in confusion.

On the one hand, he knows he should be happy the samurai is dead, for this had been his goal for so long that to feel otherwise is simply alien. But on the other, he had come to have some marginal fondness for him while they had traveled together. Indeed, he had found his company pleasant and had found his presence soothing-- towards the later half of their time together, anyway.

He’d find himself recalling the nights they had slept beneath the stars, when Jack had not yet known his identity, and how it had felt to hold him as he had never held anyone before or would ever after...

But he’d push these thoughts aside and force himself through the motions of being cruel and victorious in the light of his death, and few would be the wiser for his somehow strained behavior.

After enough time passes, he would slowly come to push his memory aside-- in the hopes that he never fondly recalls the samurai again...

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rockerrick-555p · 7 years

Text

Imapasse

{I finally got the strength to pull the hardest scene I’ve ever written. Rocker leaving the lair and the Time Apart starting.. god the feels here kill me, can’t read it without crying. This beautiful ship! Under a cut for length }

Collar pulled tightly around his neck, a furious rock star stormed away from the random meeting with an alternative. He grit his teeth and had his fists bunched in his pockets. If he didn’t find something to do with all this aggression soon he was going to combust, he was sure of it. He’d been angry before, hurt before, but never like this. I’m not going to take him away.. “Psh” he scoffed out loud to Sigma’s words circling in his head as he stopped to light a cigarette “you can’t take what’s already been taken.”

He studied the glowing end of the cylinder as he stood under a street light trying to decided where to go. He couldn’t stand to be in the lair, or even his penthouse these days, he’d been avoiding those places as much as he’d been avoiding a brooding truth in his mind. It’s why he’d just stumbled upon Sigma to begin with. He felt like he’d been aimlessly wandering the multi-verse for days. His attention shifted from the end of the cigarette to his trembling hand and he placed the butt in his mouth to better look at his palm, massaging his opposite thumb into it. He was malnourished, but he wasn’t shaking from low blood sugar, he was shaking with fury and the anticipation of being on the brink of doing something drastic, unexpected and devastating.

Rocker closed his fist, clamping it tight so his nails dug into his skin before setting his resolve. It was now or never. Dropping the cigarette he shot open a void and stepped through into the lair instantly hating how it already no longer felt like home. He wandered the familiar corridors until he found the old man and pushed his way into the lab “Rick?” He started, thankful he voice wasn’t shaking as much as the rest of him “We need to talk.”

==============================================================

Evil Rick was sat at his work station a cup of black coffee clutched in his hands, a half-lit cigarette hanging from his lips. He’d been drinking too much recently and while he normally managed to live quite amicably with his alcoholism, over the past couple of weeks it had been too much for too long and it was time to detox, not completely of course, but even to cut down a little would do him some good. He wasn’t a young man anymore and constantly drinking and smoking for days on end had made his chest heavy and his nerves frayed.

His desk was littered with an arrangement of overfilled ashtrays and weapons schematics, but he hadn’t touched the drawings for hours, he couldn’t work, he lacked the concentration and the lab, the largest room in the base, somehow felt too big, empty even, inhospitable and sterile. He’d never felt this way about his home before and he badly wanted the feeling to pass. He’d barely seen Rick over the past few days and gradually he was becoming convinced that things were far worse than he’d originally suspected. His encounter with Sigma had proved it, his old ex had twisted out of the woodwork to profess his love and Rick had not reacted at all; the lack of reaction told him everything he needed and yet didn’t want to know.

Hearing Rick’s voice he looked up at set eyes on the kid, immediately observing the state he was in, he didn’t look like he’d been eating properly, the old man could tell, Christ, the kid looked like a damn ghost of himself.

“Then talk.” He replied setting down his mug of coffee and relighting his cigarette. He had no idea what was coming, but already he felt like it wasn’t going to be good and was mentally preparing himself for the worst.

==============================================================

Goddamit this was why he’d been avoiding this. Just the sight of the old man tired and worn, the sound of his gruff voice, made Rocker want to run to him, put his head in his lap and ignore everything else. He closed his eyes to shut out some of the unwelcome feelings. He had to stop thinking that way, stop feeling these things. He’d chosen a path and he needed to stay on it.

Clearing his throat he took a deep breath, he’d came here to get this out right? Why then now could he not find the words to say it. “This.. “ he started, opening his eyes again to look at Evil Rick, his heart breaking. Was this going to be the last time they spoke to each other? “This isn’t working. You being with me and .. and .. him.” He couldn’t say Bill’s name, the four letters had become taboo for him, the demon, whether intentional or not, being the reason his life had unraveled. His hands bunched back up into fists the more he thought about it. “You’re asking me to do something that goes against my nature, goes against every single fucking thing I have worked and suffered for since you first claimed me. You’re asking me to be someone I’m not.”

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As he watched the kid take a deep, self-centring breath he instantly knew Rick was working himself up to something, the tension in the room was utterly palpable. It had taken only that one tense breath to immediately put him on high alert and in response he rose out of his chair to lean against his workbench, taking a moment to grind out his cigarette before he turned his full attention back towards the boy.

This isn’t working.

The words were so final and in truth he hadn’t prepared himself for them. He knew Rick was having trouble with this, of course he did, but he hadn’t expected him to come out with something that sounded so fatalistic. He stood dumbfounded for a moment, unsure how to react, putting all his efforts into keeping down the walls that were desperate to erect and protect him from any pain. His need to blame the boy flared inside him, a wholly protective measure, but he couldn’t allow himself to project it onto Rick in order to spare himself. This was his own damn mess, he was responsible for it all.

“I’m not asking you to be…” He paused and pinched the bridge of his nose as his stomach curdled with fast onset nausea. He couldn’t give Rick what he wanted and that was what he was going to be forced to tell him, but he didn’t want to say the words.

“Is it that difficult for you to share some small part of me, can’t you just…don’t we…don’t I mean enough to you for you to even try?”

The minute the words left his mouth he realized he wasn’t off to a good start and all attempts not to put the ball directly back into the boy’s court had failed. But his pockets were empty he had nothing to offer here, no concession to make, no direction to turn, he’d made his decision, he wouldn’t be without Bill again.

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“TRY!?” He snapped, angry quickly flooding his system. “After everything RICK! I have defended my claim over you for what feels like forever, cut down dozens for just looking at you the wrong way and suddenly I’m supposed to try and stop?! What’s the fucking point anyway? What the hell do you need me for when you’ve got him and forty fucking years together? Eh? Try! Why don’t you fucking try.. ” This was pointless. The old man had made his choice, he was never going to pick Rocker over Bill. Why would he.

“SMALL!” Fucks sake, he’d seen their texts, in a few short weeks Bill had already told the old man he loved him more than Rocker had in a year. Small his fucking ass. “It’s entirely the other way around.” What he had with Rick was small in comparison to what Rick had with Bill, it always would be. He was fuming at this point “Ask yourself the same question Rick and you’ll have your answer. You would NEVER be able to share some small part of me. Better to push me away and make me leave, so you can be rid of me once and for all and not be plagued with the guilt because I left you, just like everyone else. Evil Rick can do no wrong, no. Everything is always everyone else’s fucking problem, everyone else’s fault.” He fumbled through his pockets, angrily searching for his cigarettes before stopping to point back at the old man venomously.

“And don’t you fucking dare insinuate that I don’t love you completely, that every shred of my being exists to love you, you.. you peice of shit. Throwing everything we’ve built together away on a goddamned cock driven whim. You mean everything to me, no one is a devoted to you as I am, without you I will be nothing. But I refuse to share the spotlight with anyone.”

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He stood in silence are he bore witness to the angry tirade pouring out of the boy, a fierce diatribe of accusations, disappointments and betrayals, all of it Evil Rick’s fault, some true, some wildly unrepresentative.

“It’s not the other way around, I….” The boy cut in and he became quiet once more, determined to allow him this, determined to allow Rick to say his piece. The use of the word ‘spotlight’ nearly forced from him an angry tirade of his own, but he pushed the compulsion down, reminding himself that Rick would always view things in such narrow terms, even if he encouraged him not to.

“You’re right.” He admitted with a culpable sigh. “I would never have accepted this from you.” It was something they both knew, what was the point in denying it. “But I am not trying to push you away and this was not some cock driven whim, Rick, this was one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever been forced to make.” He held the boy’s furious gaze with an expression of apology, despite the fact one hadn’t been uttered.

“I love you more than you’ll ever understand…” He paused and took in a slow heavy breath as his eyes lowered to hide from the boy’s condemning glare, he felt like the floor was tilting underneath his feet. “I know what you want Rick but I can’t, don’t you see, I can’t give it to you.”

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“Bull fucking shit !” He stormed several steps forward ready to smack the old man “I was down the goddamned hall when it happened Rick. The two of you just snapped your fingers and made this all happen because you missed the taste of each other. You didn’t sit down and weigh the options and make some tough decisions! It just happened like that..” he snapped in Rick’s face “And it is on a whim because you’re throwing away something solid and true for something broken and eventually, because it’s going to happen, eventually when you and Bill fucking blow apart again this time ! This time you’re going to be all by your miserable fucking self.” He prodded Rick in the chest as he said it.

He turned away, breathing deep through his nose trying to push back his desire to strangle Evil Rick. Hearing him say he loved him pulled at his heart and hurt, it hurt so fucking bad. “Right.” He turned back to the old man “You can give Bill what he wants, but not me. See? You’ve made your fucking choice.” He glared at Rick before a burst of panic erupted inside him. Fuckin Christ was this really happening ?! He threw his arms out, pleading to the ceiling. “Even now! RIght here, in the face of my walking out you’re not doing anything to fucking keep me here!!”

He dropped his arms and looked helpless and defeated standing alone in the bright white lab across from the man he loved more than anything in existence, more than his own life having no idea how to live with this or live without him. He was completely at an impasse. “You know what I want? I want you to act like you fucking care. Like you give a damn that you’re about to lose me forever. That you’re not completely and 100 percent Bills and there’s anything in there all all that still loves me. Do anything to convince me it’s worth it, that it’s even fucking possible.”

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The kid’s level of aggression was rising and in response Evil Rick started to feel himself growing equally furious, a cold rage spreading over him, one that could not be quelled by the knowledge he was the one in the wrong. The interaction had all the quality of attack and that was how he was starting to react to it. Rick was continuing to make it sound like this decision had been easy for him, like Bill had snapped his fucking fingers and he’d come running like a reclaimed fucking lapdog. It was fucking insulting, did the kid really value what they had so little that he imagined the old man could ever just throw it all away on a fucking whim? Was his love really that easy and superficial to dismiss?

As Rick stepped forward to prod him in the chest and tell him he was going to end up on his own, he closed his eyes, forced to breathe deeply before he lost all semblance of calm. This kid…that’s what he fucking was, a kid, he had no idea what it felt like to spend the majority of your life, decades believing that was exactly what was going to fucking happen. The idea of living and dying, miserable, bitter and alone wasn’t something that phased him, sure he’d been on and off with Bill for decades but the majority of his life he’d spent single and alone. He’d never been married and he’d never lived with anyone for any significant period of time with the exception of Morty, another person who had sought fit to abandon him. Didn’t they all in the end.

“I can give Bill what he wants because he’s willing to accept I want to be with you, live with you, stay married to fucking you!” It was only when he heard the echo of his own voice that he realized he was shouting. “What you want, me without him, I can’t…I can’t give that to you, that…that is the fucking difference Rick.”

Hearing the boy protest that he was not even trying to keep him from leaving was the straw that broke the camels back, the accusation hurt more than any of the others and broke him.

“Of course I fucking care, look, look at the fucking state of me, how dare….how can you possibly think I don’t fucking care? What…what the fuck is it you expect me to do huh? Hug you and tell you it’s going to be alright? Threaten to kill you if you leave me. Knock you out and chain you up….tell you I can’t live without you, beg you not to go?” He rubbed his hands down his face releasing a loud groan as a stark desperation took hold. “What will that change Rick, what will any of it change….” He stretched out his arm to point directly at Rick, his burgeoning distress written all over his face. “You, you’re the one giving up on us, not me, that, that’s what this is all about, if you can’t have me to yourself you don’t want me at all!”

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“Well any of those would be a fucking start!” He stormed over to the cabinet and yanked out a fresh carton of cigarettes giving up on trying to find any in his pockets. He tore at the package sending smaller packs everywhere and eventually, finally getting one of the damned cylinders to his mouth. He inhaled deeply, exhaling the smoke through his nose. “For christ sake Rick..” He started, his tone much softer the nicotine pushing back the more violent anger “I thought I was yours. I thought there was no lengths you would go through to keep me.” He put his hands up silencing the old man before he retorted “And enough I get it, you’re not leaving Bill. You can stop shoving it in my fucking face that what you have with bill is unbreakable. I fucking get it.”

He sighed and leaned his head back looking at the ceiling “It would change the empty feeling in my chest telling me you only want Bill. It would make me feel like you weren’t just packing my bags and helping me leave so he can come take my place.” He righted his head and looked back at Rick “It would remind me that I even have a place for you to shove me back into it.” He dragged on the cigarette again “That’s the whole point Rick. You’re not trying to change anything about how I feel. You’re just letting me feel it, letting me fester.” As usual the old man had worked his way in and cracked his resolve. He wasn’t giving up on them, that’s not what this was. This was acceptance, acceptance that he no longer belonged. Rick didn’t want him as he was, he wanted a compromised version that could accept sharing, something he’d never done in his life. “Of course I fucking want you! Jesus Christ that’s what I’ve been saying all this time. I fucking want you! I want us ! I want shit to feel as it did! But I don’t feel like you’re mine anymore Rick! Or that I’m yours..” he added in an undertone.

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“I’m not shoving my relationship with Bill in your face kid, I never have.” He sighed with frustration and watched the boy smoke his cigarette before deciding he needed one of his own. Rick had gone to great lengths to get his own packet, clearly reluctant to take one from the old man’s pack. He was fully aware Rick had taken to smoking cloves again since the incident with Bill, it was as if Rick couldn’t bear to be reminded of both him and his brand. It was such a small and insignificant thing really but right now, in this moment, it didn’t feel small at all.

“That empty feeling in your chest Rick, yes, I put it there, but you’re the one that has chosen to interpret it to mean I am replacing you.” He took a long drag on his cigarette as his mood and his outlook started to dull with his growing sense of defeat. “I have done nothing Rick, said nothing to remotely suggest that.” His words were said sharp and clear, stripped of emotion and embedded in logic; he was trying to distance himself from a situation that he could feel was about to crush him.

“How can I change what you feel? You, you’re the one feeling it, you’re the one that fucking waltzed in here and announced that you were leaving me and then demanded, fucking demanded that I convince you to stay.” There was a bitter cadence to his voice which suggested he was already beginning to resent Rick for it. “If you tell me exactly what you want me to do, and exactly what you expect me to say and then I just fucking do it, how, how does that solve anything huh? Fuck sake you-you wouldn’t believe me anyway, would you?”

He steadied himself again his workbench as he listened to Rick talk about how he wanted things to go back to the way they were. “How can shit feel as it did, if shit has changed Rick, huh?” He crossed the floor to approach the boy, clearly once more becoming incapable of favouring logic over emotion.

“I know exactly what it feels like to yearn for something to be what it once was, to grieve for a return to a state of affairs that can never be again and all it does Rick, all it does is fucking destroy you. Things, things aren’t the fucking same, things have changed.” Rubbing his hand across his forehead with a frustrated huff he ground out his cigarette under his shoe. He felt a compulsion to touch the kid’s shoulder but the distance between them felt too great and so he stayed where he was, unable to move back or forward. “You will always be mine, even if you leave that will always be the truth.” He raised his head to capture the boy’s gaze, his inner torment painfully visible in his old eyes.. “But I can’t make you believe I am yours Rick, you have to feel it and if you don’t feel it, well….” The sentence hung in the air as if undeserving of an ending. “…then you have a decision to make, don’t you kid?”

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“Psh” he scoffed. He knew he was dwelling on it, it was him that kept bringing this shit up. If he could stop then the old man wouldn’t have to keep telling him how goddamned special Bill is. He sighed again, trying to hold onto Rick’s words from a moment ago, I love you more than you’ll ever understand.. why had it changed to a fatherly love? He felt like Rick was directing all his passion to Bill and Rocker was getting reminders of lessons and directions to continue working on taking the old man’s place. A sensation that was amplified by the fact that the old man was blatantly refusing to even touch him.

He held his tongue and listened to Rick, shit had changed, he was right. So was this to be what their relationship would be now? Cold glances and so much distance? He was a physical person, he thrived off contact, small touches and tiny grazings meaning the world to him. It was why he always portaled into the lab just for a kiss or to briefly rub the old man’s shoulders while he was working. He needed it to feel connected to Rick, and this.. this expansive emptiness that just kept getting wider and wider wasn’t helping anything.

The smallest amount of hope filled his eyes as Rick crossed the room, daring to allow himself to believe the old man was about to pull him to him, only for him to stop short. Not even an arm’s distance away, fuck that ached. He sucked back the pain and looked away from the emotion he saw mirrored in the old man’s eyes, trying to keep him composure and hold back the tears threatening to break through. Why wouldn’t Rick just reach for him? There was only one thing in the multi-verse he needed right now, here in this moment, and Evil Rick seemed incapable of giving it to him.

He reached up and rubbed at his collar when Rick mentioned him always belonging to the older man. That was entirely true. No matter what happened in his life, he would never belong to anyone else. He knew that down to his core, his heart was Rick’s and RIck’s alone forever. Why couldn’t he shake this feeling that the old man didn’t want it? Wasn’t he standing here telling him the exact opposite? He groaned loudly in frustration bringing his palms up to roughly rub into his eye sockets “How can you be mine and Bills!? How am I supposed to continue to call you mine and defend you as such knowing you’re also his? Damnit! It’s like I have to start saying he’s ours, FUCK!” He dropped his hands exasperatingly.

“Decision? What decision? You think I have a choice?!” He dragged on his cigarette again “Rick you meticulously reprogramed me since we met, twisting me to your malevolent design which I eagerly accepted, you said it yourself This draw to you, this allegiance, this need is deeply embedded, it will never leave me and because of that I’ll never leave you. I told you I’d never abandon you Rick and I meant it.. I just ..” he sighed again, feeling stuck in a nightmarish rut, doomed to endlessly go around in circles “I just want to fix it..”

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“I don’t fucking know okay!” The words, his confession was shouted, bellowed aggressively loud, its desperate resonance filling every available inch of the tense space still left between them. “I know how I can belong to….how to make this fucking work, I didn’t, I didn’t fucking plan this, I didn’t…I didn’t want this, not…not like this!” The kid had been right about one thing, although he hadn’t fallen back into Bill on a mere whim, he hadn’t paused to think things through or really consider how the decision might impact on Rick in the longer term. He had wanted what he had wanted and with an undeniable bloody-mindedness he had taken it and in doing so he had made a decision for the consequences to be damned, consequences he was now facing and that was exactly how he felt; dammed.

With a renewed urgency he began to pace the floor in ever tightening circles, eager to burn off some of the excess energy he could feel flaring through his system; he felt pushed into a corner and prodded for answers he didn’t have and when cornered he always reacted spectacularly badly. He was explicitly aware he could not afford to do so now and that constraint only served to make him feel even more trapped in this situation, a situation of his own creation.

“Of course you have a fucking choice!” Fraught hands flew up to grip at his own blue tufts of hair, pulling at it with frustration, he couldn’t stand to believe Rick would only stay with him because he’d been manipulated into it, like he was some kind of object of purposeful design; a possession. Sigma’s words came back to haunt him and as soon as he re-lived the utterance of that poignant accusation he scooped up his empty glass and threw it against a nearby wall, just to watch it shatter and listen to it break, just to have a moment where he didn’t have to hear Rick voice his disappointment with him.

“I can’t….you’re confusing me, I can’t….” Within the blink of an eye the gravity of the situation had come crashing down on top of him and he had no idea how to burrow his way out from under its pressuring force. Struggling to contain himself he collapsed down into his seat, his head in his hands, eyes peeking through shaking fingers, sight settled straight down at the floor.

When he finally spoke his voice was quiet, pained and hoarse. “I don’t know how to fix it.”

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As Rick yelled, Rocker felt like he’d been slapped in the face, his own thoughts getting stuck on the old man’s incredible admission that he didn’t know. Evil Rick always had all the answers and for him to say he didn’t know left the musician stunned to say the least. He flinched when the glass hit the wall, stomach plummeting when he realized he wished it had been thrown at his head. At least aggression would be something, Rick wasn’t taking anything out on him, wasn’t twisting his words around to suit his own interests and alleviate himself of guilt. Rick was accepting everything head on, such a thing was unprecedented in their relationship. His silver tongued favourite wasn’t manipulating him into staying, Rocker could hardly wrap his head around it and he realized quite suddenly that’s what he’d come here for. Twisted facts and distorted truths, to have his own thoughts turned inside out and tossed back at him until he was placated and once again tricked past seeing the situation as what it was.

With his own confusion was mirrored in Rick’s exasperation it became obvious they weren’t getting anywhere. They were both running around in circles with this and neither of them could find the solution. Rocker couldn’t live with this, he couldn’t live without Rick. What was he to do? There was only one thing he knew, one thing he could hold onto as absolute. “My heart beats for you Rick..” he said softly “nothing will ever change that simple fact.” He sighed again, it was the only irrefutable truth he had left. Pulling out another chair he plopped into it, emotional turmoil from this run around weighing on his malnourished body.

He stared up at the familiar ceiling, tracing the support beams with his eyes as he’d done countless times, memories of seeing this room for the first time coming back to him. Of sitting at the old man’s feel while he worked, pestering him for attention. Being nearly beaten to death for stepping out of line, violently claiming the old man as his and topping him for the first time. It was as if they’d been building up to a future together that no longer fit. Slowly they’d ticked everyone away from each other, tightening their grip on each other’s hearts dwindling themselves down to being the only ones in each other’s eyes, in each other’s hearts. He’d saw it being just the two of them for the rest of Rick’s life and that’s what he resented losing. Their dark twisted fairy-tale had run off course, they needed to write a new story.

“It doesn’t work Rick, because I’m still trying to live our old life. Trying not to let go of what we’ve built together.” He started hesitantly “I’m stubborn and I don’t want to let go of having had all of you, I.. I don’t know how.” He took a deep breath as his mind continued to try to put words together. “I don’t think we can fix it..” he thought briefly about the passing thoughts he’d been having about wanting sex from someone else, strictly as a way to pass the nights alone when Rick was off with Bill and how Rick would never stand for it. How he didn’t want the old man to stand for it and what a contradiction it was. Another of the many issues they both knew were in front of them but had no idea how to handle.

“The relationship we’ve built isn’t capable of supporting these new definitions.. we have to make a new one..” His face showed that he didn’t know where his mind was going with this “we have to .. like … start over?” He foroughed his brow, that sounded insane and impossible. How could they start over when they were married and loved each other so much. Had such a long and complex history together. One he wouldn’t give up for anything. “Fuck, I don’t know. That doesn’t make any sense.” He suddenly understood why couples went to counseling, it’d be nice to have some help here, someone to guide them through this. The image produced a small snort of a laugh. “Imagine explaining this situation to a therapist? We’d be taken away in straight jackets.”

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My heart beats for you Rick.

It was a warm statement and no doubt came from a good place, a place of loyalty most probably but as it met with Evil Rick’s mind it became poisoned, transformed into doubt and yet another accusation of culpability that he aimed straight at himself. The words held within them the unwieldy weight of that responsibility; did Rick’s heart beat only for him because he loved him, because the kid wanted it to be the case, or did it beat solely for him because he had stripped everything else from the boy and isolated him from all others. Did it beat only for him because all this time he’d deceived Rick into believing he could honestly somehow say the same? An unintended deception, but still a deception none-the-less. He listened in silence, eyes still drawn down to the stark white of the floor as Rick spoke once more about his inability to accept the fact he was still in love with Bill.

I don’t think we can fix it.

Some part of him, the most fatalistic part, had been waiting on the arrival of those words, unsure which one of them would dare to utter them first. Despite this, he still hadn’t felt anywhere near prepared to hear them voiced verbally and their truth struck like a dagger at his heart, piercing, cruel and cold.

New definitions…he knew exactly what that meant, the term loosely referred to the interest Rick had expressed about sleeping with other people, an interest that the old man had immediately felt compelled to violently quash because he was, in this matter, like so many countless others, a disgusting fucking hypocrite.

As the kid continued to speak, Evil Rick’s expression grew more and more confused; starting over…a fresh start? What the fuck did that even mean? How was that even possible? At first he thought perhaps the boy was referring to some kind of cognitive wipe but Rick knew that after what had happened with Sigma the old man would never dare do that again.

The kid’s quip about a therapist was met with a complete non reaction, the old man quite incapable of finding the smallest semblance of humour in anything right now. Rick’s words were settling within him, binding both logic and emotion until they rendered themselves completely infallible; deep down he knew the kid was right, something had to change, but what? Christ it wasn’t just one of them that needed to change, they both did. He’d driven this marriage off a fucking bridge and into a river and hadn’t even noticed they were both drowning.

There appeared to his mind to be only one viable answer to that question and it was one he was loathe to accept, one that he knew would utterly destroy him. He felt frantic and sick as the thought took hold, as all those ugly little variables settled into a discernible pattern which guided him towards a wholly unwelcomed but undeniably valid conclusion.

“You’re right.” He stated as he took a deep breath and worked to settle down the voice now screaming inside him, warning him not to say the next sentence.

“We need to spend some time apart.”

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The air was sucked from his lungs and his crumbling heart shattered instantly, making his gut wrench and his blood go cold. He sat there in utter disbelief over what he’d just heard. After all this time? All his mistakes, everything they’d worked through he was being sent away. Exactly what Rick had always told him he’d never do, not to him, not to his devoted kid. The kid he couldn’t live without, who he loved more than anything. His eyes swelled and he didn’t give a damn about stopping them. What did it matter now? What did anything matter in the face of this. Evil Rick’s choice was now complete, he was being cast out of the kingdom.

“I..” he couldn’t speak, he just shook his head, wishing with all his might he hadn’t just heard what he did. Over and over he shook as his head back and forth, closing his eyes as the tears silently ran down his cheeks. He wrapped his arms around himself and tried to shut it out. “No Rick..” it was barely a whisper, panic exploding as his mind started flooding him with what that meant, what time without his Evil Rick meant. “no Rick.. no.. no.. I’m sorry ..please .. I .. no.. no..” he opened his tear filled eyes and gave the old man a desperate pleading glance but unable to say anything else, he just bit his lip and shook his head.

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He could hear the shock in the boy’s voice and in truth it took everything he had to force himself to look up from the floor and meet with Rick’s devastated gaze, watching as the boy shook his head his disbelief and disappointment. He observed in horror as he witnessed hot tears track down the boy’s flushed face and in that moment, the moment that he watched the bottom fall out of Rick’s entire world, he felt, for the first time in a long time, like the monster he’d tried to convince himself he wasn’t.

He stood up as the boy began to plead with him, determined to force himself to face this, to face the effects of what he imagined the boy could only perceive as a fresh form of betrayal. For the first time since he had met the kid he could feel the years between them, feel the fact that he had lived so long and yet Rick so little; Rocker had never look so young.

As the boy began to plead with him he pulled Rick up and into his arms, holding him tightly and rocking him ever so slightly his hand moving to clasp the back of Rick’s head. “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” His voice was calm, comforting almost but behind it lurked an untouchable coldness, one that reflected the fact he was slowly starting to seal up his heart. “Some things have to be broken in order to be fixed Rick and this is one of those things.”

In truth, holding Rick close like this only made it hurt more but he didn’t have the cruelty necessary to push the kid away, it was a cruelty Rick had curbed, love tempered all in time it seemed.

Although he appeared calm and controlled there was a rising tide of panic that was beginning to swell inside of him, waves of doubt that crashed against each other disturbing his entire equilibrium. Despite the fact he felt certain this was the logical conclusion that followed the boys suggestion, he couldn’t help but fear that on some level he was punishing himself, depriving himself of Rick as some form a penance for the damage he’d caused to both of them. But he couldn’t allow for them to continue like this, trapped in a vacuum with limited air, hurting each other over and over and over again. This was not rejection, it was protection.

“In time you’ll come to realize that I did this for both of us, but most of all, for you.”

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Of course now he comes to him. Now he’s being pulled up into those arms he’d needed to desperately moments ago. When he was being hugged goodbye. Desperately he wrapped his arms around the old man, his favourite, his beloved, his husband, holding on for dear life before he was taken away, before he was cast out into the emptiness that was life alone. How could Rick be doing this to him, to them? He felt like such a stupid kid, to have ever believed he could have held onto this man, this incredible man forever.

Rick was right, it was broken, that’s where this had all started, with Rocker foolishly bringing that up. But he didn’t see how breaking it further was supposed to fix things. Fuck! Why hadn’t he just gone and gotten drunk again in another dingy bar? Why did he ever come here and start this damned conversation? Talk about throwing everything away on a whim. His stupid mouth had finally gotten him in his greatest mess. He buried his face in Rick’s chest, tears running onto the black fabric as he desperately tried to capture the old man’s scent, terrified he’d never smell it again.

“What does that mean Rick?” His voice was barely audible and muffled by the old man’s shirt “Time apart..” he lifted his face and looked up at his favourite “I..I..” he swallowed hard “I have to leave? For how long?” He was helpless to stop his voice from shaking, he’d been tearing himself apart over the pain of spending a few nights a month away from the old man and now he was going to be sleeping alone every day? He couldn’t process it. He didn’t know what to say to Rick’s statement about understanding it in time. He didn’t want to be on his own, he wanted them to figure it out together. “I.. I don’t want to go Rick, this is my home.. you, you’re my home. What am I supposed to do without you?”

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It was Rick who had walked into the lab and announced it wasn’t working, Rick who had threatened to walk out on him and now that the kid was faced with the reality of them being separated, he could see it was hitting the boy much harder than he’d anticipated. It made him wonder whether the kid had been serious about it at all, had it been an idle threat, emotional blackmail or simply Rick’s only way of expressing how desperate he was feeling? In the end it didn’t matter, Rick had convinced him that this was the only course of action, that they needed a fresh start and as the stronger of the two he felt it was his responsibility to stand firm, despite the abject misery the mere thought of it was already causing him.

“A separation.” He confirmed, huffing out a tense, shaky breath, pulling the boy away from him to clasp him by the shoulders and get a good look at him. “For as long as it takes.” It was breaking his heart to watch Rick crumble like this, he’d expected it to hit the boy hard but he thought this was, in a way, what they both wanted, no, not wanted needed. Something had to change, they simply could not continue like this, why, why couldn’t the boy see that? It was only going to take the kid sleeping with someone else and they were going to find themselves once again standing at this fated precipice deciding whether to jump or be pushed. Evil Rick had always been better at pushing than jumping.

“Rick.” His tone was a little harsher, as if his sharp utterance of the word was some veiled attempt to snap the boy to his senses. Age and trauma had taught Evil Rick to bottle and bury his feelings deep down within him the minute he felt them begin to overwhelm him, but the boy it seemed did not have that same instinct. It was just as well really, bottling everything up inevitably meant that when the bottle was full it cracked and everything leaked out twice as toxic and utterly baneful, poisoning everything it touched.

He pinched the bridge of his nose as the boy looked to him for direction, this was exactly the problem wasn’t it? Rick had grown so used to seeking his approval and guidance that without it he seemed lost, it was clear to him the kid needed to rediscover his sense of self. “That is for you to determine.” He confirmed in as soft a tone as he could muster. “This home is broken, we are broken…” He reached his hand up to stoke a calloused thumb across the boy’s hot wet cheek. “You said we need a fresh start Rick, we need to see each other with new eyes, rediscover each other, we can’t do that with you living here.”

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As long as it takes.. Nice and ambiguous. He set his jaw, hate and anger starting to flood him once again, that this was happening, that Rick had built him up so much just to toss him out. He bunched up his face as the betrayal set in, turning his stomach and ripping him apart. He pulled out of Rick’s grip, he wasn’t going to grovel, he wouldn’t beg. If the old man wanted him to leave, then so be it. “Fine.” He growled, more venomous than he intended and he stormed from the room.

He made his way down the halls, these stupid stone halls he’d foolishly not given enough attention to, coming to his lab, the stupid rusty old lab the old man had given him for his pets. The stupid spiders Rick hated so much. He gathered up Anthea and tucked her into his pocked, woke Medusa and beckoned her to follow him. Tears streaming down his face now to the point he could hardly see he went to his den, but found he wanted nothing there. It was all useless possessions and could be forgotten. He picked up his bass, the stupid bass he’d stayed up an entire night turning into a portal gun to come and find his favourite for the first time and lowered it over his shoulders.

Sobbing wasn’t his style, but man was the pain in his chest asking for it. He needed to scream and yell and expel all this anguish from his body. But he wouldn’t. He harbored it in, he wanted to choke on it and rot as he walked into their bedroom and stopped in the doorway. The agony was too much, he couldn’t step into the room he’d first told RIck he’d loved him in, where they’d slept in each other’s arms. A whimper and a fresh torrent of tears and he turned away from the stupid room with it’s massive stupid bed.

Roughly wiping the tears from his eyes, he held his head as high as he could manage as he walked back into the lab, back over to that stupid miserable old man that was the entire reason for his stupid existence, the only real purpose he’d ever had. He wanted to reach for him, hold him once more, kiss him once more, but if he did he’d never let go and Rick was right, he had to go. Taking a shaky breath his bloodshot eyes drifted from his favourite to look around the room, the stupidly pristinely perfect white room he’d first found his Evil Self in, been claimed and claimed in, this stupid room that held the story of their life. Their miserably perfect stupid life.

Blue eyes magnified by the tears landed back on Evil Rick again and he pulled out his portal gun, already having set it for the penthouse. He kept his gaze locked on the man he loved, the only person he would ever love as he shot open a void. “This isn’t goodbye Rick..” his voice was pain filled but somehow strong and confident “I will never give up on you, never give up on us..” he swallowed hard “I love you old man, I always will.” With a small smile of hope, hope that he was right, hope that Rick was right, hope that fate would place them back in each other’s arms, he turned from the old man and stepped through the void.

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The change in the boy was almost immediate, a strange flicker in his expression which instantly turned Rick’s hopeless hurt straight into caustic, seething looking anger. As the boy pushed harshly out of his grasp, Evil Rick stepped back, allowing him the space, unsure how the kid was about to react.

When Rick spat the word ‘fine’ at him and marched off he was left standing in the centre of the lab, left standing in the ruins of his life, ruins of his own making. He almost wished Rick had left him just so didn’t have to bear the burden of knowing he had done this to himself in the hope it was what they needed. Jesus Christ, what if he was wrong, what if he was wrong about everything, all of it? The kid had looked at him like he hated him, eyes cold and sharp, stabbing daggers with their stare. He’d never looked at him like that before and it chilled his very soul.

He looked down at his hands and watched them shiver and shake as the compulsion to chase after Rick and beg him to stay swelled up inside him and made his chest ache, his entire body practically convulsing with the effort required to stay grounded to the same spot and not give in to that desperate, dire temptation.

Bowing his head he sucked in a shallow gasp of air as his gaze settled on the one stained floor tile in the centre of the lab. It was a blemish he’d specifically spared from his rigorous sterilisation routine because the stain was a reminder of the day Rick had found the lair, of the day they’d playfully fought each other and he’d branded the boy. They’d cut each other to pieces that day and where their blood had mingled and pooled across the floor, he had left that one marker so he could enjoy the memory whenever he looked at it. Staring at it now only filled him with a deep and darkening despair and in that moment he realised just how joyless he’d rendered almost every aspect of his life. Slipping his hand under his shirt he traced his calloused fingertips across the interlocking RR’s carved into his chest and felt a compulsion to fall to his knees and shout the air out of his lungs until he lost his voice. But he wouldn’t allow it, couldn’t allow it, instead he worked to shut off every avenue of sentiment, to feel nothing, to be nothing.

When Rick returned the old man was still standing there in the centre of the room, unable to move, unable to speak, unable to do anything but stare at the boy, fists bunched, poisoned with guilt and tainted with failure, consumed by the ache of the impending loss that he knew was about to cripple him. When Rick finally began to speak he realised how terrified he was to hear what the kid might say, but the words were not what he expected, they were hopeful and that at least was something.

He wanted to respond, to return the sentiment, but he was frightened that if he opened his mouth to talk he would break down and plead with Rick to stay and what was the point if they were only going to continue making each other miserable. It was like feeling two entirely contradictory things at once, both with equal intensity and that fierce dichotomy rendered him absolutely incapable of doing anything.

Instead he met Rick’s eyes, his eyes wide and frantic, unable to hide his disbelief that this was actually happening. He nodded at the kid, the only response his body would allow to try and communicate that he shared the sentiment.

As he watched Rick step through the portal and witnessed it close behind him, he could still hear the kid’s voice in his head telling him that he loved him, telling him that he would always love him. It was at that moment, he felt something crack inside him, a savage haemorrhage of pain that was so overwhelming it stole his breath and finally sent him down to his knees and for the first time in over a decade, Evil Rick cried.

#evil-curtains [the black in my heart]#impasse [time apart]#{ahhh feels}#{my heart omg ahhhhhhh}#{it feels good to read this again though}

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