#and it just did not turn on again. literally no prelude no explanation. i was so fuckin confused man. post reset its completely fine too
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anyways yesterday my phone shut down and turned into a featureless inactive brick for several hours for literally no reason (ah midas curse, how i did not miss thee) so i ended up having to do a hard reset which fixed it but i hope no one tried to contact me about anything important during that time
#the only important thing i lost were my saved contacts which will be a pain to fix bc i didn't have them backed up 🫠#but if anything this is just motivating me to get a physical address book for my contacts which i've been wanting to do for a while anyways#and my music is all on my pc and i only had a few pictures on there which were not important so it really was not a freakout episode for me#if anything the most seamless complete shutdown of an electronic device i've ever had to deal with (happens to me FREQUENTLY)#i'm still so baffled as to what happened bc it was working fine i made some texts and a phone call in the morning#and then i was listening to music while reading and the song ended and nothing else played so i looked at my phone#and it just did not turn on again. literally no prelude no explanation. i was so fuckin confused man. post reset its completely fine too#the midas curse strikes again
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Oh Baby! [Spencer Reid x fem! reader]
Send me a I wish you would write a fic where…
Find my masterlist here. Click here to join my taglist.
From this Anon prompt - “you're drunk, you have sex, the only problem is that you hate each other, and you think you're pregnant so you have to deal with it (you're not, it's just late)”
Not me posting two fics in one day! I like to think of this as a prelude to Odd Socks which I posted earlier. Mild hints at smut, drinking and bad language. Enemies to lovers.
WC: 3.8k
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Spencer Reid was not your favorite person. He wasn’t even in your top twenty. Or fifty. Or even a hundred.
Working with him was a chore. He was constantly correcting you, always had to be right and you found it exhausting. After four years of working with him you’d all but reached the end of your tether.
You just tried to distance yourself from him the best you could which was easy in the field but not so easy when Penelope insisted everyone go out for drinks. Everyone. Including the anti-social Doctor Reid.
Even with copious amounts of wine in your system, he was no less annoying.
“Statistically speaking, one in five American’s-“
You cut him off when you started to make a high pitched squeaking noise. Spencer and the rest of the team turned to look at you with frowns on their faces.
“What was that?” Spencer asked in confusion.
“Oh I’m sorry,” you sipped your wine. “That’s just the sound my brain makes whenever you speak.”
You saw Spencer’s jaw clench the way it always did when you insulted him; it was his way of trying to bite his tongue and not rise to it.
But he’d also had a few glasses of wine and try as he might, he couldn’t hold back this time.
“It surprises me to know you have a brain.” He scoffed.
You growled at him, literally growled like a dog before you threw back your wine and got up from the table.
“I need another drink.” You spat before storming away.
You ordered a drink and were waiting to pay when he sidled up next to you.
“What’s the matter Y/N? You can dish it but can’t take it?” He was smirking at you and you wanted to slap that stupid look off of his face.
“Just leave me alone Reid.” You rolled your eyes. You didn't want to get into a fight with him, not here.
“I find it funny that I’m expected to just take the insults you throw my way but the second I bite back you go running.” He folded his arms, his expression telling you he found it anything but funny.
“I’m ducking smart.” You growled again. “I have a higher than average IQ but you are always belittling me and making me feel like the stupidest person in the goddamn room!”
“That’s what this is about?” He frowned a little, his arms falling back to his sides. “I’m not trying to belittle you Y/N. I’m trying to challenge you.”
“What the hell does that mean?”
“I’ve never met anyone who can keep up with me. I’ve never met anyone who can give me a run for money. It’s nice having someone almost as smart as me around.” He smirked a little, accentuating the word almost.
“You were so close to saying something nice.” You scoffed, tossing a note on the bar before grabbing your drink and turning your back on him.
You started back to your table but he was quick to catch up with you and you felt his large hand on your shoulder.
“Does it always have to be like this?” He asked when you turned back to face him.
You contemplated this for a moment before you stepped out of his grasp.
“Yes.” You spat and then you continued back to the table.
***
You groaned loudly as you peeled your eyes open and the sunlight hit your retinas. Clearly in your state last night you’d forgotten to close the curtains.
You’d had more than your fair share of booze last night and your head was pounding. At least today was your day off. God you hoped you didn’t get called in on a case.
You wriggled yourself up against your pillows and ran your fingers through your tangled hair.
At around the same time you realised you were naked was almost the exact moment a small grumbled startled you.
You practically screamed, turning over to see the other body in what you assumed was your otherwise empty bed. He had his back to you, his head buried under the pillow.
You didn’t remember meeting anyone last night, let alone bringing someone home.
“What the fuck?” You raised your voice making your head throb.
The man grumbled again and when he spoke his voice was muffled under the pillow.
“Jeez Y/N keep it down, my head is pounding.”
You froze. You would know that voice anywhere. That voice was like nails on a chalkboard to you.
You grabbed the pillow and lifted it from his head. As expected you were met with messy, brown curls.
“Reid?” you yelled even louder than before. “What the fuck are you doing in my bed?”
“Please, keep your voice down.” his voice was low and croaky. He rolled onto his back and you could see his eyes were bloodshot, probably from all the alcohol. He was also shirtless too and you would be willing to bet he was wearing as many clothes as you were.
“What. Are. You. Doing. In. My. Bed.” you slowed down, pausing between each word.
Spencer sat up a little, ruffling his hair.
“Well I’m naked.” he croaked. “And I can only assume you are too, which would lead one to believe we had sex.” he spoke casually as though it wasn’t the most ludicrous thing in the world.
“No.” you shook your head. “No way. There is no way I would have sex with you.”
“The current situation begs to differ.” he smirked at you.
“Nuh uh. Nope. No way.” you shook your head again. “Absolutely not. There must be another explanation. You are the last person I would ever sleep with.”
“Well trust me, you did.”
“You remember?” you frowned.
“Eidetic memory.” he smirked again, looking proud of himself. “Even when drunk. We most certainly had sex and you most defintely enjoyed the mulitple orgasms I gave you.”
“No.” you shook your head again. “No, that didn’t happen.” you swung your legs out of the bed, making sure to keep the bed sheet wrapped around your naked body.
Your clothes were just out of reach. You would have to get up to reach them.
You looked back at Spencer over your shoulder and he was staring at you.
“I need to get up, don’t look.” you spat at him.
“I’ve seen it all already Y/N, it’s all up here.” he smirked once more, tapping his head with his index finger. “I’ve got it all memorised. The swell of your breasts, the curve of your hips. The small red wine coloured birthmark on your inner thigh. The way you smell. The way you taste. The way you screamed my-”
“Stop it!” you cut him off. “Stop it for christ sake.” you needed to distance yourself from him so despite knowing he was watching you, you stood up and keeping your back to him made a grab for your dress.
You pulled it over your head and covered yourself before turning back to him.
“Why are you just sitting there?”
“I was hoping you’d maybe have the decency to make me some coffee? After all I did for you last night.” he winked at you and you hated that it sent a twinge between your legs.
You had never seen this side of Reid, this confidence. You always assumed he was probably a virgin but you supposed it was always the quiet ones.
“Well you know hope leads to disappointment. Get up and get out of my apartment.” you wrapped your arms around yourself, as though protecting yourself from something.
“Now that’s just rude.”
“Reid, this was clearly a huge mistake. We were both extremely drunk otherwise there is no way we would have ended up in bed together. So let’s just agree to pretend this never happened and never speak of it again.”
Spencer chewed his lip looking as though he was contemplating this. Then he smirked again.
“Or,” he had a mischievous look in his eyes. “You can come back to bed and we can have a repeat of last night. Last night I made you come four times. I think I can beat that.”
You felt your cheeks burning with embarrassment and more worryingly, arousal. You hoped he didn’t notice what his words were doing to you.
You liked this confident side of him. There was something so hot about the way he was looking at you and talking to you. If this was how he had talked to you last night you were surprised you ended up here.
“Get out!” you forced yourself to say. The thought of getting back into bed with him was too tempting. But at least you could blame last night on the wine. If you got back into bed with him now you had no one to blame but yourself. And you knew he would hold it over you forever.
“If you insist.” he shrugged, slipping out from under the covers. He stood up and faced you, stark naked. He was hard and you had to force your eyes away from his erection up to the ceiling. He clearly noticed because he laughed.
“I don’t know why you’re fighting this.” he chuckled.
“Because you are an ass and I can’t stand you.”
“But I’m an ass who can show you a good time.”
“Good god Reid just please...please get out of my apartment.” It was taking every ounce of your strength to keep your eyes away from him. You knew if you looked back at him it would be game over. You would pounce on him and throw him back on the bed and he would win.
You kept your eyes fixed on the ceiling while he reluctantly dressed in last night clothes. Once he was fully clothed you finally allowed yourself to look back at him.
He looked so different from how you were used to seeing him. His shirt was wrinkled and he kept the top couple of buttons undone. His tie was slung open around his neck and he dangled his blazer from his finger. He almost looked normal.
“Are you sure you want me to leave?” he asked with another small smirk and you swore you were actually going to smack that look off his face in a minute.
“Very.” you folded your arms in defiance.
“Fine.” he shrugged. “See you tomorrow Y/N. Thanks for a great night.” he gave you another wink before he headed to the bedroom door.
You forced yourself to stay rooted to the spot and not go after him. You stayed put until you heard the apartment door open and close behind him.
Once you were sure he was gone, you fell back to the bed with a sigh.
What had you done? Why on earth would you sleep with Spencer Reid?
Little did you know, it was about to get a whole lot worse.
***
Three Weeks Later
“Nope. No. No way. Not possible.” you paced your apartment, muttering under your breath. “Nuh uh. Nope. Nada. Not a fucking chance.”
The knock on the door startled you, making you physically jump. You’d been expecting him, you’d invited him, but you’d been so wrapped up in your thoughts you’d momentarily forgotten.
You took a few deep breaths to try and calm your breathing before you made your way to the door.
You flung it open, he was standing on the other side looking a little frustrated that you had dragged him across town on your day off.
“Yes?” he scoffed.
You were regretting this immediately.
“Come in, come in.” you motioned Spencer hurriedly inside.
“If this is some kind of booty call Y/N, I am not interested.”
You closed the door behind him rolling your eyes.
Since your stupid drunken night spent together things had been even worse between the two of you. Spencer barely spoke to you anymore, not that you were really complaining but it was odd. He gave you the cold shoulder after you’d told him to forget all about the night you spent together.
What you didn’t realise was your words had hurt Spencer. He had been waiting four years to make a move on you but had always been too scared of the ultimate rejection. When you had come on to him that night he had been elated. It had been the best night of Spencer’s life and you’d just wanted to act like nothing had happened. It hurt, so he’d had to distance himself from you as much as possible.
“Booty call? You really think that’s what this is?” you frowned at him.
“No of course not, how could I be so stupid.” he rolled his eyes now. “God forbid you would want to sleep with me.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Just forget it.” he grumbled. “What did you drag all the way over here for?”
Oh yes, that.
You sighed loudly, feeling sick just thinking about the words you needed to utter.
“I...I uhm...fuck. We fucked up. We made a big fucking mistake.”
“Excuse me?” He spat. “First you tell me to forget anything happened but now you are telling me it was a complete mistake? Wow, that makes me feel fucking great thanks. You know what Y/N you-”
“Shut up!” you cut him off. “That’s not what I...not like that. We just...fuck this is fucked up.” you started pacing again.
“What the fuck are you talking about Y/N?” he grabbed your wrist to stop you pacing and pulled you to a stop to look at him. He saw tears behind your eyes. “What is this about?”
You had to just say it, blurt it out. Just like ripping off a bandaid.
“I t-think...I m-might be...I’m not sure...but I’m late and I’m n-never late…” a few tears escaped your eyes. “Fuck Spencer!” you sniffed, you had never called him by his first name before. “I think I might be pregnant.”
Spencer felt the air leave his lungs, as though your words had just punched him in the gut.
The words hung in the air between you like stale smoke in a bar. Time stood still. His head was spinning.
“P-pregnant.” he choked out. “With a b-baby.”
“Yes genius.” you dried your eyes on the back of your hand.
“And it’s m-mine?”
“Do you think I would be telling you this if it wasn’t?” you spat. “Fuck Reid, say something useful!”
“I don’t know w-what to say.” he swallowed hard, struggling to grasp at a coherent thought. “Are you s-sure?”
“No.” you shook your head. “I said I think I might be. I haven’t taken a test yet, it’s probably too early. But I was due five days ago and that is not normal for me. I am like clockwork.”
He could tell how much this clearly pained you to admit to him so he knew if you were telling him this you were pretty damn certain.
“Pregnant.” He repeated, still trying to wrap his head around it.
“What the fuck are we going to do Spencer?” You started sobbing then and Spencer couldn’t help but come to you and throw his arms around you.
You tried to resist at first but then you gave in and buried your head into his chest while you cried.
He ran his large hands up and down your back and placed soft kisses to your head. It was a very strange situation for the two of you.
“Y/N I am going to be here for you every step of the way.” He used his finger to guide your chin up so you were looking at him. “You and our baby will not be alone in this ok?”
You chewed your lip trying to sniff back your tears.
“You don’t have to. You don’t have to be involved.”
“I want to be.” He stroked your cheek. “The truth is Y/N, I’m crazy about you and I have been for a really long time. I want this. Us, this baby. I want it all.” He brushed away your tears and placed a soft kiss on your forehead.
“Spencer Reid has feelings, who would have thought.” You teased him.
He laughed a little.
“You can say something nice every once in a while you know?”
“I hope our baby has your eyes.” You smiled softly at him. “And your smile.”
“I hope they have your everything.” He replied.
He bowed his head a little to meet you and he let his lips brush cautiously over yours as though testing the waters. When he went to pull away, you gripped the back of his neck and kept him close, your mouth opening and allowing his tongue access.
It felt right. It felt like you should have always been doing this. It felt like the stars and planets aligning.
But of course, it couldn’t last. You should have known better.
***
Over the next few weeks things changed dramatically between you and Spencer. It was amazing how this had brought the two of you together and seemingly washed away four years of contempt you held towards each other.
Despite the pregnancy the two of you decided to take things slow, you went on dates, held hands and had the occasional make out session but that was as far as it went, despite being desperate for each other.
This was the time to get to know each other, really get to know each other. You were going to be parents after all.
Or so you thought.
The day before you were going to take your first pregnancy test Spencer found you in the bathroom at Quantico, on the floor in tears.
You’d been away from your desk for a little while so he’d gone looking for you. He had never expected to find you like this.
He ran to your side and fell to the floor next to you, instinctively wrapping his arms around you.
“Y/N, what’s wrong?”
You pushed him away.
“Don’t touch me.” You sobbed.
“I-I...what’s happened Y/N? Please talk to me.”
“What’s wrong?” You spat. “What’s wrong is that I just came on my period, that's what’s wrong!” You raised your voice.
“You...you’re not…” he croaked, unable to form a sentence.
“I’m not pregnant Reid.” He finished for him. Hearing you call him Reid again was weird and it didn’t sit right with him.
His own eyes welled with tears. He’d already gotten so used to the idea of having a child with you he felt his heart shatter in his chest.
“Oh.” He croaked. He had no idea what to say.
“Just go Reid.” You wiping your eyes on the sleeve of your blouse.
“I’m not going anywhere.” He sniffed.
“We don’t have to do this anymore. I’m not pregnant, I’m not having your baby. You’re free. You don’t have to pretend this was any more than what it was.”
“And what was it?” He chewed his lip with a frown.
“We were trying to force feelings that weren’t really there. We were just trying to pretend for the sake of the baby. But there is no baby. So we don’t need to bother anymore.”
Spencer’s frown deepened.
“Pretending?” he scoffed. “Y-you thought I was pretending?”
“We both were Reid and it’s ok. We just wanted to make it work because we thought we were having a child. But we aren’t so let’s just go back to normal and pretend nothing happened.”
“You expect me to pretend nothing happened?” he swallowed, his mouth feeling suddenly dry. “You want me to pretend I wasn’t excited at the thought of being a father? You want me to pretend I hadn’t started thinking of baby names and planning our future together? A future for the three of us. You think I can just pretend that baby or not that I’m not head over heels in love with you?” His words came tumbling out of his mouth so fast he barely had time to realise he was saying them before they were out.
He saw the moment you registered what he’d said. He saw your mouth fall open and your eyes widen. Understandable really, he’d just confessed his love to you in the bathroom of the BAU.
“I-I…” nope, there were no words, at least none that you could find anyway.
“It wasn’t supposed to come out like that.” He swallowed a lump in throat. “But uhm...now it’s out there I can’t very well take it back. I’m in love with you, I probably have been since the moment you walked through the door. I remember it like it was yesterday. Hotch introduced us and I knew when our eyes met you were the person I’d been searching for.” A few tears escaped his eyes.
“Y-you...me?”
“Yes you.” He laughed a little cupping your face and you let him wipe away your tears. “I’m sorry you aren’t pregnant, I’m really, really sorry, because it would be a privilege and an honour to father your child.”
“I-I had no idea you felt that way.”
“You’re a worse profiler than I thought you were in that case.” He teased.
“Oh if you're so good, tell me Doctor Reid, what am I thinking right now?” You gave him an unimpressed face.
“You’re thinking,” he moved one hand around to the base of your neck. “That I’m an ass and you’d be right. But you’re also thinking that you want me to kiss you.”
“Oh am I now?” You raised an eyebrow at him but you couldn’t help but glance down at his lips.
“Let’s see if I’m right.” He smirked and then he captured your lips with his own in a deep kiss. When you opened your mouth to allow his tongue access, he knew he was right.
When you pulled back both of your tears were all but gone.
“I guess I should say, I love you too by the way.” You told him with a shrug.
“Oh I know.” He shot you a smirk as he pushed himself up to his feet.
He held his hands out and you took them and he hoisted you to your feet.
“I don’t like cocky Spencer.” You grumbled.
“No, you love him.”
You nudged him playfully in the ribs. To your surprise he suddenly enveloped you in a tight embrace.
“I really am sorry you aren’t pregnant Y/N.” He kissed your head. “One day we’ll make one, I promise. But in the meantime,” he smirked to himself. “We sure can have a lot of fun practicing.”
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retrouvailles
Summary: Kyle and Michael pick Alex up at the airport.
Tags: reunions, post season 2, fluff, POV Kyle Valenti
for @caitlesshea !! happy birthday, I hope you enjoy it!
ao3
“What if I set off a sensor or something?”
Kyle stopped, pulling Michael to a stop with a firm grip on his arm. Michael looked at him with wide eyes as if he didn’t understand why he stopped him.
“Do you have something on you that’ll set off a sensor?” Kyle asked.
“No, but what if, like, my organs do it?” Michael said. Kyle let go of him and sighed.
“Isobel has been on a plane before and she was fine,” Kyle said, walking through the entrance of the airport, “Besides, I’ve done a lot of tests and as far as I can tell, none of you have any metal that’ll set off metal detectors in your blood. You’re fine.”
“Okay,” Michael said, taking a deep breath before following.
They walked further into the building, Michael trailing him and very clearly uncomfortable. Which. Fair. The only reason Kyle was even here was because Michael was very clearly uncomfortable with this whole thing trip. Kyle was just kind enough to be his friend through it‒and also because Alex asked him to.
Twenty-eight days ago, Alex had to leave for some special secret military thing that he couldn’t talk about for special secret military reasons, but he promised it wasn’t a full deployment. It was just a short, month long trip because he was needed at the US embassy in Qatar. No explanation further than that, but, from Kyle’s research, it didn’t seem to be the worst place to travel, so he tried not to stress. Maybe he was training someone. Or something.
That didn’t stop Michael from being an absolutely hellish person to be around since Alex was gone. They’d apparently just got on good terms, a romantic prelude of sorts, when Alex found out he had to go and politely asked Kyle to keep an eye on Michael. They’d been speaking and Michael was staying sober and busy, but Michael was keeping busy by annoying the shit out of everyone else. Kyle was thankful Michael would have someone else to call at 3AM when he had some sort of scientific breakthrough and needed someone stat. Liz had started turning her phone off, but Kyle felt too guilty to do so.
“How many people a year go missing in airports?” Michael asked as they headed towards the waiting area. They didn’t have to go through any metal detectors to wait out here and so that seemed like the safest place to be, all things considered.
“Excuse me?”
“I’m just saying, I feel like a prime target here. There’s so many fucking cops and military people. How many people do you think go missing from airports that aren’t even reported because they’re just kidnapped by the cops and the military?” Michael asked. Kyle closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
“Your boyfriend is in the military and your brother is a cop,” Kyle said slowly.
“Yeah, exactly how I know how fucked up it can be. And I’m‒you know. They could have heat sensors on me and know, ” Michael said. Kyle resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He knew Michael was just exaggerating as a way to release actual tension. He was nervous. But Alex was almost here and he was going to take over soon enough.
“It’s fine. Anyone tries to take you and Alex will literally kill them, just relax,” Kyle said. Michael furrowed his eyebrows and frowned like he was annoyed that he wasn’t being indulged which, to Kyle, meant Alex had been doing a great job at talking to him despite the miles between them.
Michael tapped his foot as they sat and watched the screen that displayed projected landing and take off times. Alex’s was on time, thankfully, and he should be landing any minute. Then Kyle wouldn’t have to babysit anymore.
“This is the sixth time Alex has come home and this is the first time I’m here to meet him at the airport,” Michael said. Kyle blinked and looked over at him, almost shocked with the honesty. More than almost. That being said, he kept his mouth shut and listened. “That’s a lot of times, you know?”
“I mean, yeah, but you’re here now. You guys were at a different place then,” Kyle tried. Michael took a deep breath and looked up. “Look, you’re just stressing yourself out because you’re nervous.”
“I don’t think I should’ve come. I don’t think he wants me here.”
“What? How the hell did you draw that conclusion?” Kyle asked, trying not to be too harsh about it. If there was one thing he learned from Michael and Alex, it’s that they were both fucking impossible. “Didn’t he say he wanted you here?”
“No,” Michael said, “He said I could come if I wanted, but no pressure. Sounds like he doesn’t want me here.”
Kyle’s eyes drifted to the monitor and saw Alex’s flight had turned green to announce that it’d landed. He just had to hold Michael out for a few more minutes and then Alex could do whatever Alex did to de-escalate his brain.
“I think he does want you here and he’s just so busy feeling the exact way you’re feeling to tell you that,” Kyle pointed out. Michael shrugged and stared at the screen that displayed all the plane landing times. His hands tightened where they rested over his knees. “Look, Alex is getting better with telling you what he wants, but no one is perfect and no one can heal super fast. He wants you here. It’s been a long time.”
“He’s been gone longer.”
“Yeah, he has. But something tells me this time is a little different,” Kyle said.
That something was Alex himself who Kyle imagined to be spinning around in an office chair as he waxed poetic about how good things were going between them. Better than ever before, namely because they were actually speaking while he was gone and they’d gotten a proper goodbye instead of Alex fleeing into the night while he was asleep. They had spoken about how, when Alex got back, they were going to start dating. They were going to be the annoying couple that is concerningly attached at the hip.
And, honestly, Kyle couldn’t fucking wait.
“What if he’s changed his mind?” Michael wondered.
“Then, knowing Alex, he’ll be honest and tell you to your face.”
Michael, groaning, sunk into the chair even further. Kyle rolled his eyes and reached over to pat him on the shoulder. He knew it was just pent up emotions. Alex would be walking out any moment now and all of his fears would be gone. He almost felt bad that Alex was by himself because he was probably going through the same mini freak out.
One day, hopefully, there wouldn’t be any hesitancy and he’d get to gag freely as they excitedly mauled each other in the middle of an airport. One day.
Time passed slowly as they waited for Alex to appear. Occasionally, Michael would say something off the wall, just to get some sort of reaction or response, and Kyle would entertain him and tug him back to reality. All things considered, this was the same version of him that called people at ridiculous times of day and night, just a little more anxiety-induced (as if that version wasn’t already anxiety-induced). Nothing Kyle couldn’t handle.
Something Alex would probably enjoy handling.
They had lapsed into silence for only a few seconds whenever a throat was cleared behind them. Kyle very casually looked over his shoulder while Michael quickly jumped up and turned to face him as if he’d just been caught doing something he shouldn’t. Kyle almost rolled his eyes, but he was too busy being thankful that Alex was stood there.
He looked tired, but he was in civvies and had his bag already and his hair was starting to grow out a bit again. His eyes were trained on Michael, clearly waiting with baited breath to see what to do now that they were face to face again after a month apart. Kyle would’ve felt like he was intruding if the situation was any different. But they were still figuring it out and they were both a little anxious and they definitely needed some kind of crutch. Kyle was happy to be it.
“Hey,” Kyle said, speaking first.
“Hi,” Alex said, glancing over at Kyle and giving him a nod with a smile before looking back to Michael.
“Hey,” Michael jumped in, his fists clenching and unclenching like he wasn’t sure what to do with his hands before deciding to shove them in his pocket because he had nothing better to do. “Um, how was your flight?”
“Fine. Long. Had a layover in Dallas, lasted too long. Got coffee though,” Alex said, shrugging and smiling at him, “How was the ride here? Where’d you guys park?”
“Not too far,” Michael said quickly, “Waited to get an up close parking spot so you didn’t have to walk too far. I figured it’d be uncomfortable since you’ve had your prosthetic on the whole flight and stuff.”
“Yeah, thanks,” Alex said.
“Good to see you back,” Kyle said to spark more conversation. As soon as they just got a good hug out, they could just go to the car and leave and then Michael could drop them off at Alex’s house and they could do whatever they did in private with Kyle having done his job.
“Yeah, it’s good to be back. I like the work, it’s just challenging enough, but it’s good to be, uh, home, I guess,” Alex told him, though the word sounded a bit unsure as if he had a different word in mind.
“I bet.”
“Hey, um, I watered your plants,” Michael jumped in, still looking a little out of sorts. Alex smiled wider. “None of them died.”
“Thank you,” Alex said sincerely. Michael smiled.
Then they just stood there awkwardly like two teenagers before a dance. Kyle felt like he was supposed to shove them together to take pictures. Instead of doing that, he kicked Michael’s shin and gave him a look whenever Michael turned his head to him with a glare. His jaw clenched and he took a deep breath before looking back at Alex.
“I missed you,” Michael said slowly as if it was rehearsed and practiced. Kyle had to resist the urge to roll his eyes as he looked away, giving them some semblance of privacy. “Like. A lot.”
“I missed you too,” Alex said, “And I was thinking that maybe we could‒”
And then Alex’s voice was muffled and, when Kyle looked over, they were very occupied with each other’s lips. Kyle huffed a laugh and pushed himself onto his feet and decided saying ‘ finally’ would ruin the mood.
“I’ll wait at the car, don’t stay too long or you might get security called on you,” he told them. Alex pulled out of the kiss long enough to laugh. His hands gripped Michael’s biceps and he squeezed.
“Come on, let’s just go home so we don’t have to stop again,” Alex said. Kyle scrunched up his nose, but he decided not to say anything more.
The drive home was pretty casual. Michael drove (for an alien, he was way too susceptible to car sickness) and Kyle rendered the passenger seat to Alex who shared the stories he could from his time in Qatar. He had developed a software for their embassay’s security a few years prior and they needed some updates as well as training their IT team how to work the updates, he’d said, and it gave him an opportunity to freshen up his Arabic. He’d spent most of his days at a computer.
If Michael and Alex held hands the whole time and bounced back and forth between who’s lap they belonged to, Kyle said nothing.
When they got to Alex’s, Kyle gave him a hug and they promised to go get lunch the next day. Then he gave Michael a nod before taking back the driver’s seat of his own damn car and started heading home, a smile finding his lips as he thought about it. Alex was happy. And not only that, but he and Michael were on good terms. Which was good.
Of course, he’d never admit it, but he kind of liked hanging out and working with the two of them.
It wasn’t until he got home, though, that he realized he had a text.
Michael Guerin: Thanks. You’re not as bad as you could be.
Kyle snorted and dropped his phone on the couch as he headed to the kitchen.
He was so glad Alex was back.
#malex#malex fic#michael guerin#alex manes#kyle valenti#roswell new mexico#my fic#HAPPY BIRTHDAYYYYY
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Okay so I just reblogged a thing talking about season 2 and 3 of Cobra Kai and I have some Thoughts about what they did to everyone’s character arcs in this so if you’d like a rant it’s under the cut with spoilers from all 3 seasons plus spoilers for all 3 Karate Kid movies
Okay so my issues start with one very key scene that I personally think fucked up the whole rest of the narrative, and by extension everyone else’s character arcs: which is from Different but Same. And no not that scene- not yet at least.
The first scene that I think fucked over the narrative and killed several character arcs was the beach scene. Miguel, reasonably distraught over the idea that Sam is hiding him from her dad(which she is actually doing to be fair), gets completely drunk and when Sam and Robby arrive together he loses it, pushes Sam and subsequently gets dumped. Now why do I think this ruined everything? It completely goes against Miguel’s character up to this point. Miguel is absolutely trying to mimic Johnny in a lot of key ways but also up to this point Miguel has also been Johnny’s conscience; he’s smart and kind and had not at all shown to be anything even close to what Johnny was in KK1. He’s stood up for his friends, defended the girl he likes from bullies, he’s a huge mama’s boy and a bit of a hopeless romantic. In no episode up until that point does he ever display any tendency towards unnecessary violence, despite Johnny’s “strike first” motto. Miguel getting wasted and violent does not add up in my mind. Miguel is supposed to be a narrative parallel to Daniel for fuck sake. Also, and this is my main complaint, there is no fucking reason for Miguel to immediately jump to the conclusion that Sam is seeing Robby- literally none. They look very much alike, hell Robby looks a little like Amanda honestly, he could very well be her cousin for all Miguel knows. Robby and Sam don’t even act like a couple in the shot- they’re literally just sitting next to each other at family dinner. None of this subplot makes any fucking sense.
And then, obviously, there’s the very next scene- Johnny goes with Daniel back to his place, tipsy and happy and seemingly in a very good place with each other. Then Robby shows up, Johnny loses his shit and Daniel proceeds to get pissed and kick Robby out.
Now there is one thing I point out about this scene whenever I talk about it that doesn’t add up: no where in this scene is it ever even implied that either Johnny or Daniel know about Robby’s original intentions. (Also nothing up till that point ever even establishes why Robby knows about Daniel and Johnny’s rivalry in the first fucking place for the record). There is no reason for Johnny to suspect that Daniel knew and was hiding it, or even that Robby was doing it on purpose, and there is no reason for Daniel to get mad or even suspect that Robby knew what he was doing or was lying about it; and the fact of the matter is that Robby never actually lied(also Daniel never fucking asked) about his home situation. His mom was neglectful and an addict, and his father wasn’t in the picture. That’s it, and none of that was a lie. Now I’m not sitting here and denying that what Robby did was wrong because it absolutely was-- it was manipulative and unfair to Daniel and he had a right to be angry when he found out it was the case but there is nothing to suggest that he didn’t just jump to conclusions. And also, personally, I don’t think any of that justifies kicking a teenager to the curb, and one that Daniel explicitly knows has no one and nothing to fall back on. Be angry, be furious with Robby, but leaving a teenager to fend for themselves is cruel and completely unjustifiable behavior from a grown ass adult(also there’s a whole can of worms involved in Daniel never trying to figure out where the fuck Robby’s parents are and letting him live there without an explanation but that’s for a different rant).
Now assume none of that weird subplot happens, there is another way to have the Robby and Miguel rivalry that would have made so much more fucking sense and it only hinges on one fucking thing- Robby enters the tournament. It could be with or without Daniel’s approval(maybe even with a KK3 parallel, but Daniel honestly seems pretty into the tournament these days so he’d probably be down for Robby joining and reping Miyagi-do), but all we need is for him to do it.
Robby gets there, and Johnny sees him, potentially rocking a Miyagi-do gi and can have his surprised/hurt moment with him and Daniel, even potentially a confrontation between them. We can also still have Miguel beating Robby in the tournament and having Johnny be conflicted about his son losing. Hawk can even still hurt him and give Johnny his “holy shit this is wrong” epiphany and Miguel not understanding why Johnny wants him to go easy on Robby. Robby can still be hurt and upset by thinking Johnny cares more about Miguel after he loses.
Okay now as for season 2? Assuming everything stays the same in season 1, I have one MAJOR complaint. Robby becoming Sam’s love interest; and no it’s not because I think Miguel and Sam should be an endgame couple when the show is over(I do but that’s beside the point) but because it turns Sam into a plot device. This carries over into season 3 where she starts dating Miguel again and apparently just never breaks it off with Robby which is such a dick move I can not for the life of me imagine Sam of all fucking people doing it. She isn’t perfect by any means but she’s also outspoken and and much more confident by that point and should not have had a problem breaking up with someone in an email. But I digress, back to season 2- the moment I saw that Sam and Robby were going to be a couple I immediately knew the writers fucked up. There was no build up for it, nothing in season 1 to foreshadow this as a possibility(Different but Same doesn’t count because that was a whiplash of an episode) and they just decided offhandedly to put her in the middle of Robby’s and Miguel’s rivalry. There was no reason to make them a couple other than to fuck with Miguel and set up the Tory & Sam rivalry which could have happened fucking anyway with the shit at the country club, the rift between Sam and Aisha, and Miguel’s ongoing feelings for Sam even after he’s dating Tory(also a dick move what the fuck Miguel??). Adding Robby as fuel to the fire was super unnecessary and all it did was set up the clusterfuck that was the season 2 finale.
And OH BOY was that finale a clusterfuck. First of all, as a prelude- Fuck. Daniel. He pulled the exact same shit as in season 1 with dumping Robby the second he does anything even a little bit wrong. But also, as a gut punch, Robby didn’t actually do anything wrong. What was he supposed to do at the party? He couldn’t stop Sam from drinking even though he wanted to, it was her (very poor) choice. But he did what he could, he kept an eye on her, and when the cops showed up, he didn’t just leave her, he put her in the car and drove her somewhere he thought she’d be safe without having to immediately face her father(who super fucking overreacted btw) while she was recovering. This scene, which could have been an excellent bonding moment for Johnny and Robby, and an introduction to Sam getting to know Johnny outside of her father’s influence, was turned into a brawl for no fucking reason.
Which leads me to the school fight. And right off the bat I’ve got to say this; even as, and maybe especially as, a person who has written post season 3 fix it fics, there is no way for Robby and Miguel to convincingly fix what happened in the season 2 finale. Yes, what Robby did was absolutely an accident and he has already done his time for it. But the elephant in the room is this: Miguel could have died. Or at the very least, been totally paralyzed. There is not a good way to come back from that. They will always have that hanging over their heads, even if they somehow reach an understanding. And I know someone is going to try and make the argument about that being a parallel to Johnny and Daniel in KK1, but if it is that it’s a terrible parallel. What Johnny did was supremely fucked up and I won’t deny that, especially with the Halloween scene and Daniel’s knee in the tournament(which actually was technically more Bobby’s doing, but I digress), but it was never “almost permanently disable/kill someone” bad. (Again there’s a whole can of worms to open about the shit with Chozen and Daniel’s seemingly pretty easy forgiveness of a man who tried to kill him because what the fuck?? But again that’s another rant.) But the writers wanted to push the envelope so now Johnny will always have the tug of war of choosing Robby, who he loves but who also really fucked up, and Miguel, who was the original reason for the rivalry in the first place but who was also the one who, again, almost died because of his son, even if he somehow fixes his relationship with both. It will always be “why did you pick him over me?” and Johnny will never have a good enough answer for either of them.
And finally the big complaint- Johnny completely regressing in season 3. Season 3 honestly felt like a rehashing of season 1 because we literally had to see him progress in his arc all over again from square fucking one. He still isn’t there for Robby, he’s still fucking up things with Miguel and his family, he’s still fucking up his relationship with Daniel, he still chooses to miss his appointment with Robby to see Miguel(who would have been there after the appointment and he could have seen him then), he abandons half of his fucking students to fend for themselves and leaves the other half with a man he knows is a dangerous psychopath. And yes we get the cool scene at the end of December 19, but is it worth it?? I’m genuinely asking because, as much as I love that scene, I really don’t believe it is.(edit: Also fuck that whole subplot with Eli and Demetri- you don’t get to just break the arm of the boy who was your best friend and just have that go away with no repercussions. Fuck. That. I hope Demetri gets at minimum an actual on screen apology, and hopefully Eli actually trying to make amends.)
We could have still had the big team up- have Johnny admit to Daniel that he’s fucked up and tell him everything that’s happening with Kreese. Have them join forces to defeat Kreese in the tournament. Have the dumb fucking bet. Introduce Terry Silver in season 4. Have Johnny’s and Daniel’s tenuous truce strained at every turn because they’re idiots. Do all of it. But y’know what? We could have had all of that- all of it- without it being at the expense of at least 2 character arcs; Johnny’s and also Robby’s.
Also before I end this I just have to add- nothing and I mean nothing will ever redeem Kreese or Silver for me. I do not give a singular shit about either of their tragic backstories, I just don’t. I get why and how Chozen got his redemption- he was a teenager when that shit happened, and while the shit he pulled is personally unforgivable in my opinion, he has actively been trying to redeem himself by spending the last however many decades making it up to his community. I’d even understand a Barnes redemption to an extent, even though I wouldn’t accept it, because he was also very young and being manipulated by, again, a dangerous psychopath. But Kreese and Silver? Abso-fucking-lutely not. They were two grown ass adults who purposefully targeted an 18 year old and put him through emotional and physical for weeks, paid someone to intimidate him through both threats of physical violence but also through vandalism, and gaslighted him and isolated him from the only family he had at the time because he beat them in a children’s karate competition. Look, I’m not sorry, I don’t give a fuck about Kreese’s tragic backstory, nothing about what Kreese has done can be rationalized by just saying “oh his mom and girlfriend died and he was in ‘Nam”. And any good thing he does for Tory, or even Robby, does not balance out all the harm he has caused. Silver is even less redeemable- I don’t care that he almost died in war, I’m an army brat I know plenty of people who almost died and don’t act like this. In canon we have evidence of him being completely, unrepentantly evil- the first scene with him in it has him basically confirmed as the BP of nuclear waste, he pays people so he can beat them up, he’s been personally funding Kreese’s child indoctrination classes. They could pull out the saddest backstory for him possible and I would not give a shit. And that’s fine. We don’t need every bad guy to have a tragic backstory- sometimes an evil villain can just be an evil villain for no reason, not all of them need a traumatic turning point that the authors shove in to make the audience sympathize with them. So please, writers, stop trying to make me feel sorry for them because I really don’t and I don’t understand anyone who does.
Okay rant over.
#cobra kai#karate kid#spoilers#johnny lawrence#daniel larusso#robby keene#miguel diaz#sam larusso#tory nichols#aisha robinson#eli moskowitz#john kreese#terry silver#demetri#chozen toguchi#mike barnes
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Story Headcanons: Orleans (Prelude - Section 2)
This was actually very interesting for me to write, since as I went on, I found more and more that it felt natural for Eva to be passive. At first I wasn’t sure why this felt so right, until I realized that I was having Eva dissociate herself from the present circumstances. While this isn’t a fic - so you don’t really have access to every thought going through her head, I hope that that comes across in this, even though I don’t have much personal experience with dissociation caused by past trauma.
That said, this is a relatively slow start a singularity, but I hope you guys enjoy it! I got it done a lot faster than expected, but I can’t say for sure when the next part will be done... Let’s just get to it!
Prelude
We should all be thankful that it is Fou who has taken it upon itself to wake Eva up, because if it was literally anyone else, she would likely be having a minor panic attack once again. After all, dreaming of evil Servants and people being burned alive is… Unnerving, to say the least. But she wakes up to Fou, meaning that Eva immediately tucks every disturbing theory about that dream away for later in favor of thinking about how damn adorable Fou is.
When Mash comes in, she’s surprised that Eva says she slept really well. While that’s not entirely true, since Eva was having to put up with what she’s classified for the moment as nightmares, she did go to sleep and wake up at reasonable hours for once, which is unusual. When Mash remarks that she’s glad Eva is finally getting sleep, Eva merely responds by saying that anyone with half a brain would sleep the night before they’re supposed to time travel to save the world.
Unlike many other times Eva’s had to sit through explanations, she pays extremely close attention to the entire briefing, wanting to make sure she doesn’t miss a word. She may be a theory expert, and she may have interrogated everyone she could about how Chaldea’s systems work, but there’s still room for her to screw everything up. Lucky for her, the rules around travelling to the singularities are a lot looser than normal rules for time travel that have been proposed in theory - this is because singularities will dissipate after you take away the source, which in this case is the Grail. Knowing that, Eva takes that as a permit to do whatever the hell she needs to so long as she gets the Grail out, which takes quite a bit of weight off her shoulders. Now she doesn’t have to worry about accidentally killing someone that needed to live in order for all of human history to proceed as normal.
She’s a bit concerned at the prospect of having to summon within the singularity - since there might not be catalysts, and she might be forced to do a normal summoning again - but she’s assured that if the summoning circle is properly established, she should be able to tap into the FATE system as smoothly as she does at Chaldea. Upon learning this, that concern promptly vanishes. Eva returns to being all determination.
We’re actually going to assume that Eva had been introduced to Da Vinci before this moment, since on our timeline it’s been at least a week or two in between singularities, and Eva spent a good few days of that time in the command room, not sleeping. There’s no way she hasn’t met Da Vinci yet. She accepted Da Vinci’s physical appearance really quickly, especially after hearing the reasoning behind it. To her, it makes perfect sense that a Heroic Spirit, given the chance, would choose their ideal appearance as their form when summoned. Also, for our purposes, we will be using female pronouns for Da Vinci. (I reblogged a post about trans characters in Fate recently that offers a basic explanation of why I will stay firm in this decision.)
She’s very grateful to actually have a coffin for rayshifting this time, to say the least. The last thing she wants is for there to be a mishap and for her to die in the process. So she hops in there without hesitation and and rayshifts away to save humanity.
Section 1: Land of the Hundred Years’ War
This time, Eva’s reaction upon safely rayshifting is not to panic. She’s once again glad to find that Fou tagged along - even if it means having one more life to protect along the way. And she’s very grateful that it appears they’ve landed in a very peaceful area this time - the seemingly endless rolling fields is a welcome change from everything being on fire. It doesn’t hurt to breathe, the breeze makes sure that the sunlight won’t cause her to overheat, the sky is gorgeou- The sky.
And… There’s a big ring of light in the sky. That’s not normal. However, without concrete proof on what it is, she can’t even begin to try to trace it back to anything she already knows about. Even Roman admits that he doesn’t have any real idea, which isn’t very helpful.
There it is again. She’s forgetting something. If she could just remember it she’d know what’s going on. But she can’t remember… Why can’t she just remember?
She does her best to not focus on how annoying that is, snapping back to the moment as she and Mash begin the trek towards the nearest civilization… If there is any. Fortunately, they do run into what appear to be humans - French soldiers, to be exact. She’s glad that there are humans this time around, but still warns Mash about trying to interact with them at all. They don’t know what’s going on here yet. And they don’t exactly look like they’re of the era. There’s a fairly high chance that they won’t be able to negotiate.
Sure enough, they end up having to fight them. Eva is already sick of this. It clearly wasn’t that we aren’t speaking French. We should have just avoided them in the first place. I told you we should have just not tried to approach them…
Of course, she does make sure to check in with Mash after they get out of there, since every fight leaves both of them at risk of further injury. She was fortunate enough this time to not have to do anything that put her at risk… But the same can’t be said for Mash. Things seem to be okay, though.
Why the hell would they think following them is a good idea? They just fought them. That’s a horrible idea. But she’s also not in charge, so the least she can do is follow orders and try to mitigate potential damage.
Section 2: Chase the French Soldier
Upon reaching the fort, the sheer amount of injured immediately sends Eva’s mind into overdrive. The war is supposed to be having a respite at the moment. Yes, the possibility of there still being skirmishes is still there, as Mash points out, but this doesn’t look like the result of skirmishes. Skirmishes leave people with mostly minor injuries that’ll heal, at worst, in a month or two, given the time period. Maybe some people get major injuries. Skirmishes don’t leave a fort crippled like this. Skirmishes don’t put soldiers on such high alert that they attack the second there’s even a tiny chance of a possible threat. Yes, she and Mash look strange, but they weren’t displaying hostile behavior. If the war was truly in respite… Wait. What if the war isn’t in respite?
Lucky for them, the soldiers don’t attempt to attack this time around, and her theory is confirmed, be it while bringing in another complication. There was no peace treaty, and therefore no respite. But that’s because the king got killed by evil Jeanne d’Arc. While England having retreated is good - less enemies to deal with - she starts worrying very intensely upon hearing all of this. She knew history would be screwed with but this is more than that. This is history being warped so badly that it’s almost unrecognizable.
And then there’s another attack, seemingly out of nowhere. Great. At least they didn’t provoke this one. And oh great more skeletons look at that. Kill those, make sure everyone’s okay, done. How many times is she going to have to do this? At least fighting actual servants is well… Interesting. Dangerous, but it requires a lot more thought than just bashing piles of bones.
Eva is actually somewhat skeptic about the Jeanne situation. Her coming back from the dead is something she can believe, after all, Servants exist. But for her to come back and actively attack France? That just doesn’t seem right. Heroic Spirits record heroes at their best, or what they’re remembered for. Jeanne is remembered as a saint, as a savior of France. It doesn’t add up. And then there’s the change in physical appearance the soldier mentions… It could be linked back to it, but it could also be a dead giveaway that this isn’t actually Jeanne, but rather someone posing as Jeanne. Or Jeanne was corrupted in some way, like what happened in Fuyuki. But the circumstances here seem very different, so that’s less likely.
It doesn’t matter what the truth is, all of those are bad, and they need to save France regardless of which it turns out to be.
And then there’s the wyverns. Those… Should not be there. So let’s make them not there. At least they aren’t skeletons. Of course… They fly. That’ll make things difficult. But she can manage-
And oh great another person showed up. Not a person. A Servant. On their side. Well that certainly happened faster than last time. The stress Eva’s was feeling dies down a little at the prospect of more allies. This is a bad situation, but at least something good has happened.
And then the fight actually starts. It’s… Surprisingly short. Between the soldiers, Mash, and the other Servant, she barely has to do anything other than give orders and heal the wounds afterwards. She doesn’t know how to feel about that. Either those wyverns weren’t all they were cracked up to be, or Mash is just stronger and better prepared than she was in Fuyuki. She’d like to think it’s the second option.
Mash gets her to genuinely giggle with the mention of attacking Roman as revenge for the sweets. It’s funny to think about but well… Probably not the best idea. She might laugh, but she’ll also be sure to tell Mash that she doesn’t think it’s necessary. Of course, if Mash wants to take it upon herself… She’s free to do so, provided she doesn’t kill Chaldea’s director.
And look at that it’s Jeanne. At this point Eva really doesn’t feel like she’s… You know. There. She feels like her body is there, but mentally, she’s not. She’s not back at Chaldea either. She’s not back in the normal world. Her mind is just… Observing. It all feels foggy, like she’s drifting in a void, and just going along with what other people say because she doesn’t feel like fighting back. She doesn’t feel like being there. The last time she was there, she got hurt. The last time she really fought, it only made things worse. There’s no harm to going with Jeanne. She doesn’t seem hostile right now. It’s the only lead they have.
We’ve got tags!
@contractgreen @panyum @withanina @campanulabell @delfinaschiffer @princessaslan @armageddon25 @patproductions @xviicprc @eldritch-flowers @rankeluck @areeta9 @bitter–edge @uncommoncritter @blackcherrybombbomb @bluefiren7 @dtgvxg @velkiibo
#fgo#fate grand order#mastersona#gudasona#my writing#f/go#fate go#fate/grand order#fate/go#oc#fgo oc#Eva#mashu kyrielite#headcanons#story mode hcs#orleans#first singularity#things can only get worse from here#she's already dissociating#what will happen next#tune in next time to find out
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newfragile yellows [1038]
Ellana watches with narrowed eyes as the Iron Bull casually starts to arrange her clothes near the fire so that they can warm. He straightens each garment out and lays it flat, or hangs it over the wooden chair he’s dragged towards the fireplace.
“Why are you being nice?” Ellana pulls a blanket around her shoulders, shuffling down the bed towards him. Is he trying to steal one of the vials of dragon’s blood the Inquisitor gave her? Is that it? She already told him no. She doesn’t think he’d resort to stealing it out of her pockets while she’s indisposed. “What’s wrong with you?”
Bull laughs, “I can’t just be nice?”
“No,” Ellana spits out, “You’re never just nice. What’s the catch?”
Bull glances at her over his shoulder before he returns to arranging her cloak over the back of the chair. “Watch it, Wolf. You’re going to hurt my feelings if you keep talking like that. I can be nice. I can be plenty nice. Ten minutes ago I was being very, very nice to you.”
“You aren’t arranging my clothes for me just because I let you put your mouth on me this one time,” Ellana retorts. “What’s the matter with you? Are you dying? Am I dying?”
Ellana casts a glance around the room. She’d politely told the Wolf to fuck on off when she decided earlier today that yes, she’d give Bull’s previous suggestion of a new type of physical intimacy a shot. But if the she’s actually dying she’s pretty sure the Wolf would have stuck around anyway.
No god to be seen.
Ellana pokes out a tendril of magic.
No god to be felt.
If he’s not here now she’s not going to try calling him.
Ellana leans against the footboard, trying to assess the Iron Bull for clues.
“I can be nice,” Bull repeats. “Not everything is transactional, Wolf. I got you a cat for your birthday. You don’t see me asking for anything in return. I’m not even asking you to stop using your cat against me like a projectile weapon.”
Ellana scowls. “Usually when you go out of your way to be nice to me it turns around to bite me in the ass. Do not literally turn around to try and bite me in the ass.”
There’s an audible click when Bull shuts his mouth against the lewd joke he was probably about to make.
“You’re nice to me when the situation arises,” Ellana admits. “You’re nice to people when it suits you and when the opportunity is in front of you to be. But you don’t go out of your way to find those opportunities.”
He can’t see her with his back to the bed, but Ellana finds herself pointing anyway.
“I don’t think you normally get out of bed after sex to start arranging your partner’s clothes so they’re nice and warm,” Ellana says. “If you’re getting out of bed I would wager it’s so you could leave.”
“I’m not leaving, and I’m not doing this because you agreed to try something in bed,” Bull says. “And you know I don’t lie to you. So you can conclude that I’m being nice just because.”
“You’re not nice just because,” Ellana protests, scouring her mind for any other explanation for this bizarre behavior. “Wait. No.” Ellana presses her thumb to the dip between her brows. “You’re nice when you’ve done something. What did you do?”
Bull slowly rises to his feet, walking over to run his hand through her hair. The heat of his palm feels good over her forehead, her hair.
“I’m being nice,” Bull says, “Because I feel like it. You’re reading too deep into it.”
Ellana pushes his hand off and flops down, pulling some more blankets around herself as she thinks. Bull picks her up and pulls her against his side, trying to take a few blankets for himself. She allows this, but she also pointedly kicks a few she hadn’t been using at him.
Bull laughs as he reaches for those, too, leaving her to think.
There’s no holiday or occasion coming up that she can recall, but Bull’s head is better for dates than she is so she can’t be sure. It could be that. But it’s unlikely.
This could be the prelude to him asking her to do something. But Bull’s rarely done that before. In fact, Ellana doesn’t think he’s ever done that before. If Bull wants something from her he just asks her. And Ellana will either say yes or no, and that’s it. Well. Sometimes Ellana will argue that there’s someone better equipped to do it, but then Bull will explain why it has to be her. And then Ellana will try to argue some more, but they both know that she’s going to do it anyway. Or. Bull will drop it immediately and never speak it of again unless Ellana brings it up herself.
Chances are he's done something and she’s going to find out soon. Or he’s about to do something and he’s trying to butter her up so she doesn’t get quite as upset with him as she would normally. That’s entirely plausible. He’s done that before. But not like this. Normally his attempts at bribery take the form of him laying low, lulling her into some sense of passive serenity, before he springs it on her.
“I’m going to get self-conscious,” Bull says, leaning his chin on top of her head. “Am I really such a shitty person that I can’t just be nice to you because I want to?”
Ellana presses one of her knuckles to her lips, her teeth.
“Hush, I’m thinking,” Ellana mutters.
“I need to re-evalutate this current persona,” Bull says, “Apparently I forgot to work in that the Iron Bull is capable of being nice.”
“You’re nice,” Ellana sighs, “But this kind of nice is very unusual and it’s put me on my guard.”
“I promise you, this is just because I felt like it,” Bull says. “It’s nothing more, nothing less. You can stop reading into it. There’s other things to talk about. Like if you found tonight’s experience okay.”
“It was wet,” Ellana deadpans. “And unhygienic. We both need a bath. Right now.”
“So we aren’t doing it again?”
“I don’t know. Probably not. You can find someone else to do that with, though, I’m sure.” Ellana shrugs. “Are you sure you aren’t up to something? No guilty conscience you’re trying to make up for?”
“If there is something to make up for then even I don’t know about it,” Bull replies. “But moving forward I’m going to have to try to be extra nice to you because you’re being very weird about me being nice right now.”
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Prelude
With Volume 7 just beyond the horizon, I figured to look back at my thoughts for Volume 5 and, through more cooled down eyes, boil down why I consider it to be the worst volume of RWBY. When I wrote my review of Volume 5, it was literally the night the episode premiered, so I was boiling. But now? I’m going to look through the review with fresher eyes and clarify what sort of problems I had with RWBY.
First, a bit of backstory. There was an interview made during the summer in between Volumes 4 & 5 that had the cast say what sort of themes one could expect for Volume 5. Among these were stuff like “building yourself back up again”, “shouting ‘we’re not done here!’”, “solving problems on your own”, and lastly, from Barbara herself, “Strength” and “Growth”. For someone who was just starting to realize why people were turned off by the darkness of Volume 3, this was uplifting to say the least…
Shorts
The Character Shorts kinda hyped the Volume, though they sunk in their own way. Weiss’s Character Short effectively foreshadowed her loss to Vernal. This tough and talented girl gets her ass stomped rather quickly and needed to be bailed out. Winter’s line about how she “won’t be around to save her” was foreshadowing to her not actually being in the season, but when I first heard it, I thought she meant “Hey, I’m going to die this volume, lol!” and that’s without bringing up how the trailer fails to hype Weiss up like the other trailers did.
Blake’s Trailer was alright, especially in taking steps to address a problem regarding Menagerie, but it felt more like Ilia given the backstory dump we got that feels all the more like mandatory reading. The problem is that, and it’s perhaps the very first problem I’ve heard about RWBY, is that the trailers (and by extension, anything that’s a spin off of RWBY like World of Remnant) feel more like you need to watch this rather than you can watch this. It’s confusing, but let’s use Blake’s Short as an example.
Ilia talks about her backstory as it is contrasted with a chase between Blake and a random dude we never see again. Assuming you’ve never watched the trailer, you’d just get the truncated version of “MUH PARENTS ARE DEEEAAAD!” and not the bits where she was forced to resent her own race because it was easier to blend in to her surroundings, like a chameleon. It’s ironic, since RWBY would do the reverse problem with Adam, where his trailer isn’t mandatory but we barely get a backstory for him beyond “I got branded, but everyone will speculate that it’s because I did something bad and not that it drove me to do bad things”.
Lastly, there’s Yang’s short, which had the minor hiccup of contrasting what an interview said about running out of Aura means you can’t use your Semblance. The Aura thing is something that can be discussed for another day, but the basics you should take away from this is that, for some time, people didn’t know how running out of Aura is symbolized. Most people take the flickering as the signal as the next hit on those guys are usually the one that does them in. As such, you had this huge debate on what kind of flickering means Aura broken and what just meant Aura is low, which, personally, could have been avoided if the writers and/or animators just utilized that Aura dust thing (seen prominently in the Bumblebee vs Adam fight) as their definitive “aura broken” animation instead of just using it some of the time.
First Episode
The first episode proper promised a lot. In fact, a good chunk of the first half promised a lot. However, it became much clear in a second viewing that a lot of it was just padding at worst and showing us where the characters are at best. But what I think was done dirty the most in this episode was introducing Mistral. We were hyped in Volume 4 (thanks to World of Remnant) that Mistral was this dichotomy of rich, cultural people and the seedy underbelly of criminals and that, at least one of the elements would be utilized in Volume 5. Unfortunately, all we got were a few mat paintings that contrast what Lionheart was saying in regards to Mistral being in chaos.
And so, the most we get out of Mistral are those mat paintings and a perpetually raining downtown that we don’t see much of, even when it gets briefly revisited in Volume 6. We’re supposed to be invested in the city and yet all we get are empty rooms and 2D art. They took great steps to improve this in Volume 6 with Argus, though, so if there’s any consolation, it’s that they learned from their mistakes here.
But we now get into the biggest problem of why Volume 5 is disliked. Because of the situation, the group are left to basically wait until Lionheart convinces the council to get them some Huntsmen. The heroes. Wait. In a volume where the writers were talking about the themes of improving yourself and pulling through with your own strength.
Do you guys see the problem here? I know people have bitched about Volume 5 to hell and back and you’ve probably heard the complaints to high noon, but this entire issue is what rots Volume 5 to the core the most. Not the piss poor fight scenes, not the inconsistent characterizations, it’s that the plotting decides to take a back seat when the volume was meant to be about taking action.
As the episode goes on, you see the problem unfold. Ruby and friends hit a dead end until Oscar appears and has Ozpin exposit things to them, Weiss is denied a chance to save people and fight the Grimm until the Grimm come to her, Blake is hit with the dead end of the Albains deflecting blame, and Yang had the chance encounter with Bakugou where he knows the hideout of her mom.
The closest person who is taking action here is Yang, who established that she is actively looking for Ruby (technically Raven, but as we see later on, moot point). Blake’s situation is being handled by her dad, Weiss is sitting in the plane until the Grimm come for her, and Ruby is sitting on the couch that I’m pretty sure has her grooves molded into the cushion with how many times she’s sat there.
Episode 2
A minor complaint before we go to Episode 2, we had the Stinger repeat itself because the crew thought that people wouldn’t see the stingers. This is the show, mind you, that makes a point to include scenes at the end of every volume, regardless of how long they are or what point they serve in hyping the next Volume. Hell, one of the major complaints about Volume 2 was about the stinger not mattering. So why did they suddenly decide that the viewers might not see the stinger in a culture where the MCU exists?
Alright, cooling things down, we have three major scenes in Episode 2. Salem’s chat with Lionheart was meh at best and wtf at worst. I get the idea of Salem using different approaches to get people to do what she wants, but the cool aspect of Salem was that her approach was not what a villain would normally be. Instead of berating or choking her minions should they fail or talk back, Salem instead talks people down like she’s a mother to them. Even when Tyrian fails, she doesn’t hurt him, but rather tell him that he disappointed her. So, having her choke Lionheart, even when in hindsight it made some sense, is kinda an odd thing to do.
But not as odd as Salem’s whole “Not you, Arthur” bit. A lot of people drew points to that and the best I can explain is that it’s either a typo (she’s meant to say not yet or not now) or Arthur and Watts are some sort of Jekyll & Hyde thing. Unfortunately, it seems Watts is more a parallel to Watson rather than Jekyll, so that brings me to believe that it’s a typo and so, rather than have an easy explanation for a problem, we just have a compounded problem. One of many.
And there’s something funny to be said about Salem warning Cinder about Silver Eyes when Ruby barely learns about it this Volume. And also that she wants to speak with Tyrian but we never see what comes of it. At all.
I only have one new thing about Weiss vs. the Bees. Originally, the pilot was supposed to be gay, but held off on it because they’d be killing off their first revealed gay character, something that wouldn’t look good to the fanbase. Now, while I understand the reason behind it, I have to question the logic behind why they think it isn’t okay for their first LGBT character to be offed, but instead be someone who seemed okay with murdering her crush’s parents while sending said crush to her abuser.
But more on that later, we have Sienna to discuss. Now, there’s a lot to dissect. For one, RT has obviously realized that they’ve messed up and brought Sienna back for a bit (while taking the heat for “if she’s so badass, why did she go out like a chump”). However, in hindsight, what purpose did she actually serve outside of some cute nod to Shere Khan?
All she did was tell Adam that he’s going too far and that’s it. And really, it just seems hypocritical for the leader of the White Fang to effectively restructure the organization into a terrorist group, murder tons of people, and then suddenly back away and say “woah, too much” when Adam proceeded to help torch Beacon. It’s to the point where one question most people want to ask at cons is “did Sienna order the hit out on the SDC”, since we don’t actually know and that it could be a radical leader of that quadrant like Adam.
It felt more like Sienna should have been just the leader of Mistral’s White Fang faction instead of ruling over all the White Fang, which would make more sense as Adam would need permission to attack a kingdom that isn’t his stomping ground. Then there’s the introduction of Hazel, who at first is presented to be a pretty decent character, not wanting to kill people if he had no choice, but as time goes on, is basically your stock “big soft guy with a secret hulk side” character.
Unfortunately, this episode didn’t help enforce the theme of taking action when it’s the villains who are doing it and seeming to be two if not twenty steps ahead of the heroes.
Episode 3
Episode 3 has that whole speech thing I overlooked. Barring Ghira’s speech that the crew said is based off Obama’s “we killed Osama” speech (which, if it is, paints the whole situation of Sienna’s death in a rather dark light) before Ilia interferes. Now, I actually liked that Menagerie is hesitant to stand up for Haven. After all, humans hated their guts so much that the island was originally planned to be a place where people could dump Faunus on. There were lynchings and enslavements that are still going on to this day, just in subtler forms, Of course the Faunus wouldn’t want to fight.
Then Ilia swoops in and robs Blake of any agency she has with the scene. If RT wanted to not let Blake convince the people until three quarters to the end, they should have cut the subtlety and have some annoying kid go “IT’S TOO EARLY IN THE PLOT TO DO YOUR SPEECH!”. Hell, let Blake tell her story about her team, but the audience balks at the fact that she’s not only friends with a Schnee, but also a human who crippled a guy on live television. Remember that plot point?
We then cut to Oscar and this is perhaps the reason I decided to do this revisit of Volume 5. The way Ozpin talks of action and resolve, it felt like we’re going to the root of the themes of taking action. No more being subject to the events of the plot like in previous Volumes. Now? Now is the time to fight back! And that built up to… what? One training scene and Ruby learning headbutt?
Granted, we see later on that there was a bit more to the plan, but for the most part, it seemed like an excuse for “character growth” as opposed to actual character growth. A training arc isn’t just some short scenes of a person lifting weights and jogging up stairs. Its meant to be a sort of means of growth for the character. There’s a reason most training montages have the character suck at first, but then get better by the time the montage ends. It’s because it’s the quickest way to show growth. But even without that, you could get some serious mileage for a pulled off training arc.
Rocky IV and Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back have some good examples of it. Rocky IV had the titular hero train and work out in the middle of a cold, mountainous range, while his opponent is simply given steroids. It shows the dichotomy between the two and how they view their eventual fight. Empire, on the other hand, had that masterful scene with Luke in the cave, where he has a huge moment of both foreshadowing and character growth.
Here? We just have Ruby learn headbutt like she’s nothing more than a Pokemon. There could have been a lot more done with it, like having Ruby put a lot more force in her punches, causing others to realize she’s extremely angry about what happened to Pyrrha and Penny, or, if the need to exposit about Semblances is needed, bring something new to the table that isn’t going to confuse the fuck out of people… Something like:
“Your Semblance might not reveal itself until you need it most” or something like that. Not “A semblance is someone’s personality, but not. Wow! Exposition!” or “Hey, remember how we said Aura was passive? Welp, not anymore!”
Not to mention that Jaune is seemingly cool with Ozpin suddenly coming back from the dead. Here’s the thing, last Volume had him upset with Ozpin about what happened to Pyrrha, something that didn’t seemed to resolve itself. Keep in mind that, for all rights and merits, Jaune believed Ozpin to have died. In fact, it was that confirmation that Ozpin had lost against Cinder that convinced Pyrrha to kill herself. Now here he is, seemingly stuck in the body of another kid and he just outright said this is a normal thing for him.
You’d expect him to have something more than “golly!”. The fact that he didn’t seem to have any aggression towards Ozpin until after he ran to his hidey hole in Volume 6 seems rather odd given that his entire character is that he’s angsting about Pyrrha and angry at Cinder for what she did. The group seem rather content to just sit back and let the plot happen, which is the opposite of what the crew was trying to convey with their themes.
Episode 4 and Episode 5
I still stand by what I said regarding how Episode 4 was a good episode, finally having a reunion between two members of Team RWBY, but it’s perhaps one of the last good things about RWBY we’ll ever see in Volume 5. Because Raven’s promise to tell Yang “the whole truth” turns out to just be regurgitated exposition at worst.
But first, we need to have Blake, the woman who doesn’t want her race to be labeled, turn out to have labels for her friends. Okay, granted, it’s not that dumb but it is kinda patronizing that we need to have a character tell us what another character is. While the rest of her speech is pretty effective in defining Blake’s character, making her perhaps the only character these themes of growth and strength actually apply to, it still is annoying that the most we take away out of this is her boiling down every character to a single word, then bringing up how Adam is going to ruin everything for the Faunus. You’ll see why this is a problem later. I liked the setting of Menagerie’s Shallow Sea marketplace thing and felt like Menagerie is wasted potential.
Ruby’s whole speech still feels like damage control, but with the added complaint of Ruby deciding to blame Salem for something Cinder did. Now, I heard the common excuse a lot: “Salem told Cinder to do it so it’s all her fault”, but that problem with that? Cinder told Emerald to kill Penny. So… Yeah. It is her fault. Hell, I wouldn’t have minded this if Ruby didn’t word it like Salem personally killed Penny and Pyrrha. Like as in, she just up and appeared out of nowhere and shot both Penny and Pyrrha in the head.
It still doesn’t fix the fact that Ruby is basically “hey, remember how I’m supposed to be upset?”
Lastly for Episode 5, we have the White Fang do the brilliant plant of murdering the chieftain who just spoke out against them. It’s dumb. Extremely dumb. What the hell do they think will happen after they murder the chieftain in cold blood? Menagerie is just gonna magically bend over and obey the White Fang? But perhaps the biggest waste is the White Fang in general.
You have these two sneaky fox brothers who seemingly oversee everything and even state that they’re only letting Adam do what he wants until he’s no longer of use to them, a buff bat dude, and a spider-lady… And they’re never seen again after this Volume. I get the idea, because RT is trying to wrap up the Faunus subplot as quickly as possible, but the problem that you can’t exactly introduce new characters or hidden depths if you’re just gonna throw them out with the bath water.
If they wanted to end the subplot, why did they put all the effort in some random characters that are just gonna be defeated off screen with a tea tray? Then again, this is a problem endemic to RWBY. Introduce this character, then quickly shoo them away before you’re committed to writing a plot for them. If you know you were going to half-ass the White Fang conclusion, why bother with stuff like more White Fang members or the SDC brand? In fact, why bother with the White Fang to begin with if you’re going to do so little with them?
Episode 6
Moving on before I lose my cool, we have Qrow aimlessly walking around downtown Mistral. Now, the crew said that Maria was supposed to be here… But… Why? What purpose would she serve? If she’s just gonna be a “hey, look, cameo to foreshadow Volume 6”, then that’s a horrible purpose. You know how most Cinematic Universes tanked because they spent more time hyping the next twenty movies when they should focus on their pilot? That’s what she would have been like.
Not to mention that she would have been caught in the crossfire of why Volume 5 was bad. “So here we have this random old lady who doesn’t matter at all to the plot so why is she even there” and then “Oh wow, she’s a SEW. They’re doing damage control to justify her unneeded presence in Volume 5”. And, don’t get me wrong, Maria is a fun lady and all that, but there needs to be a reason she was there beyond “hype for next Volume”.
What makes the problem worse was that they’re planning to include Maria so as to have a sort of Yoda to teach Ruby. This makes the complaint of “why didn’t Ruby ask about the Silver Eyes” even more of a complaint because now it seems like they decided “hey, we’re going to address it next volume, so let’s not bother bringing it up here”. Which is even worse than “hey, people noticed we didn’t address this so let’s completely invent this character for the sole purpose of addressing it!”
And then there’s Raven who is all “lol, I know more than you realize but I’m not actually gonna answer anything trolololololol” AARHG!
Okay. Okay. Before I completely lose my marbles, there’s one thing about the scene with Raven that’s stupid.
It’s the “there’s no such thing as magic” thing.
Okay. I get it. Turning into a bird is something that, in the world of RWBY, seems impossible. But there’s a ton of problems with this:
What makes summoning dead Grimm to fight for you so much more different than magic?
You’re willing to believe in magic rocks that augment your fighting style and are in fact part of a company that profits off magic rocks, yet turning into a bird is the messed up thing?
The guy who gave her this ability is currently inhabiting the body of a young boy and has said to basically devour his soul in due time, as well as create the magic that’s responsible for torching your school and your friend… And the BIRD is the most messed up thing!?
“But Raven made it sound like she was forced into it”. She didn’t seem to have any fucking problem with it though. Not only that, but it didn’t seem like a big dark secret that Ozpin wouldn’t want uncovered. In fact, he even said he gave Qrow and Raven the ability to turn into birds in an amused way.
Even more so when everyone but Yang seemed to respond to it with disbelief rather than outright anger. There’s a reason this whole bird issue was made fun of in Jello’s “So This is Basically RWBY” video.
Also, before we move onto Episode 7, I wanna bring up that the scene where Qrow visits the Shields is perhaps the reason why I hold Ozpin’s censorship of Lionheart’s role in the Battle of Haven to be one of the most scumbag moves he could have made. “Your mom’s dead, but don’t worry, the guy who sold her out is a hero!”
Episodes 7-10
Right, back to Episode 7. Okay, I’ll admit, it was a nice reunion scene all things considered, albeit with some rather unnerving things like Yang asking Weiss if she let the Boarbatusk skewer the trophy wife or even the dumb, patronizing “we haven’t made character arcs for us to go through so I’ll just say we had some”, since they had the great idea to use Ren, who is voiced by Monty’s brother, as the mouthpiece for that.
Unfortunately, this is the episode I always think back to when I think of Volume 5. The perfect epitome of a slow, monotonous Volume. The problem I have is that, yeah, it’s meant to be this breather episode, a calm before the storm, but this just feels like a long lull that’s made even more insulting with the cliffhanger. All it has is people dumping exposition that viewers have either figured out or weren’t even burning questions and I think the awkward silence that followed Ozpin saying how he was the wizard that gave the Maidens his power is the perfect epitome for just how boring the volume is. The dude just revealed a massive plot twist and it’s treated as nothing more than a “did you know” factoid.
While I liked how they addressed that Blake leaving Yang would have had some serious negative emotions in Yang, it felt rather half-assed that they basically resolved it with “hey, my mom’s drunk, so shut up and accept Blake the moment she comes back”, especially since it comes from Weiss, who told Blake at the end of Volume 1 that if she ever runs away again, she best let RWBY know. If they wanted to ship Bumblebee so badly, this would have been a great hurdle for them to come across instead of just “hey, let me resolve this plot for you”.
Now, the whole thing with Ilia… Let’s get the elephant out of the way. The way they revealed her sexuality, I feel, could have been done better. “You wanna know why I’m gonna kill your parents and bring you to your abuser? Because I wanted you to look at me like a lover!” There’s a reason why some fans label her as a “psycho lesbian”.
However, I want to bring up that Rooster Teeth did an excellent job at building tension during the climax of the Menagerie Arc. Sure, the cliffhangers were tiresome, but you couldn’t help but admit you were at the edge of your seat and it even did a good job at subversion. Even if they allegedly didn’t even intend for it to happen.
The constant dryness of exposition and dialogue exchanges is what made Episode 10 so much better than the other episodes. Not just because it’s action-orientated, but because it finally tries to get back to the themes that it was originally supposed to tell. Throughout the entirety of the middle portion of Volume 5, the group basically took a backseat and allowed characters and plots to happen to them rather than advocate for themselves. The closest thing we got to the theme of “building yourself back up” is Weiss talking to Yang about Blake.
In fact, the only actual characters taking action are the villains. Constantly roadblocking the cast, setting them in for a trap, and even aiming to screw each other over. These guys have more advocacy and agency than the main characters. The most any of them did was…
Burn down their own house and blamed everyone else for it, all while saying that the house is the message Adam wants to send.
Use a girl’s unrequited feelings towards them to their advantage, straddle them, and guilt tripped her enough for her to consider switching sides.
Cry about how things are not going their way until their hands start magically glowing.
Yelling at someone until they cry bitch tears and then have them run away without even bothering to close the door leading to the dangerous artifact everyone had been working so hard to keep out of enemy hands.
In the volume where the theme is “solving problems on our own”. Just because Yang drops the word strength a few times when bitching out at Raven doesn’t mean that the theme had been accomplished. In fact, they do nothing of their own accord and just follow a script. Even Ozpin, the supposed smartest guy in all of Remnant, doesn’t even bother to figure out a way to counter the trap. Just instead walk in. Hell, if Yang didn’t spot Raven, they’d be mulched.
But, back on track. Episode 9 was an entire waste that failed to pay off the expectations of what we had with the cliffhanger set up in Episode 7. “But it subverted your ex-” NO. There’s a good way to subvert expectations and being promised a fight after episodes of bland exposition only to have it be “lol, no, it’s just gonna be more talking” is not a good subversion.
No. Here’s a better way. Set up the cliffhanger like normal, but don’t show Cinder’s dragged out negotiation with Raven. Instead, have her “allying” with Cinder be a twist. That way, people’s expectations for what happened are actually, you know, subverted?
The Battle of Haven
But, you know where this is leading to… The Battle of Haven. Really, I don’t think I can say anything that hasn’t been covered by someone else. We all know it makes all the Vytal fights look like masterpieces by comparison, we all know the jokes about useless Weiss or Lionheart hogging the staircase, or even the plot holes of Raven knowing Cinder’s arm being Grimm but doing nothing about it or Blake, despite spending the past volume saying how Adam must be stopped, suddenly doesn’t care about him…
So let me cut it simply:
The reason this battle sucks might have to do with the crunch.
We don’t know how long this issue with Rooster Teeth had been going on for, but if it is indeed what people say it is and that animators don’t get paid for the last quarter or third of their work, then that might explain all the cut corners animators and writers made. Why the fights are broken up into one on ones or why fights are cut out entirely. Maybe they weren’t getting paid enough and thus, the quality of RWBY suffered as a result of it.
And that’s perhaps the shittiest thing about the Battle of Haven. It could have been this epic fight that would have made up for all the boring, drawn out scenes of exposition and chatting, but because Rooster Teeth got too greedy or even because of our own impatience (which, again, isn’t helped by the aforementioned long, drawn out scenes), we are treated to a final battle so broken and tiresome that the Battle of Winterfell manages to be a better final battle, with the only thing holding it back being that Haven had a better identity twist.
And if, for whatever reason, it isn’t due to crunch issues, then we have another problem. This was meant to be this hyped up rematch between the heroes and villains, who haven’t seen each other since the latter ruined the lives of the former. This would have been excellent to see how the killers of Jaune and Ruby’s friends would interact with them, how Yang would react to the person who framed her, even how the group had grown since their last battle…
But… if crunch wasn’t to blame for the quality dip and the writers intended for the fight to go the way it went… I have to say… What the fuck were they thinking!? So many moments could have been brought up here and yet they decided that they weren’t important enough to focus on! And now, with this battle over and done with, those moments lost their luster. If they decide to bring them up, it’d be too little, too late at best and “why the fuck are you bringing this up now” at worst.
I’ll deal with one commonly used example to get what I mean. Adam was established in Volume 3 to be a threat only made strong because he uses Blake’s emotions against her and has a Semblance that lets him dish out aura-breaking damage. Blake easily defeats Adam and has him on the ropes, only to let him run with a few excuses that some people have debated to death and back, when it would have been much easier for Blake to have to choose between apprehending Adam and helping Yang. Then, when he inevitably returns to haunt Blake next volume, suddenly he’s a threat that Blake is afraid of again despite Blake having “grown” to oppose him.
They wanted that “triumph” over him, but realize that by doing so, they’ve burned that opportunity to have the triumph be meaningful. Same goes with Emerald and Mercury. They had a good opportunity for Ruby to effectively call them out for their crimes like how Jaune did to Cinder, but instead she just headbutts Mercury. Yang had at least some closure on her arc with Mercury, but it was meh.
The Point in All of This
Hell, speaking of wasted opportunities, the reunion of Team RWBY, something that the opening had hyped and one that the fans had been waiting for since Volume 3 ended, is nothing more than an afterthought. They couldn’t even be assed to show Blake’s first fight back with Ruby and Weiss. That’s how little they cared. It’s like everyone was just wanting to get that paycheck but they needed to rush that final episode out the door and also need to make room for Gen:Lock and Nomad trailers. They didn’t even care about the stinger, as they basically ignored any sort of information relating to the stinger.
Perhaps the biggest reason why Volume 5 sucked so hard was that it was running off the heels of Volume 3. Everyone basically accepted that Volume 4 was meant to be a breather Volume, with lower stakes and lower drama (with the exception of possible death flags for Ren and Nora), but the moment they made Volume 5 the grudge match everyone wanted, then the stakes got raised back to the heights of the third Volume, only for it to fail to live up to the expectations. Sorry, I think I mean to say “subvert the expectations” in this day and age.
Though, I think the huge problem with all of this, and perhaps the biggest bottom line I can say, is that it might be due to Volume 3 going too over the edge. By killing important characters and even dividing the team, the villains had raised stakes up so high, that people began to take the show more seriously. When characters were vaguely hinted to die, be it through threats from the villains or even flashbacks, people fretted that they would die. When the villains go back to striking distance with the heroes, people desired a grand battle. When the show tried to deal with the ramifications that happened with RWBY separating, people wanted to know what was going through the characters’ heads.
And when Volume 5 failed to deliver/“subverted their expectations”, people considered it a bad volume.
But worst of all, it failed to live up to its own themes. Jaune was the only person to build himself back up again through deus ex hands, and we saw next Volume that it needed a statue for him to feel better. No one was in a position of giving up only to be defiant and shout “we’re not done here”, but instead cry “it wasn’t supposed to be like this!”. The big problem of Volume 5, make sure the relic is secure, is only solved because two characters had a catfight in the basement and the survivor didn’t bother to lock up because their daughter was too busy bitching at her. No one really grew or strengthened their resolve. The triumph… wasn’t theirs to have.
Although, it seems Rooster Teeth had learned from their mistakes, with Volume 6 being leaps and bounds better than Volume 5, regardless of what you thought of the latter half. Best of all, the themes promised in Volume 5 were shown prominently in Volume 6, albeit some of the scenes capitalizing on those themes feeling more like a child is having a tantrum because they couldn’t have the airplane.
To close out this rather long winded discussion, and to give people a tl;dr on the whole matter, Volume 5 failed to address the themes it had presented and instead just padded itself out, expecting people to accept it because it’s RWBY.
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Rev Recaps Hard Contact (Chapter 7)
CW: mass execution
TL;DR Recap: Niner & Omega watch the Separatists murder Hokan’s old militia. Etain and Darman meet and it’s incredibly awkward. Hokan takes time to gloat. The truth finally comes out about Atin.
Beginning Kal Count: 10 Ending Kal Count: 12 (or 12.5)
THIS RECAP IS THE LONGEST YET. Everything seems to happen in this chapter.
So we open with Niner being bored, Fi being Fi, and Atin being cheerful because he’s up to his elbows in electronic guts. The scene starts pretty quiet before a massive tonal change, but it’s honestly the front half that’s my favorite, just for character reasons.
Niner is bored and grumpy, so logically he’s thinking about how to revise the training manual. Plus his little “if one precaution was good, two were better.” Good old Niner. Fi being amused that Atin is made content by shredding a computer to pieces. I don’t know, it’s just the little things about their dynamic that makes me happy.
Niner is still upset with Atin, but he’s also curious. He doesn’t have long to think about it though, because the Separatist troops assigned to Uthan along with some of the battle droids assigned to the planet start approaching Hokan’s old Weequay militia. The squad watches as the Separatist officer and the droids proceed to murder every single one of Hokan’s old “associates” in visual range with no warning then retreat back to their base, which Niner finds understandably worrying.
We switch then to Etain, who is frustrated and paranoid and is building herself an emergency exist by loosening the boards in the back wall of the barn where Jinart has been hiding her. She’s yet again frustrated that she can’t do more with her Force powers, and her lack of self-esteem really comes out in full measure.
“She wondered why Jedi blood had bothered to manifest itself in someone who was so fallible.” Sweetheart...
Jinart arrives to take her somewhere and lets Etain finally feel her presence in the Force. But when Etain mistakes Jinart for a Jedi and asks why Jinart didn’t tell her what she was... Jinart tells Etain to shut up.
“And given your competence, I’m the one who’s most at risk. Now, silence.”
Okay, listen, if you could give her even like three seconds of genuine explanation rather than just attacking her for not trusting you after her teacher was literally sold out and then tortured to death, then you wouldn’t need to tell her to STFU. I’m just saying, Jinart.
Anyway, Jinart tells Etain that there’s a soldier waiting up ahead for her, so Etain heads in that direction, despite Jinart still being extremely shady. She’s about to meet Darman, and while I love them both dearly, while this ship is my OTP, it’s... really fucking awkward.
Listen. This is just weird as hell, okay? I’m gonna admit it. I also pretend it ... wasn’t written like this. Because while Darman is naive and inexperienced, he still has enough neurological development (and enough experiences that go beyond the pale of normal adulthood even) that this weird framing of him as “childlike” just comes off creepy. So I ignore it. That’s really all I have to say about it.
Etain feels Darman’s scope or his attention through the scope or whatever, and decides “well, I’m going to fuck someone up before I die, if I can”, which to be fair, is a very Etain thing to do.
Darman sees her lighstaber is like “oh, finally a Jedi”, and tries to greet her politely. Except this is Etain, who really has no idea what the fuck is going on except that she’s been on this planet for three or more months, the only person she trusted was murdered, and there’s an evil Mandalorian somewhere who wants to hurt her badly.
So naturally when her vision clears (Darman blinded her with some kind of light), she see his helmet, assumes Jinart’s shadiness was in fact the prelude to a betrayal and that this is Hokan...
Darman getting worried now:
And Etain being Etain,she launches herself at him. (ง'̀-'́)ง(ง'̀-'́)ง(ง'̀-'́)ง
It... doesn’t go well. Darman deflects most of her attacks pretty easily and literally dumps her in the river, continuing to try and calm her down to no avail, but she’s reached her breaking point and is pretty much in a blind rage.
“and when she was frightened and desperate and angry that was very hard indeed. She hadn’t know it until now.”
Listen, it’s a very un-Jedi-like but very Etain thing to do, and also who can really blame her given what she thought was happening and the kind of time she’s had on this planet so far. But Darman is exasperated, and I’m pretty Etain was embarrassed looking back at this for the remainder of her very short life.
Anyway, Darman finally manages to calm her down enough to let him talk, and in the process, he tries to smooth things over by taking the blame. He didn’t identify himself, it’s his fault, etc. He introduces himself (with the wrong designation- KT uses CC 1136, which would make him a Commander, rather than RC 1136) but in doing so, he uses terms of ranks, confusing the hell out of her. She asks when they got a Grand Army and-
We get the iconic “handing her back her lightsaber from the river” scene, except the official art for that picture always neglects to depict the fact that as gentlemanly as he’s trying to be, she’s dripping wet with her hair plastered in her face and desperately trying to politely ask her not to either get herself shot or go after him with a lightsaber again.
Instead of “meet cute” it’s more of a “meet extremely awkward”.
Anyway, this is all coming on the heels of several really bad months for Etain and the utter dismissal she just got from Jinart, so her insecurity really comes out in this conversation. It’s not really pretty.
(Side note, for once I do have to give KT some points on effectively carrying a tiny world building thing: Dar was embarrassed when Jusik asked for his name, he’s embarrassed that Etain is doing it now, and he’s going to be embarrassed again when she asks the rest of his squad.)
“talking army gibberish” lmao.
Again, self-esteem issues. But to be honest, as embarrassed as I am for Etain in this scene (she really doesn’t give her best here) it’s probably because I can relate a hell of a lot to her emotions?
Like, imagine. You’ve already got major issues with your self-worth from a lifetime of not being good enough for the people and the system that raised you, you just got dragged by an old woman after months of struggling behind enemy lines, you failed in your mission to protect the one person who gave a shit about you, and some (to your knowledge) regular human just successfully took you down without too much struggle when Jedi are supposed to be more than human, the best of the best. Then he turns to you with wide-eyed confidence and insists you are now his commanding officer, and you almost feel worse because he’s trying to absolve you of any fault.
I’d be kind of prickly and asshole-ish, too, if I’m honest.
Again, we start with her having trouble with some wounded pride. But... we end on that bomb shell, and I would not blame Etain for short-circuiting at being told a 10 year old had been “bred to serve [her]. It’s a hell of a lot.
Anyway, I’m aware I copied and pasted almost the entire scene, but there’s a lot there, okay? But next comes more Hokan, and he’s basically just gloating that he’s now more powerful than Ankkit.
*long, exasperated sigh*
Listen, I could write a college essay about characterization just focusing on this man’s use of the word decadent, holy fuck. Also, the gloating is “vulgar” but all he does for pretty much his entire appearance in this chapter is gloat.
You know who Hokan would have gotten on with? Vizsla. Wait- no. Even Vizsla kicked him out. Anyway, Hokan finishes gloating and then goes off to murder a farmer for not divulging important information quickly enough/trying to trade it for booze.
This chapter is long and I know I’ve made this post really long, but we cut back to Niner and Fi again. They’ve made their way to one of the rendezvous points, only to find the trees that should be there aren’t. Fi eventually guesses that they’ve been logging and makes a disparaging comment about intel. Niner gives a little bit more exposition on how terrible the Kaminoans were, including a rumor about clones with impaired eyesight who disappeared and a comment about how Jedi giving orders is different from Kaminoans because Kaminoans are the only things he fears.
Fi is sighing, and eventually Niner prods at him:
And we get our biggest Kal Count yet. Technically this is one continuing remembrance, but it’s also long as hell and includes lots of little memories, so I almost want to include it as 1.5 towards our Kal Count, bringing us to a total of 11 (or 11.5). I’m way more interested in their conversation before Kal is brought up than after, honestly. But the reminiscing gets broken up when Omega is suddenly shot at by a few Separatist officers and a bunch of battle droids:
Please, please imagine this moment with the cartoon B1 battle droid voices from The Clone Wars. Please, I’m begging you.
Atin saves Niner’s life, which is honestly the most positive thing that has happened between the two of them so far and marks a turning point for them in general. It’s also the first time we get to see Fi jump in as squad medic, but he’s super efficient about it. Also, he snarks at Atin as he’s actively trying to decide if Atin is dying or not:
Niner offers to carry Atin’s pack for him until he’s doing better, which means he’s probably carrying something like 300 lbs now, even if Atin did save his life. And I know my screenshots for this post have been ridiculously long, but Niner finally, finally reconciles with Atin enough to figure out why Atin has been an asshole about Darman this whole time (minus the Vau thing):
It’s a pretty nice closing line to the scene, honestly. Also, technically speaking our Kal Count just jumped to 12.
I’ll spare you most of the closing scene because it’s just Hokan being pissed and thinking it’s impossible clones could have done this, but:
a) Mandalorian. Honor. Complex. You’d think Mandalore the Ultimate had been in charge for the last few years instead of Jango.
b) seriously. What is it with the word “decadent”??????
But it’s over quickly with Hokan making the wry observation that if he didn’t know better he would think he was being haunted by Jango’s ghost.
#Rev Recaps RepComm#Republic Commando#Hard Contact#Etain Tur-Mukan#Darman Skirata#Niner Skirata#Atin Skirata#Fi Skirata#Ghez Hokan
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The Rescuers Dumb Under
Hey there, an invasion of stag beetles. Here's a terrible Teen Titans comic to balance out your day, which is mostly physical unpleasantness given the current heat, I'm assuming. The comic does psychic damage, is what I’m implying~
Here's the cover, too:
To rescue Superboy, the Titans must fall! Apparently! They sure look like they're doing a bangup job. I wanna point out this gold guy in particular. First of all, who the hell is he? I have no idea. Secondly, yes, I see the big laser. It's hard to miss. Helpful of you to point it out instead of doing anything. Thirdly, due to perspective, doesn't it look like he's at least fifteen feet tall and grabbing Tim Drake by the chest? Who laid out this cover, and why is it such a mess~?
So we open to get away from the headachey cover, only to find the very same image on the first page. Minus the Titans, but the gold guy has now shifted from pointing like a pod person to gloating. So you may recall at the end of issue 6, the Titans were gearing up for a second fight with Superboy. But this issue is promising a rescue, because Superboy made a heel-face turn in the pages of his own series. But if you, like me, weren't reading that one, you wouldn't be privy to that information. It's kind of a jarring shift, and a bit much to be asking you to be following both books when everything's a reboot.
So in any other comic, they'd probably just say the green lasers are "Kryptonite lasers" or something, but here the gold guy just calls them "Lashers". (One of Santa's lesser known reindeer, I think.) They suddenly stop firing on Superboy, and it's because Kid Flash has moved them away. So, not only are we not privy to Superboy's heel-face turn, we're also not privy to the Titans' discussing their decision to help him, and that is the book we're following. Fortunately, the book will explain this, but it's a very confusing cold open. Anyway, Gold Guy has psychic powers (which we've established can defeat Kid Flash) and makes a psyonic wall to block Kid Flash. But Bunker and Skitter show up to help him, so he won't be abandoned in a NOWHERE facility again.
So, rather than continue this confusing scene, we jump back to late last night or the night before, where Tim Drake is asking Kid Flash to demonstrate his powers, now that his molecules are all contained. Tim asks him to impress him, which Kid Flash does by running to the Statue of Liberty and stealing the "give me your huddled masses" sign. He then puts it back in a matter of seconds. They then return to Tim's apartment on Danny the Street, who gets explained in half a paragraph, which is not satisfying enough an explanation for a teenager who turned into a sentient street that can teleport.
So it's Danny who alerts them to the idea that Superboy is in trouble, by flashing Superboy's symbol upside-down in his windows. I guess it doesn't mean "resurrection" in this case. Tim gathers everyone and explains a very detailed plan for how to break Superboy out of NOWHERE, and... they all decline. They're not interested in helping someone who just tried to kill them, even if he's now the target of being killed. Tim says he's sorry they feel that way, and he hopes to see them again when he gets back--if he gets back. Cassie decides "screw it", and follows after him. I guess the others also decide this? We never see the moment for them, but we cut back to the opening scene of the other Titans helping out, so they must have.
So now we're back in the fight scene we opened with, and Kid Flash suddenly gets a vision of some kind. Probably part of his amnesia plot kicking in. Not important for right now, but it implies Kid Flash was part of a group that beat people with sticks. Anyway, Kid Flash recovers and rushes back in, rescuing Superboy from his restraints. Superboy is baffled that they're helping him, and Kid Flash admits he's basically as confused as why they're helping him as Superboy is. The four of them back into a corner as reinforcements arrive.
Speaking of reinforcements, Cassie runs into someone else somewhere else in the facility. This guy is Templar, who was Superboy's handler. He opens his coat, but thankfully he's not a public flasher. Instead, he just has a bunch of Venom-looking worms coming out of his body. They're also his intestines, apparently. Before we can do that, however, we have to manufacture some artificial conflict between team members. Tim Drake's in a control room, downloading some stuff from the computer. Solstice asks why he's in here and not actually rescuing Superboy. See, she didn't want to come back here, calling it a "literal hell on earth". Do Indian/Hindu beliefs include a hell?
So here's how everything concludes. Cassie uses a special power of her lasso to drain the life out of Templar until he's just a pile of goo on the floor. Superboy uses a big burst of tactile telekinesis to dismantle all the reinforcements at once. And Solstice ends up feeling hurt because Robin knew there were other kids in facilities like this, and "did nothing about it". Because, you know, one dude can really fight all these facilities on his own. Also, he says he only had suspicions, not proof. That's what he's downloading now, proof that these facilities have kids in them. Spoilers: This "conflict" between the pair means nothing in the long run.
The group go to leave as the facility starts crumbling around them. Because what kind of secret facility would it be if it didn't explode at the end. The conflict rears its ugly head, as Tim tries to leave Solstice behind, but the rest of the team won't hear of it. After all, Kid Flash already rescued her from here once before, and that was when he was alone. As the facility collapses, we get our first look at the major boss of NOWHERE. Yes, it's finally time. Next issue, the prelude to The Culling begins, and we'll have to contend with Harvest. Oh boy.
So yeah. After a somewhat promising start, now we’re starting to get into that terrible area of the comics. Manufacturing conflicts that don’t need to be there. Referencing things in other books that play out in this book without explanation. And oh boy, is it going to get worse. Like, I dunno if you’ve heard of The Culling storyline, but it is not good. And that’s what we’ll be reviewing for, like, the next month. But that’s later. I think this issue is where the series started to hit its downward spiral. This is the teetering point of the roller coaster incline. Next week, we’ll begin the downward plunge with the terrible things they did to Omen~
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Helicobacter 17
Previously on Helicobacter, everything was right ridiculous. Regardless of whether the long and undisciplined unwinding of twists here has been entertaining, I’ve enjoyed the practice of putting it together. Free-associating was great; getting from that initial hellscape—poor JK!—to the koans to the raccoons. Et cetera. In sixteen prior installments! No actual pies were injured in the making of this story, which I think shows laudable restraint on my part. Oh, I did finally figure out how to get that one troublesome shoutout in, though you may find it a bit of a shoehorn. And there’s that one additional little backgroundy twisty twist near the end, one that calls back, in a whisper, to an earlier thing... anyway, it won’t be too long before I put some more words up; I’m working on a part of an older unfinished piece and may also float a couple trial balloons for new things. Stay tuned.
Helicobacter 17
“Are you sure you want me to put my shirt on?” Helena heard Myka ask. She had turned her back to allow Myka to change out of the hospital gown and back into her clothes—to enable Myka to do it, really, because Helena was in the end only human, and their physical relationship had not reached a point at which any sort of unclothing could be casually received—and now Helena was reminded of being in her kitchen, of listening to Myka’s disembodied voice explaining the plan, of having no effective way to respond to what was being said. “Trousers are next,” Myka went on, “but feel free to stop me anytime.”
“I am terrible at being good,” Helena said, resolutely not turning her head, “and so the universe gave me you. To test me, over and over again.”
Myka laughed. “Just so you fail every now and then. You can turn back around; all that’s left are my shoes.” Helena did then turn around, on some level expecting Myka to be naked, as one of those perpetual tests. Instead, she was in fact fully dressed, pulling a boot onto her right foot. Helena couldn’t hold back a little sigh of disappointment, and Myka laughed again. “What should I say in the note I leave my mom tonight?”
“What is so appealing to you about sneaking out? Is it the thrill of the forbidden? Should I worry that you’ll lose interest when both your mother and the overall prohibition are gone?”
“My honest answer about whether you should worry is, ‘how should I know?’ My hopeful answer is, ‘of course not.’ As for the sneaking out, it’s mostly for my mom’s benefit at this point. She doesn’t want to have to show how pleased she is to have the place—a place—to herself. Once in a while.”
Puzzling. “I thought your father took many fishing trips.”
“It’s only when Mom’s gone, really. He doesn’t say much about it, but he’s happiest when they’re together.” She finished with her boots, stood up, and began to tidy the bed. She looked over her shoulder at Helena. “Maybe you’ll want to go fishing only when I’m out of town.”
“I don’t know how to fish,” Helena said. She added a silent And now I don’t want to learn. But why keep silent? Why was her first instinct to censor such words? So she said, “And now I don’t want to learn.”
Myka turned back to the bed. She said a warm “Good.”
“Your father did invite me, however.”
A chuckle. “You should go, and Skype and Facetime and text and DM me every chance you get, on lots of different devices. Send me emails too. He’ll lose his mind.”
“What if I tell him about the aquatic abilities of raccoons?”
Myka spun around again, her mouth open in comic protestation. “I’ll never forgive you! I want to annoy him, not give him a heart attack. Besides, you should bear in mind that he’s the one who bought a very significant textbook lot.”
“My gratitude is stipulated.”
“Plus, and I realize this matters to me more than to us, he got me Georgeliot.”
“Under duress,” Helena noted.
Myka nodded. “Sometimes it takes a little duress for people to do the exactly-right thing.”
“So if I happen to come home some evening and am greeted not by you but by a large gaze of raccoons, I should assume there’s some right course of action I’ve failed to take?”
Myka pulled her into a half-embrace and bestowed a swift kiss, recalling the tactility of the rehearsal dinner. “I really like that you just said ‘come home.’”
Helena resolved to say “come home” far more often. “And not even under duress,” she said.
Another swift kiss. “I also really like that you know the collective noun for raccoons.”
“I like that you like that I know it.”
“I like that too.” Myka’s expression changed from affectionate to sly. “Want to sneak out of the hospital?”
“No.”
Myka pouted. “You are no fun at all.”
Rolling her eyes at the pout—which managed to be annoying and attractive at the same time—Helena said, “To test me, over and over again. And I’d like to add that that’s a ‘no’ in perpetuity, because—”
“No fun.”
“Will you let me finish? In perpetuity, because I don’t want to be in any hospital so as to have occasion to sneak out of it.”
The pout dissolved. “Oh. That’s reasonable.”
“Now call your mother back in here,” Helena said, “so we can get on with leaving, so we can get on with working—”
“And back to no fun,” Myka interrupted, herself back to the pout.
“And back to, will you let me finish? So we can get on with working, so the day can get on with ending, so you can then get on with sneaking out.”
Now the pout became a familiarly brilliant smile. “Oh. That’s even better than reasonable.”
The half-embrace became full.
****
When Helena opened her door to Myka after the promised, and much-anticipated, sneaking out, it was the hospital room again: no one lunged. Instead they looked.
One beat, two. Unhurried because there was at last no hurry? Or were they waiting for something?
Then Myka said, “This is different than before. Both times. Me standing here.”
“This is different than before,” Helena agreed. She glanced down at the ring on her finger, as if it might itself be the explanation.... it glittered back, wise and clear. A symbol, but not the cause, of everything that stood differently around them, how they stood differently before each other.
Myka spoke again. “Belief is a good look on you.” She took a slow breath. “Then again, I think just about everything’s a good look on you.”
On that, Helena’s memory barked a shin. “Wait. How do you know what I look like in a hardhat?”
“I have a vivid imagination,” Myka said. She stepped inside and kicked the door closed.
The kick was strong and deliberate, but not overpowering; Helena was able to respond, somewhat calmly, “While I know that’s true, I don’t believe it represents a truthful answer to my question.”
Myka’s mouth shaped into a languid smile. It was even more deliberate than the kick. “You really want to know? Fine. One morning Abigail was giving me grief about how she was going to be meeting you at the neighborhood site. This was right after the committee was formed, and I thought that maybe Steve would come with you, and that that would mean the whole committee was there, and I could pinpoint, and you’d be there too, so... you see how I thought the plan was going to come together. But as it turned out, no Steve.”
“So no pinpoint.”
“No pinpoint, and so I felt really silly, lurking around a corner like I was part of some pathetic, busted sting operation, ready with my camera and telephoto lens, but then there wasn’t a drug deal after all. Then again, I did get to hyperventilate about how irresistible you were in that hardhat.”
“But not irresistible.”
“No, seriously.”
“Perhaps seriously, but not literally. You resisted, did you not? Remained out of sight, around the corner?”
Myka paused. “Fine. You win.” She paused again. “But only in the short term.”
“I win only in the short term?”
“I resisted only in the short term. I mean, look at me.”
Helena obliged, and Myka wrapped her arm around Helena in her now-familiar loop, this time as a clear prelude to what would come next. “You do not appear to be the picture of resistance,” Helena acknowledged.
“Good. But obviously resistance was never really on the table. Case in point: that disaster with Ben, the guy in Accounting, happened right after my attempted ring bust.”
“The PTA-meeting fellow. The dressing-down.”
“Which was supposed to put the fear of god, or just shame and unemployment, squarely into all of us.”
“Instead you called me,” Helena said.
“See? I couldn’t resist. I remember you practically ripped my head off.”
“Abigail had made very clear to me that the situation was no longer abstract or humorous. given how you would react to such a public mortification... will you be all right with the consequences of the ‘truth’ about us becoming known now? Whatever those consequences may be?” Helena asked, out of genuine curiosity.
To her surprise, Myka laughed at that. “Given that a lot of the people I work with have both seen you and heard you, I might just get high fives rather than any metaphorical pies to the face.” She turned serious. “But regardless, even if I have to cringe my way through some of it, I’m going to remember that the real consequence is that our situation, yours and mine, doesn’t have to be abstract anymore.”
“Humorous, surely,” Helena said, pressing herself close into that bodily loop.
Myka smiled. “I hope so. But Abigail did try to make the gravity clear to me too. She shoved the ring at me, told me to take it and return it. I almost agreed to.”
“But?”
“But I realized that if it was in my possession again, I was going to track you down. Partially because you were so on fire to keep me out of trouble, and that was... well, irresistible.” She placed her lips softly against Helena’s temple: a gesture of proof. “I have to believe there’s a way out of any box, if you’re willing to work hard enough to find it. Even though that box, then, seemed to be collapsing on us.”
“Like a poorly constructed architectural model,” Helena said, but she thought of that sturdy little community center, flanked by those valiant trees. “You are persistent.”
“Maybe it was because I’d heard the word ‘cancer,’ but I knew what I wanted. Who I wanted. Really, at long last. It was such a relief.”
And Helena considered that Myka wasn’t wrong, not at all. She herself had received no such mortality shock, yet it was still a relief to know with such seeming clarity: this. It was also a relief, now, to be able to act on that knowledge unencumbered. “And at last we can—”
“Wait,” Myka said. “Grapefruit.”
“All right. Turnabout. I see. Interestingly, or not, it also involves a grief-giving from Abigail. It was when she and Steve koaned me. I don’t believe they were yet a committee...” The half-embrace was turning full again; Myka’s ‘wait’ was clearly not intended as any sort of prohibition, but Helena continued, “Abigail was having fun, asked what I liked for breakfast, rubbing in the fact that you and I did not, and would not, share it. ‘There is no grapefruit’ was said, to make me feel terrible.”
Helena realized she’d drawn her expression into severity only when Myka began kissing it gentle. “My poor baby,” she murmured.
The addition of “my.” Entirely right, yet entirely a surprise in its rightness. How could anything so apparently destined be composed of so many pieces that Helena did not expect? “I was wearing a hardhat at the time,” she told Myka. Then she pushed. “Can you imagine? Perhaps you can...”
“Now you’re just showboating,” Myka said, but her hands moved in a way that suggested “just showboating” meant “issuing clear instructions.”
Whatever instructions Helena had inadvertently given, they were exactly the right ones. “Mm,” she said. “Trying to hold your interest.”
Myka said, her words another decisive door-kick, “Irresistible. In the long term.”
****
Early in the morning, a bit baffled by the morning (“It’s only Tuesday? We can do this again tonight and it will then be only Wednesday?”), they went to Myka’s apartment for breakfast.
“I thought your mother liked having the place—a place—to herself,” Helena objected.
“This morning I think she’ll like making maternal noises,” Myka said. She insisted they stop and buy grapefruit and Pop-Tarts, “because symbolism is important.” Helena considered objecting but then reckoned that this stood as one of many lessons, and that her life going forward would be easier if she absorbed those lessons as they presented themselves.
“Three,” Jeannie greeted them.
Helena winced: “Please don’t keep count.” Still so small, that number. What would change as the tally increased?
“I read up on that third Emperor Napoleon,” Jeannie informed her, with a Myka-esque innocent blink. “He instituted several much-needed reforms. So on a scale...”
“Oh. Then please carry on.”
“Actually I’d find that a little weird,” Myka said, with a wince of her own.
“That. That’s what you’d find weird. In addition to my family, of course.”
“A little.”
“You could name my first grandchild Napoleon,” Jeannie suggested.
“Really?” Helena said. Not the worst of names. But also: children. Charles and Jane had been talking of having a child, and Helena had thought that when they succeeded in doing so, that would be that, childwise, for the Wells family. And yet... Napoleon?
“Not really,” Myka said. She frowned at her mother.
A thought struck Helena. “Donovan.”
“What?” Now Myka swung her frown toward Helena.
“First there is a mountain.”
Jeannie said, “I remember that song.”
Myka’s face softened. “I don’t hate it.”
“The song, or the name?” Helena asked.
“I’ve never heard the song. I think. But the name is nice.”
“I can’t wait to tell your father,” Jeannie said. “He’s been terrified you’d name your first after the dog.”
“The author, you mean,” Myka said, and the frown was back.
“No, the dog. The one-word version.”
“Why wouldn’t he like that?”
“For a little girl’s dog, it was charming. An actual human?”
“We’ll name her Emilywilson,” Myka declared. “How about that?”
“Sweetheart, your father’s the one you have to reassure about the name. I just want a grandchild. Name it Child One if you want to.”
Helena, hoping to inject a bit of levity, asked, “But then how will little Two feel?”
Myka raised her eyebrows. “More than one? Really?”
Helena had meant it in jest, but... more than one? “We’ll need to talk about it,” she said.
“We will. The things we get to talk about now!” Myka seemed to glow at the very idea.
Helena had a strange and wonderful presentiment of their doing exactly that: talking about things. Coming to real agreement when an issue was essential, reaching détente when it was not. All while the tally grew: Four. Five. Six. Seven. In some universe, surely there were uncountably many Emperors Napoleon, each bettering the previous.
Aloud, Helena instructed herself. Take this lesson from Myka: speak it all aloud. “Uncountably many Emperors Napoleon,” she said.
“Forget Maine,” Myka countered. “We’ll move to Florida and buy a grapefruit orchard.”
“Most likely more profitable than refusing to fish for lobsters,” Helena said. “One and Two will need college funds.”
“Three?” Jeannie suggested.
“I don’t know how much money there really is in citrus, particularly if this cheapskate raids the grove every morning for breakfast. Three might have to be one of those pretty never-children,” Myka told her. Then she turned to Helena. “But we’ll need to talk about it.”
“We will,” Helena agreed. The things we get to talk about now... Helena was reasonably certain she was glowing too.
****
Once Myka’s mother and the overall prohibition were gone, Myka did not seem to lose interest. And she and Helena did talk about things. Helena was becoming accustomed to the idea that she would never become accustomed to what Myka would say... happiness pushed up against surprise, always, to make a double bed.
“Here’s a funny thing,” Myka said one morning, standing in Helena’s kitchen, holding a cup of coffee, just as Helena had hoped she might but despaired that she would never.
“Oh god,” Helena responded, because while she was of course thankful for the circumstance under which Myka was speaking, she was still not quite fully thankful for never knowing what she would speak about.
Myka laughed, as she always did. “No, no. It’s just a question; what’s funny is that I never thought to ask you. Why’d you come to the U.S.?”
It was true, though not very surprising, that the topic had not yet come up. Many practical, reality-related issues hadn’t yet come up, perhaps in part due to temperament but mainly due to time. Helena could still easily count their nights... then again she might always keep that count, reflexively. Joyfully? Myka was looking at her, so Helena said, “Sorry. Preoccupied by a number—”
“Thirty-six?”
“That’s the one.”
“We should give each other cards for significant ones. Maybe the primes?”
“Tomorrow, then. I’ll bring you flowers as well... no, I’ll have them sent to you at City Hall.”
At work, Myka had in fact been high-fived more than she had received pies to the face. Apparently most people’s hearts weren’t made of stone, and it was true that Myka was porous when it came to the extent of her happiness. Not to mention, her illness had banked her some goodwill... but it was most likely Myka herself, being herself, that led to the indulgent responses.
“You’re trying to distract me,” Myka accused, but not seriously. “You, to the U.S., why?”
“It isn’t a very interesting story,” Helena said. “Not nearly as interesting as your gratifyingly enthusiastic response to receiving flowers. But since you ask: my mother was fascinated with America, and Americans, when she was young. She instilled it in me, I suppose, and so when I was deciding where to study...”
“I thought that kind of fascination usually went the other way—Americans love the British. The accent, the royal family. Scones. I know my mom did, and I guess she instilled that in me, if we take you as evidence. But so why did your mother—”
“She had an American penfriend.”
“A pen pal?”
“Yes, that. I heard about her my entire childhood, not least because I was nearly named after her.”
“I can’t imagine you not being ‘Helena.’ What was it you were nearly named? And why weren’t you?”
“Jeannette,” Helena said promptly. “Or, as my mother always called her, ‘American Jeannette,’ and in fact that might have been my name, but my father prevailed, because my mother had been the one to name Charles. Although now that I think about it, I don’t know why she wanted his name to be Charles. It isn’t a family name, not that I’m aware, and his ears were of perfectly average size, thus no connection to the prince, so I—”
“I’m going to take a wild stab here,” Myka said. She had set her cup down and crossed her arms, and she was regarding Helena with what was, even for her, an enigmatic expression.
“Are you? At what?”
“Your mom’s name is Sarah.”
Nonplussed, Helena said, “That stab wasn’t wild at all. It was in fact... wait.” No.
“Okay,” Myka said.
“No. Oh no. No.”
“Always with the same bad argument.” Myka’s smile. As if she had always known... but she couldn’t have. So: her smile, as if she had always been—would always be—willing to believe.
“I don’t understand,” Helena said. She didn’t. At no turn had she understood.
Myka said, “Well, me neither.” But she moved across the wide space of the kitchen; she put her arms around Helena, and that was something Helena did understand.
A kiss, a long one, and she understood that too. “Words about destiny,” she said, when she could.
Myka said, familiarly, against Helena’s neck, “Does it really even matter why?”
“I don’t enjoy being set up.”
“You were set up with me.” Still familiar, still against her neck.
“That improves the situation,” Helena conceded. “Marginally.”
“I’m going to make you regret that addition.”
“Are you?” Now it was Helena’s turn to put lips where they would be familiar. And persuasive.
Myka chuckled. “Depends on how you thought you’d be spending the next several decades.”
Helena determined to take this literally. She leaned back and moved her left hand in front of Myka’s face. “I have a ring, my acceptance of which indicates that ‘married to you’ is my thinking in the matter. More-detailed projections are your job.” This was true: speculating about the gamut of possibilities, from fantastical citrus groves to children, real or never-, delighted Myka.
“Speaking of projections,” Myka said, “I don’t think it’s too crazy to predict, based on this new information, that the wedding—which was already going to be fantastic!—just got that much better. My mom always wondered what happened to her pen pal from England.”
“Is there any prediction that you would consider ‘too crazy’? But my mother wondered too.”
“Both busy raising daughters destined for each other.” This Myka emphasized with a kiss, but...
...so chancy, all of it. “What if it hadn’t happened?” Helena demanded, as if Myka would be able to say. “What if something in this Rube-Goldberg destiny had gone wrong?”
“What if it had? Well, what if it already did? For all you know, this is destiny’s backup plan. She tried a ton of other ways, but then finally threw her hands in the air and said ‘Go forth and matchmake, Helicobacter pylori!’”
Speaking of throwing one’s hands in the air: Helena didn’t perform the action, but, “I give up,” she said. “You win: it’s H. pylori’s fault.”
“Bank on it,” Myka said, her words accompanied by a bright-eyed smile that spoke equally to their past, their present, their future. She followed that with a kiss that was soft and sure, a word about the short term, a promise of the long. “But better yet, bank on me.”
END
#bering and wells#Warehouse 13#fanfic#Helicobacter#part 17#AU week#I see that bering-and-wells-land is a bit of a ghost town these days#but I am a ghost#so I suppose it's now my spiritual home#(did you see the terrible thing I did there)#anyway I had to talk myself into posting this final part#because writing this silly story has been my security blanket#through a lot of strange days (and an insane workload)#to replace it I'll need#as Freud wrote in a letter in 1898#'a lot of patience#cheerfulness#and some good ideas'#an excellent friend of mine quoted that once#and I've never forgotten it#particularly the 'and some good ideas' part
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Red’s Measurements
(Start notes: I made a prelude thing to give this a bit of background before really getting into it, hopefully it’s not too bad lol. I wanted to flex my writing muscles a bit and be creative, so I did it from a reader’s point of view for this piece. This may or may not be a Red X Reader thing. You can replace the reader with your gem in mind, it’s really all up to you lol. I lost all my shame in the meme war. Support your local meme veterans.)
“Pfft, I actually don’t know Every time he takes his pants off, five minuets later I’m on cloud nine.” You giggled as your friend spoke to you over the phone. For the past half hour, the two of you were just generally going over things, talking about this and that-until she brought up the topic of measurements. You had never really thought about it before. Leave it up to Smoke to bring up lewd topics. But in the back of the mind, it actually made you wonder, just how big was he?
“No, Red’s in the shower right now. Remember the gigantic tomatoes Moldavite bred with those piranha fish? Yeah, Yeah, those!” You uncross your legs and relax, recalling what had happened earlier that day. “They got out and went crazy, so he went and helped. Though he got tomato juice everywhere on him. You know how I feel about the smell of tomatoes, so I told him to get a shower before he sits his big old butt down on the couch.”
You glance at the bathroom door, and then back at the tv. Newscasters were going over the same tomato rampage, though clearly neglecting to mention Red saving the day anywhere. Then again, seeing a seven and half foot man beating a tomato to death with a shovel and then reporting it might be a bit too much for the average news station. Sighing, you kick off your shoes and Smoke snaps you back to your conversation. Cheeks flush with pink as you hear her questions. “I-I um, I don’t know that.” How large were his balls? How much could he shoot in a load? Those were questions you never asked either. “What do you mean I should know? Well, I just-” Your face turns cherry cardinal as you hear her over the phone, and snort, mildly amused. “Smoke, I swear to god, you’re just as horny as him!” She was his counterpart after all, at this point, you should’ve seen this coming. Still, it made you curious, even though you didn’t want to admit it.
Getting up, you head over to the kitchen drawers and pull out a ruler and measuring cup, pressing the phone to your ear with your shoulder. “Okay, okay, you got me. I um, I may be a bit curious. Ahh, but I don’t really know how to ask him that!” Shutting the drawer, you back down on the edge of the couch and hide the items on its side. The bathroom door lock clicks open and you turn your head. “A-Ah! He’s getting out now, I’ll talk to you later!” Hanging up, you set the phone on the coffee table in front of you and look back, spotting Red.
“Hey babe, got all that tomato smell out!” Tossing his towel into the nearby hamper, Red shook his head like a dog, ridding himself of extra water. He plopped down next to you, and wrapped an arm around your shoulders, and sat you on his lap. The scent of strawberries caught your attention, and you nodded approvingly. “Much better.” Silently, you thanked the stars that he was only wearing boxers, letting you eat up as much eye candy as possible. It still was amazing that this stud of man chose someone like you. All of the people in the universe and he chose you. Smiling, you took up his other hand and squeezed it, and pecked his forehead.
Red raised an eyebrow at the tv screen, and he turned it off. “Man, they never do get their stories right, do they? Besides, I think I could make a better reporter in this case.” You hummed lightly, and turned around to face him. “Well then Mr. Reporter, tell me what happened,” you coaxed playfully. While Red was boasting about his most recent achievement, that gave time to let you help pitch his tents up. One of the good things about having two shafts was that it took longer for him to notice that they were up at mast.
“Alright then, I suggest you get comfortable.” Shifting your body around, you settle your pussy directly on top of his cocks, with only cloth in between the two of you from making contact. “Okay, where do we start? After I found the tomato hoard, I rushed after them and start to hit them with my destabilizers. They fried pretty well, better than fries, to be honest.” Nodding, you could barely pay attention to what he said, unable to take your mind off of your mission. Silently, you slid your hand over to the front of his boxers, and undid the buttons. “How did you avoid their seeds? They showed them using them as knives on there.” Red was too preoccupied with answering your questions and telling his tale for him to notice what you were doing. “At first they actually got to me; one of them got stuck in my leg! I figured out that they can be deflected pretty easily though,” he replied.
While he was distracted with his explanation, you drifted a hand into the opened front pocket, and settled it on his top tent. Soft and warm, it wasn’t going to be like that for long. Immediately, you began to rub it back and forth, badgering it on. Red let go of your other hand, and laid his head back, continuing to recall what had happened, taking his eyes off of you and enabling free reign. Immediately taking advantage, you stuck your other hand into his pants and started to play with the bottom shaft, thumbing it at the same time. Within a minuet, they had begun to harden and rise, throbbing lightly. You bit your lower lip as they pressed against your folds, arousing your sensitivities. Stifling a moan, you rubbed faster, getting the twin cocks to throb harder, squeaking as your body was raised by the hardening sabers. “Eep!” Red snorted. “Eep’s right, I didn’t really think that it’d be an easy time getting outta that thing! Never really thought that tomatoes could be so tough from the inside out!”
Glancing behind yourself, your eyes widened in surprise as the two shafts had torn and burst through the boxers, leaving a gaping hole in their wake. Both of their heads dripped with crimson pre-cum, threatening to burst. Perfect! Leaning over and grabbing the ruler, you set it up against the side of his cock and measure it twice over, counting out the inches in your head. E-Eighteen inches?! Jesus, that was massive! Just how was he able to pack them in there?! For good measure, quite literally in this case, you counted out the inches of his hefty balls, and put it up against the size of his shafts. F-Five inches...how...just how much could something this big make? Quietly, you set the ruler down and turned around your body, facing his shafts. Picking up the cup, you thumbed around the top shaft again, and pressed under the foreskin, rubbing it back and forth while quickly bringing it up and in front of the cocks.
Like a volcano, his shafts blew their load, filling your cup and causing it to overflow in seconds. Setting the dripping cup on the floor, the site of the flowing cum arousing your dripping cavers. Biting your lower lip, you looked away and curled your toes, trying your best to not make it evident what was going on. However at this point, you weren’t sure if you could keep it together much longer. “And that’s how I saved the day, again.” Quickly nodding, you tried to wipe away the cum on your hands in an attempt to hide what you were doing.
“Babe.” You turn your head to see Red staring at you in the eyes, grinning madly. Your face flushes as you realize what had just happened, and squeaked in embarrassment. He had known the whole time. He was just playing along with it. The crimson bunny licked his lips hungrily, and pulled you into a kiss, swirling yours and his tongues together. It was sweet and wet, and to be honest, you didn’t want to break away. Breaking away for a breath, you gasped in shock as his shafts tore through your tights and barreled through the front walls of your pussy. Red smirked at your expression. “Now that you’ve seen how much I can make, let’s see how much you can hold.”
(End notes: I can’t feel my hands after typing this, Red is a thot, and sorry for taking so long to reply to my threads, I was working on this instead. I should be able to reply tomorrow.)
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Hi! I asked Phoenix (horsegirlharry) for fic recs about star trek tos and she sent me to you! I am a new fan and in desperate need for some good fics since I am having a hard time finding them. I would be very grateful if you could link me to some. Thank you in advance
Oh my goodness!!! Hello my friend! I’m honored Phoenix directed you to me, I really am! To tell you the truth, they’re the one that actually convinced me to watch TOS from the start. Welcome to the fandom!!
To start off with, here is a lovely rec blog that is exclusively TOS (that I’m a mod on, so I am of course biased, but I loved the blog even before I was added, haha!) It’s not updated that often at the moment, usually just when I have some spare time, but there’s a lot of recs already added to look through, and there are plenty of tags to maybe let you look for tropes or genres that you like. :)
Alright, here go the recs!
Sha Ka Ree The year is 2258. Jim Kirk is a Lieutenant on the U.S.S. Farragut, Spock the science officer of the U.S.S. Enterprise. When the ships come together for a priority landing party, these two strangers find themselves fighting against the odds for a chance at life in an alien world, and the only way they’ll make it through is by relying on each other. This is a TOS fic that takes place seven years before the show begins. It’s one of my favorite fics ever, it’s beautiful and just perfect. It’s a lovely slow burn, and it contains one of my fave tropes: Jim (Kirk) and Spock crash on an alien world and get stranded there. So, so highly recommended! Honestly, that writer is amazing and anything by them I recommend.
Crash and Burn As the Enterprise’s celebrated voyage winds down, the tension between her captain and first officer escalates, and three days aboard Jupiter’s premier lunar station will change everything. Jim doesn’t handle change very well. Slow-build, character-study prelude to the Lost Years and TMP. Unhappy ending, but canon functions as a fix-it! As the summary states, this fic doesn’t end happily. But it’s basically an explanation as to why Spock does what he does prior to The Motion Picture (I’m not sure if you’ve seen the movies so I won’t clarify just in case you haven’t, haha!), which also means there is a happy ending after the events of the movies. I had it in my bookmarks under the tag I use for fics that hurt me (literally ‘ow’, lol) so apparently I found it pretty painful. ;__;
The Squire of Eros An old nemesis pays a social call to the Enterprise just in time for the annual Valentine’s Day party. On this occasion it’s Spock who draws the brunt force of his irritating personality. But when his holiday-inspired antics turn dangerous, it’s up to the Captain and crew to take him down, and Jim is forced to confront his long-evaded desires regarding his first officer. Written for the K/S Valentine Challenge at LJ, beta’d by purple_spock. This one isn’t even remotely as serious as the other two. It’s honestly just a lot of humor and lightheartedness for the most part. It features Trelane from TOS paying another visit to the crew. :D
Definitions “We call it t'hy'la,” Spock says. This one is so beautiful. It’s a relatively short oneshot (under 10k) but it’s so romantic and in character and just perfect (this author is another one of my favorites, I would read anything at all by them.)
Pattern Deviations A mind meld is the most intimate of any possible connection – to know and be known, wholly and completely. Usually, melds are advocated for leading to increased understanding and empathy. Spock wonders what it means, then, that everyone he melds with is so repulsed by his mind… Until he meets James Kirk, anyway. This is by the same writer as Definitions; another lovely oneshot by them. I love it!
And I Am Also Quite Blind In the aftermath of Spock’s blinding in Operation Annihilate, Jim tries to help him through his pain. A fic with premise that Spock doesn’t handily recover from his blindness in Operation Annihilate. Lengthy, painful, excellent. I try to avoid WIPs because I can’t deal with the pain of fics that are NEVER FINISHED, but I started reading this one when it was only halfway through and man, it sucked me in. Worth it! (And it has been completed now, so no worries, haha.)
Undone During first contact with the highly telepathic Nghians, an invasion begins on their home world. A powerful psychic attack cripples the populace–and Spock.Out of contact with the Enterprise and stranded on a planet at war, Jim must struggle to keep himself and his violent, unpredictable first officer alive. Another of my favorite writers! I love this fic. Lengthy, excellent, and that favorite trope of mine again (being stranded, heh), this is great. Please note the tags, though!
What I Am To You I say, “Ask me anything, Spock,” for perhaps the fifth time.This time, you respond, your gaze bright and penetrating, “Perhaps you could satisfy my curiosity in–one particular.”“Of course,” I say enthusiastically.You seem perfectly calm as you ask, “How long have we been lovers?” And I am certain I have heard you correctly, even as I struggle not to allow my astonishment to show on my face. Takes place after the events of the third movie. Spock tries to make sense of his and Jim’s relationship.
Spice It’s a question of biology. Vulcan biology.The problem with falling in love with a member of an insanely private species is that it just might take you the best part of a five year mission to work out that the feelings are requited. And then you might discover that he’s already decided that the two of you can never be together.And what are you supposed to do if he won’t tell you why? Honestly, I’m reccing this one with…some trepidation. I never did decide whether I actually liked the fic or not, but I know a lot of people do like it. It’s most definitely one of the longest fics I’ve ever read in this fandom. It’s the SLOWEST OF ALL SLOW BURNS, which you said you liked, and even though it made me SO ANGRY at one point that I almost threw my phone across the room when one plot twist happened, it’s well written and in character. The reason behind it all is…kind of silly, in all honesty, but it makes complete sense why Spock thinks it would be best if Jim wasn’t with him, just like him to be so overprotective. *sigh* I’d say definitely give it a try and see if you get sucked in!
Translating Ennoia Spock intends to resign his commission with Starfleet six months into the Enterprise’s mission. Then he meets Captain Kirk – his t'hy'la – and everything becomes infinitely more complex. This author again! This fic has lots of pining. I love pining. And I love happy endings and romance and watching Jim and Spock’s friendship develop, too, and this fic has all of that.
Dirty Laundry Jim keeps leaving dirty dishes in the sink and toast crumbs in the bed. Spock deals with the mess silently until an unfortunate ironing incident puts it all in perspective. Jim and Spock have to adjust to domestic life. Spock has to adjust to Jim’s messiness. Domestic Spirk is always wonderful, and I enjoy that in this one it’s not all perfect at first. They have to adjust and learn to actually live together.
Breaking Tradition Newlyweds James T. Kirk and Spock spend their Holiday shore leave alone together in a remote cabin once belonging to Jim’s grandparents. They learn more about each other and Jim introduces his new husband to the Winter Holiday traditions - even if he doesn’t quite understand why he take part in them himself. An unexpected event occurs that disrupts the couple’s newlywed bliss. Luckily, one of them has experience with taking charge of a situation. This one is sooo sweet. Jim just wants to share Christmas with Spock, but they have a mishap. But it’s okay, because Jim takes good care of Spock. (Features cold!Spock, one of my favorite things. :3 )
Ghost in the Machine Tom Paris stumbles upon a Pandora’s Box of loss and regret. This fic is the outlier in this list; it’s actually a crossover of sorts between TOS and VOY. I’ve not actually watched Voyager yet, but that doesn’t stop me from reading and enjoying the fic, so please don’t let that stop you! Let me tell you, though, this has to be one of the most painful fics I’ve ever read. It just makes me cry for Jim and Spock both. It’s so painful. But also really great. But I totally understand if you don’t want to read this one, haha! It’s not for everyone. It messed me up though, I kept thinking about it for days. Especially Jim as he is in this fic. Ugh.
Home Renovation Shortly before his first mission to Romulus, Spock buys a fixer-upper house with Jim. Although Jim is excited to begin renovating their new home, Spock worries it’s only a matter of time before his husband falls off a ladder and breaks his spine. Not to mention, the house’s derelict state is preventing Spock from enjoying his remaining time with Jim. Old Married Spirk, protective!Spock, perfection.
To Be Wed “With a human ruling alongside King Sarek, it makes sense that they would want a Vulcan to rule alongside you. Look on the bright side. At least it’s not Sybok."Prince S'chn T'gai Spock and Crown Prince Sam Kirk are pushed by their families into an awkward courtship, sure to become an awkward marriage. Meanwhile, the younger Terran prince just wants to make sure his future brother-in-law feels comfortable in his new home. But unfortunately for Jim, the road to hopeless, unrequited love is paved with good intentions. It’s an AU, obviously, and it’s by the same author as Sha Ka Ree (who as I mentioned is one of my favorite writers) and I just adore this fic, it’s so great! Pining, slowly getting to watch Jim and Spock falling in love even when it’s ill advised, Sybok!! I’m also just a total sucker for royalty AUs so that helps.
In My Own Skin After the events of Turnabout Intruder, Jim is trapped in Janice Lester’s body indefinitely and has to learn to carry on with his normal life and duties trapped in this body. Established relationship with Spock, but things become understandably difficult as a result of Jim’s situation. Complicating matters even further, the Enterprise is assigned to a difficult diplomatic mission with a new member of the Federation. I don’t know about everyone else, but my brain definitely went “what if Jim was stuck in that body…” after watching Turnabout Intruder, and this fic definitely satisfied that urge to see that explored.
Heat Trapped together in a cave until the storm ceases, Jim and Spock find some freedom outside the press of the ship and its responsibilities. Oh look….this writer again. :DDD You’re starting to notice a pattern here, I’m sure. This was written because of a prompt I gave, so obviously I’m a little biased, but it’s just SO perfect??? Cold!Spock, cuddling for warmth (another of my favorites, hello), and just so ROMANTIC that I almost can’t handle it.
Okay, those are all TOS, but now I have just a handful of AOS AUs:
Still, Like Dust Vulcans have been enslaved on Earth for more than fifty years. To Jim Kirk, 14, this is just one more chapter from his history book… until his uncle brings home a Vulcan boy to help on the farm. I know this fic isn’t for everyone, it definitely isn’t, but it really is a great read and I enjoyed reading it a lot. There’s a lot of pain, it’s true, but there’s also a happy ending, if that helps.
Inside The River Starfleet sends Jim a spouse and an oddly vacant honeymoon. Arranged marriage!AU, always fun, and an interesting mystery going on throughout. Great read!
That’s all I’ve got for you for now, this should be a start! Welcome again to the fandom, and I hope you find something in this list that you enjoy. :)
#slumber--parties#fic rec#space husbands#tos#and like two aos but i wont tag that lol#can't remember which tag i use for that...#long post#this got long sorry
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A False Reprieve
The chapter this reminds me the most of is 99, and 101. There are actually several parallels in between them.
CH.99 Kaneki wakes up and is told his stupid and selfish to go back alone and fight on his own actually wasn’t that bad after all, because the people he lost back then have all gathered together through no effort on Kaneki’s part. That everything can return to the way it once was, that Anteiku is back together again.
CH. 163, Kaneki wakes up and his decision not only to fight Juuzou alone, let Goat stagnate and form dragon turns out to be not so bad after all because it’s resulted in all of the people Kaneki loved banding together again, once again through no effort on Kaneki’s own.
That humans and ghouls are now banding together just like he had hoped, and entirely for his sake as well. Remember, Kaneki has admitted that he doesn’t actually care that much about peace, coexistence, really the only reason he has to work for a world in which humans and ghouls coexist is so he’ll have a place to belong.
Not only that, but even the people from the days Kaneki went up against Aogiri alone with Tuskiyama and Banjou in tow, as well as Hide are back to him after he thought those days, and those people were lost.
Going back even further, the entirety of the Tsukiyama arc was about the temptations of such nostalgia. How much you can lose sight of when you’re trying to cling to the past, instead of looking at what you have right now in the present and what you can work for in the future.
An arc which ended tragically as Tsukiyama was not able to rid himself of that nostaglia until the literal last minute. In case you have not picked it up, here’s a chart of all of the things Tsukiyama lost as a direct result of his nostagliac yearnings for Kaneki.
Anyway, my point is not to bash on Kaneki but rather to explain my own feelings of foreboding. We’ve witnessed these shallow returns in Tokyo Ghoul Re: over and over again, and not once have they stuck. In the last arc alone Kaneki was given the will to live by Arima, surrounded by RE: the home that was waiting for him to return, the former executives of Aogiri, the ghouls from his Anteiku days, and even the zero squad which defected with him. Once again let me draw a chart of the people who are left, and the people who were lost specifically because of Kaneki’s nostalgia leading him to ignorance and poor leadership.
My point is these chapters which seemed to hopeful, later, much later became foreboding as the hopes presented in them turned out to be shallow in the end. These characters clinging to a shallow hope directly caused a consequence. Rize even says as much, that regardless of whether they look at the truth or delude themselves people will still die.
The zero squad that was left to Take, a sign of his nostalgic days for Arima? Gone, torn to pieces by the one zero squad member that Take left behind, an another child who was doing drills with them.
The fact that Take himself said that mutually understanding people is not actually that important?
It’s actually proof that Take was hiding something and playing a much bigger game that he originally intended all along.
Finally, there’s even a direct parallel to the scenario that Furuta laid out in 101, and then Amon’s explanation of what happened when Kaneki was in dragon in the most recent chapter.
However, Kaneki himself said that he would not like to see that ending by Furuta come into fruition, because he does not trust Furuta to be the one in charge of the scenario.
Which we see in the aftermath of the most recent chapter is very much the case. Furuta turns on the news when there’s absolutely no power or media coverage in the city anymore. He is quite literally still in charge of the narrative, and for the worst of reasons.
So, even though Kaneki has been saved we’ve been left with quite a few hints that he’s still in a precarious situation. Out of the frying pan and into the friar, so to say. We’ve been told multiple times that the alliance between humans and ghouls is only temporary.
The reason why is made pretty clear, at the end of the day nobody cares that much about the welfare of ghouls. Goat moves for the sake of Kaneki and his cult like following now, the CCG is simply responding to the situation they were thrown in. There’s no examination of wrongdoing on either side, no planning for the future. The central issue of the series, is literally called “A trivial matter” by Take, subordinate of the man who supposedly gave his life to the cause so that humans and ghouls could find peace.
To make my point even clearer, here is Urie Kuki about to cut down a ghoul for eating a dead body that he does not even know she killed herself.
Kaneki the one eyed king, the one who said he wanted to fight for the sake of protecting ghouls, that he would take responsibility, that he was happy that Arima and Eto chose him for this purpose... just kind of watches as Urie’s about to kill him.
Only moving when he finds out that she was a human originally and not a ghoul. Which is why, when Kaneki hears that Hide is still alive and instead of immediately going to see him, deciding to go on a walk to brood instead
As if he didn’t already say these exact things on the subject matter in the first place.
Kaneki isn’t happy to see Hide back again, he’s terrified. The same way that he wasn’t happy to have Anteiku back, he just became terrified of losing everything again.
That is really the challenge presented by these false returns Kaneki experiences. The temptation to go along with it, to sip the pretty parts, to cling to them and become drunk on them. Therefore to ignore his fearful anxiety of them, because Kaneki does not believe himself capable of sustaining that loss.
This hand has always been an especially meaningful piece of artwork in regards to Tokyo Ghoul with me because it resembles what Kaneki struggles with the most ultimately. He doesn’t really want to face reality, he wants to cling to others, their love for him, and comfort himself with it. Which is why we see him abide by systems a lot more easily than he ever did as a rebel.
Kaneki’s purpose left behind to him by Arima and Eto was that he needed to destroy the CCG in order to help ghoul kind, and yet Kaneki is 100% comfortable and okay with immediately returning to the CCG, dwelling within its halls, and even abiding by orders from Marude a known ghoul hater that he has to be followed around at every moment because it relieves him.
Kaneki liked being in the CCG, he was satisfied with it because Akira and Arima did all of the thinking for him. He merely had to follow orders and he was given a stable existence and a structure. Perhaps it’s a life he could have abided by, but it’s the opposite of the existentialist, message of self realization that this manga is all about.
What gave Kaneki anxiety when he was in the CCG was not the unethical things the CCG did, the amount of power and how brazenly the power the Washuu held was, the fact that he was forced to kill ghouls as a ghoul himself. What gave him the most anxiety was that he might have to go back to living as a ghoul and being seen as a terrifying ghoul by others.
Even if his identity was tied up in that name, he didn’t want to be called by it. So, once again there’s yet another parallel between these few chapters and another prelude. The Q’s were to Kaneki after all, yet another false return to normalcy that he clung onto.
The CCG is an extremely tempting substitute for having to think for yourself. Urie Kuki even after allying with ghouls, after escorting a ghoul around who was a leader of a ghoul rebellion, was literally about to kill a ghoul in the street for no other reason then “I’m still a ghoul investigator so...” and Kaneki and Saiko both of them who wanted to fight side by side with ghouls only barely put up the slightest protest to stop him.
When Sasaki tells Shirazu whose worried about the needless bloodshed of going after the remaining member of a ghoul family whose members surrendered in totality to them. That he can just talk about it and think about it later.
Kaneki’s own decision to just meet with Hide later rather than right away, his assuring Saiko in a similar way that she’ll be able to talk with him again and again later.
Foreboding, foreboding, foreboding. I can’t see this as anything but foreboding, considering the massive number of unresolved issues still in the air.
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I've seen a lot a hate for the ship but not a thorough explanation of why. I wanted to see the pros and cons of them. The effect it has on Wanda in the comics and in MCU, same for Vision. In which scene in the movies made people dislike it and which part in the comics made people explicitly hate. . . I don't think I'm doing a good job explaining why I want a Meta on it. My reasoning looks all over the place to me.
Yeah, I’m not entirely sure what you mean with some of this but as for why people don’t like and why they do, I can do that. I haven’t read enough comics to have a firm idea of the impact in comics, or what scene in the films makes people hate it (though if I had to bet it would probably be Wanda putting Vision through the floor, or like. Generalised fan hate for Wanda due to goddamn fandom misogyny and fucking Tony stans) or what scene in comics made people hate. A lot of those things are seriously subjective and personal and the hate for WandaVision is not just limited to the personal. Anyway.
Main reasons I’ve seen people say they don’t like ScarletVision:
They feel Marvel is pushing it too hard with all their nods to the comics.
They didn’t like the relationship in the comics in the first place.
They think Wanda’s abusive because she shoved (the practically indestructible) Vision through the floor and…
They find it squicky because Vision is technically a year old in CACW.
Now, I don’t mind the nods to the comics too much [1], and sure you can dislike the relationship in the comics, but it was very significant, producing the first incarnations of Wiccan and Speed (before the death, time-jump rebirth and other shit) which drove the House of M plotline, which has had a huge impact on the Maximoffs in general [2], and so… I can see why they’d want to reference so enduring a relationship. You can dislike it if you want, but I don’t especially think there’s a need to hate on it. Find it personally obnoxious, sure. Want to desperately avoid it, sure. But honestly, fandom’s need to try to justify their hatred of something or to be incredibly judgy is something I find deeply grating these days (hence the vagueblog the other day) so I think people need to tone shit down some.
As to the “Wanda’s abusive thing”… Vision did literally lie by omission to her regarding keeping her under house arrest. Let’s look at two other cases where she was lied to.
Strucker and List! They recruited the twins in This Scepter’d Isle tie in prelude comic, and claimed to be SHIELD by speaking of “our Avengers, our Iron Man”. But they weren’t and, as you see, the twins readily abandon them when the fight comes to the castle.
Ultron! “You were supposed to make a better world!” “It will be better!” “When everyone is dead?” And what happened then? She set Helen free from the sceptre’s control, she and Pietro got the hell out… only to return to fight Ultron alongside the Avengers.
Wanda, simply, does not like being lied to. If she offers trust then to betray it is one of the worst crimes you can commit against her. The same holds true of Pietro in comics, it’s the reason for the end of his relationship with Crystal Amaquelin. To break their trust is a surefire way to earn their ire and Vision is clearly very close to Wanda by the time of CACW… and he lied to her.
Besides which, he’s indestructible. From their conversation we see that they’re both very much regarded as Other by the other Avengers and by the public - the android and the witch - and they seem to understand one another’s capabilities. Vision begs Wanda to not leave not to refrain from putting him through the floor. Being put through the floor is easily survivable for him. He is literally made from Vibranium. He can phase through solid matter! He can alter his own density! He’s also an android who doesn’t think like we do, he’s genuinely surprised that he can be distracted because his way of thinking is very very alien to that of a human.
So if Wanda’s abusive, so is Vision. But given their conversation at Leipzig Airport when Wanda finally stops fighting, it seems like they’re generally quite open with their emotions and their thoughts. They each understand why they responded as they did and don’t seem to hold it too much against it each other. So, honestly, I’d say they have a healthier relationship than some (Pepper/Tony has a few problems, so I actually Do Not Judge Pepper taking a break from him in CACW) especially given that Wanda comes out of a codependent bond with her brother because her brother dies. The fact she’s not an emotional wreck and is capable of healthy relationships is amazing. Given a lot of factors… look the relationship - whatever it may be - between Wanda and Vision needs work, but all relationships do. And both of them clearly put a lot of thought into their discussions, with Vision’s awkward hamfisted attempts to make Wanda feel better, and Wanda’s willingness to talk openly to Vision in turn. It’s clearly a relationship based on communication and intellectual exercise, which I think is a decently solid basis? But then again, I’m ace, and of the few relationships I’ve had, one of them involved a hugely manipulative dickhead, so what do I know.
Honestly the squickiness is the one reason I can really see and get behind [3] even though it doesn’t squick me out personally. Vision is literally a year old by the time of CACW. That’s not hyperbole, you can check the MCU timelines on the wikia. He’s very young, he’s still very naive, he still lacks a solid understanding of human nature because he’s very logical and so emotion and ulterior motives sometimes - heck, often - pass him by. He’s seriously lacking in life experience and that makes forming relationships with him of any kind to be very weird.
The way that I find it easier to handle is… well, look at Ultron. Emotionally immature, yes, but intellectually he had a great understanding of things, even if he was an omnicidal maniac. Then, look at JARVIS. We don’t know when JARVIS was made, but he’s existed in MCU canon as a whole and intact thing for years, he’s had plenty of time to mature as a half AI half natural language UI, and then being merged with what there is of the part-sceptre brain of Ultron…. physically he’s a year old, but he’s got more going on in his skull than just that. He may lack a lot of experience and understanding - of course he does, part of him comes from an omnicidal maniac, the other part is a bodyless AI that acted as Tony Stark’s nanny, minder, adviser, best friend and general helping hand. His understanding of a lot of things is very off.
But he isn’t just a year old. He’s also got a lot of other stuff going on.
Honestly, if you don’t like ScarletVision, that’s fine. Its your business, it’s your preference. I don’t get ClintCoulson or Stony or… hell a lot of slash ships these days, if I’m honest, partially due to how they dismiss female characters even when written by female fans, but I’m not going to shit on them. If ScarletVision is your NOTP just block it. There’s no need to go shitting all over it, or trying to justify your hatred, distaste or squicked-out-ness by it. Just say “I don’t like this,” or “It makes me uncomfortable” and leave it at that. You don’t have to justify your personal feelings to other people. You’re allowed to dislike things just because you dislike things. You’re allowed to like things that are ProblematicTM [7] just because they scratch your id.
But yeah. People have their own reasons for not liking ScarletVision and that’s justified. Seeing it pushed in their faces, I can see why someone who doesn’t care for it would come to hate it - I didn’t care about Tony Stark but his stans have made me detest him on principle. But, you don’t need to spew hate everywhere about it, and that isn’t necessarily a personal issue.
That’s a fandom issue, largely due to the purity police, problematic TM thing, the callout brigade and people trying to prove that they are ideologically pure to try to prevent such callouts happening to them. The solution? For people to stop calling out other people or to stop giving a shit if they get called out. For people to stop overusing or misusing callouts to get back at people they don’t like. For people to stop lying with callouts. For people to stop uncritically reblogging callout posts without checking facts for themselves.
This probably isn’t going to happen, not for a while at least. Not before fandom has almost entirely burned itself out, burned itself to the ground and had to rebuild itself from the ground up.
But hey. I guess chewing up and spitting out your friends and companions only to team up again for the sequel is in right now - it’s what’s going in in the MCU.
[1] And hey, if it was nods for BuckyNat you know people would be practically cheering, so I find it kind of weird that this specifically is an issue while people are almost panting for a reference to BuckyNat, just as I find it annoying that people spent ages begging JKR for more information only to turn around and go “why won’t she stop!?” Answer: Because y’all spent years begging her for more. Don’t be bitter because your wish got answered.
[2] Yes there are issues with House of M, yes I know you may dislike it, no, I don’t care right now. Like what you like, dislike what you like, whether house of M was good is not the question, the question is if it was significant and it was.
[3] Being sick of Marvel pushing something via nods to the comics sure, that can be irritating, but there’s a bit of a double standard there because no one minds it for other characters and, indeed, they seem to be begging for it for BuckyNat. They ignore the nod to Ultimates that Clint’s family is [4] just to spit on it because it’s not Clintasha like they wanted or ClintCoulson (how did that ship start, honestly? IT MAKES ZERO SENSE), they hate on the nod to comics for WandaVision, but they seem to keep their eyes peeled for every other Easter egg opportunity, draw wildly out of proportion parallels between comics and MCU [5] and practically beg for BuckyNat [6].
[4] As is like… Clint’s character in this, he’s much more brutal than 616 Clint. MCU Clint is more disaster to humans than human disaster, and that is very Ultimates.
[5] People saying how much of a slap in the face the Raft is in MCU are WRONG because the Raft is new in MCU and has never been used to imprison anyone, let alone villains or heroes, so the slap to the face that it is in comics does not apply here.
[6] I get it, BuckyNat is really interesting and features two people dealing with their differing yet similar traumas from the same source. I’m a sucker for that kind of thing, I get it. But guys, it’s not what’s happening.
[7] Kylux feat. blood and force choking for example. Look I have issues with the shipping of Kylo and Hux but those fics are AMAZING and HORRIBLE and I LOVE THEM, for the simple reason that they are very id-scratchy. Sometimes I like to read about deeply unhealthy bloody relationships or just like. Straight up healthy BDSM. We all have likes and dislikes, but those don’t have to be due to an ideological basis. All things are flawed, some things more than others, but just because you don’t like something doesn’t mean that everyone should dislike the thing [8].
[8] There are, of course, exceptions to this. Nazis and Neo-Nazis, for example, should be universally hated and vilified because they wish to commit fucking genocide. White nationalists should be universally hated and vilified because they want to destroy anyone they don’t see as white, when race is a completely arbitrary construct entirely designed to create social divisions in the first place. But, some things can be problematic without being The Worst And Most Awful Thing Ever and that’s what this post is about.
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Scissor Sisters Frontman Talks Going Solo, David Bowie’s Death
“Oh, did I print that?”
Jake Shears is in a state of surprised perplexity, wondering if a version of his new (and very moving) memoir, “Boys Keep Swinging,” landed in the hands of journalists, such as myself, with what he calls the “weird epilogue.”
After all, Shears (born Jason Sellards) thought he stripped that throwaway entry – quite literally, as “I had them rip that page out from the ones that hadn’t been sent out already when I found out about that” – but those not-to-be-published pages still made the rounds.
In addition to reflecting on the process of reaching into tucked away corners of his life for the two-years-in-the-making memoir, the flash-forward epilogue explains his lengthy break from the Scissor Sisters, which Shears formed with Scott “Babydaddy” Hoffman in 2001, just days after Sept. 11. He writes, “I didn’t have much to say anymore through that particular filter.”
Calling from New York, where he’s starring as Charlie Price in Broadway’s “Kinky Boots,” it’s clear in conversation that even if you didn’t know Shears studied fiction writing at the New School in New York City and went on to adapt Armistead Maupin’s “Tales of the City” into a stage musical, you’d catch on to his writerly conscience quickly. He cycles through his thoughts carefully, acknowledging his tendency to get lost in thought – “here I’m not talking in complete sentences” – or prefacing his explanation of the Trump era’s judgy, joy-shaming rhetoric with, “I’m not gonna be eloquent saying this, I don’t think.”
A love letter to the band of misfits he met living in Seattle and New York responsible for his queer coming of age, a journey that transformed his youth as a suppressed, bullied Christian outcast into a flagrantly gay, go-go dancing, glam-rock superstar, the wonderful “Boys Keep Swinging” is an unflinching account of sexuality in bloom, imbued with Shears’ colorful record of his most formative years.
Musically, he’s found his creative mojo again, releasing last year’s ’70s-inspired groove “Creep City,” a prelude to his upcoming summer solo debut. “I feel like through the kind of lens of Scissor Sisters, I wasn’t particularly inspired at the moment to make more music that goes through that filter,” he tells me, elaborating on the nixed epilogue. “I really wanted that filter to just be me, and I’m definitely in a place where I am very comfortable and happy to call the shots.”
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My mom is a fan of yours, and we’ve been to a Scissor Sisters show together. She wants to read your book, and I want her to, but I’m worried she’ll ask me a lot of questions about the gay community’s deep, dark secrets – like, what are International Male catalogues?
It was weird to have my own mom read it! She read it in a day, and I was really beside myself when I finally gave it to her, but I had her primed for it for a couple of years while I was writing it, so she was ready for it. She’s actually been super supportive and loved it.
Considering she wasn’t accepting of you after you came out to her, that’s a pretty evolved woman.
Yeah, my mom’s amazing. I couldn’t have a better mom.
Reading it, I don’t think I expected to find parts of myself in your life story. But some of my earliest memories have been jolted and brought back to life because of you sharing your own. I forgot B. Dalton Bookseller even existed until you mentioned it.
I had no expectations as to what people were going to think or respond to, or whether people would identify with it. It’s funny: (Musician) Sam Sparro, a really great friend of mine in Los Angeles and one of the first people I gave (the book) to when I got the uncorrected proofs, that’s what he said. He was just like, “I feel like this is my own story in so many ways.” The day I turned this book in was devastating to me. I was really very unhappy. Basically, it had to be ripped out of my hands. (Laughs)
Why was letting the book go so difficult for you?
It’d been such a part of my life for a couple of years. I don’t know if I would call it a crutch, but it was definitely this obsession once I had started editing it. I was editing it until the last hour. When I turned in the final – the very last edits – I was so unhappy! I feel a lot better about it now. (Laughs)
When your friend, novelist Rakesh Satyal, suggested you write the book, did you immediately know where to start?
For a while, the book had started where the New York section starts. That was the beginning of the book, and I was going for quite a while. I really wasn’t planning on writing that whole first third (about my youth), and then I hit this point when I was writing well into what is now the second section where I was like, I’m not gonna be able to go any further without actually starting from the beginning. So, I went back. That whole first third I ended up going back and writing.
Today’s the Day. Boys Keep Swinging out in the USA!!! Link in bio
A post shared by Jake Shears (@jakeshears) on Feb 20, 2018 at 5:23pm PST
As gay people in their 30s, it’s sometimes easy to forget the emotional turmoil and personal struggle we went through to be comfortable with ourselves. Did reflecting on your own sexual adversity give you a greater appreciation for who you’ve become – this unabashedly gay role model?
I don’t really think of myself like that, but the thing I did underestimate, though, is, I’m a pretty resilient person. Going back and writing some of the more painful stuff, I feel like I kind of underestimated its effect on me, just in general in my everyday life. I would finish a week and feel terrible and realize I had been sort of reliving some hard stuff, and I didn’t really consider that when I was getting into it and didn’t really know that was happening at the time. It’s strange. I feel like there are 30 different books that I could’ve written.
Did you tap into any other queer memoirists for advice or insight?
The Carrie Brownstein book (“Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl”) came along exactly when I needed it. It really resonated with me, and it was very influential. Over the summer I met up with (gay author of “The Hours”) Michael Cunningham, and I’ve had a couple of great talks with him about this thing and have gotten a lot of support from him.
It’s hard to give the book to somebody when it’s not finished. It’s just strange. You’ve gotta pick the right people to give it to before it’s done. I had lunch with Elton (John) a couple of weeks ago, and I was excited for him to read it because he plays a prominent part in the last third of the book. He read it in a day and wrote me this email, and he was so happy and loved it. That was really sweet.
In addition to Elton, you write a lot about your childhood idol, David Bowie, in the book. You didn’t actually meet Bowie, right?
No, he just came to a show and I found out about it after I got off stage. I was heartbroken. It was the scariest. Just a really freaky moment for me.
When you found out about his passing how did that affect you?
It was so strange because I’d been pounding “Black Star” all weekend and just absolutely loving it, and then I had told my friend Laura it was great and she needed to listen to it. And so, it was Sunday night and I was hanging out with this guy, this friend of a friend, and we were just having a drink and he didn’t know any Bowie stuff, so I was like, “I’ll play you some good Bowie tunes.” And I was playing Bowie and I got an instant message from my friend Laura that just said, “David Bowie,” with a frowny face. I was so confused. I wrote back and then she gave me the news. It was just a really strange moment because I was playing his music when I found out he died. It was a very weird night. This person that I didn’t really know ended up just being with me all night. I was wrecked.
I woke up the next morning and was going through a lot of stuff at that time in my life, and I was actually overjoyed in the following weeks to see the outpouring of love for him. All the parties and all the memories and just everyone’s enthusiasm and love for him was so wonderful, and my darkest time was just that night, and I’ve been celebrating him ever since.
Considering Bowie’s influence on you as an artist, did his death have you contemplating your own legacy as an artist?
Oh, I don’t know. I don’t even really think about it. (Laughs) I do feel like I’m into probably chapter three. The next 10 years are gonna be another thing for me. The album is coming out this summer, and it’s an album that I’m so beyond proud of and that I love so much and that I’m so excited to put out. You’re gonna dig it. I’ve never been prouder of something so much, as a whole.
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Your photos, including the single cover for “Creep City,” have crossed over from twink to daddy, at least according to the gay men who comment on your Instagram photos.
I know! (The daddy name) just started a few years ago and I’m like, “Well, I guess we’re here now.” I turn 40 in October and have a great life and feel as sexy now as ever, if not sexier. I don’t mind going into my 40s. I’m really excited about the next 10 years, and then the next 10 years after that. It was weirder finishing up my 20s and going into my 30s, but now I’m very happy about my age and aging.
Regarding the Scissor Sisters, can you give me an example of something you had to compromise on that you no longer have to as a solo artist?
This whole record is about a time and a place in my life, and it’s definitely me writing about a very specific place that I was at when I wrote it. There’s no way I could’ve made this record without everybody being like, “Why do we all have to perform songs about you?” (Laughs)
Will it reflect the political turmoil that a lot of Trump-era art has?
In an inverted way. I personally think the world needs more joy at the moment. There needs to be joyful music, and I think sometimes we forget that in hard times. Sometimes we can forget to have fun, and I think right now there are a lot of hands on the hips and frowning upon having fun, and I just don’t subscribe to that.
Being in “Kinky Boots” has been the perfect show for me because it really sums up my philosophy with the music that I make. It’s been a really nice fit in that way, and the magic of being in that show is getting to see all the people come from all over the world that have never seen anything like that. As a New Yorker, we take a lot of stuff for granted. Urban sophisticates take a lot for granted, and here’s a show about being yourself, and in a very loud and proud way. Seeing the various people come to the show who have never seen anything like it before is a really beautiful thing. I do think that it opens and changes people’s minds.
I make music for everybody, and I really don’t care who you are or what you believe. If somebody who has a different belief system than I do finds something in my music to like, I think that’s a really great thing. I just really can’t stand the rhetoric happening from everybody – or from a lot of people – at the moment.
What rhetoric are you referring to?
I just think there’s so much judgment coming from all sides with social media. It’s just one big pile of judgment on everybody and everything. I just think everybody’s got room to grow, and I think that should be encouraged.
You go through a lot of personal growth in the book. Had you known what you know now about life, what would you tell your younger self?
I would try to bolster my own confidence that my own instincts at the time were correct. There’s nothing I would go back and tell myself to do differently because I don’t really have any regrets or anything – OK, I mean, of course we all have regrets. But I just took my own path, and I would tell myself, at 18, 19 years old, “You’re headed in the right direction. Don’t second guess.” It’s so crazy how much more self-doubt I have now as a 40-year-old man sometimes than I did then. Just writing this book and looking at me being 21 years old, I’m like, “Oh my god, I probably should’ve had a little more fear than I did!”
from Hotspots! Magazine https://hotspotsmagazine.com/2018/03/15/scissor-sisters-frontman-talks-going-solo-david-bowies-death/
from Hot Spots Magazine https://hotspotsmagazine.tumblr.com/post/171899430135
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Yiffpunk Prelude 6: Vanessa
Vanessa frowned as she looked at the three roaches trembling before her. Roaches… They were by far the most worthless of henchmen but also the most plentiful when you found yourself operating out of the slums. Naturally they probably didn’t like to be called henchmen. Officially they were paid employees of Mountain Foot Courier Services LLC. But as far as Vanessa was concerned, if they didn’t like being called henchmen that was tough shit. She didn’t like being stranded in the Mountain Foot Slums with no money and no means of leaving. But her ex-husband didn’t give her a choice when he opened the car door and kicked her out there before speeding off without her. She had to work and struggle to build her company from the ground up in that filthy dump where everyone else was just as poor as she was. It hadn’t been easy and she’d had to cut a few dirty deals to get her head above water, but she had managed to do it. Maybe she still hadn’t earned enough money to get out of the slums, but she was at least one of the most successful business women in that pit. So she had earned the right to call her employees henchmen if she wanted to. And they had not earned the right to argue on the matter.
But she didn’t plan to stay in her current position for much longer. Vanessa had just scored a deal that would pay out big time. All she needed was to hire some know-nothing thug from the slums who was desperate enough for money that he would do anything and send him to recover a package and she would be set for life. She could finally say goodbye to that awful mud hole of a town and live somewhere nice again. Maybe she could even track down her ex-husband and have him killed. But that depended on finding the right man or woman to pull off this job. And her worthless henchmen were not making matters any easier on her.
“Okay this is a simple question… Which one of you is taking the blame for this?” Vanessa asked angrily as she looked down from the oversized flowerpot, which served as her favorite chair in her office, at the three quivering roaches. They each exchanged glances with one another but none of them stepped forward. Sighing, she pulled one shapely leg out of the potting soil and extended it down over the edge of the flowerpot, wiggling her foot at them. “Then you had better be ready to do some serious kissing up…”
The three roaches instantly rushed forward, pressing their mandibles to her foot as they kissed it over and over again. It was easy to be intimidating when you were a Venus flytrap and your staff were all insects. Plant people weren’t all that common. Even back in the days when Genetic-Co was still around, before the Genetic Purists kicked off their crusade against all things non-human, when it was perfectly feasible for anyone who wanted to walk into a clinic and have their genes spliced with whatever they wanted, there still weren’t a lot of plant people around. Not a lot of people wanted to be turned into a plant when becoming a humanoid animal was both considered more attractive by the social standards of the time, and called for far less lifestyle changes.
But today plants were even rarer than they had been back then. With Genetic-Co gone, the only ones around now were the offspring of those originals, which were few and far between considering there weren’t a lot of plant people around to populate the species in the first place. So Vanessa was a rare and exotic beauty. Her head was essentially all mouth. Flat and green on the outside, deep red on the inside, and lined with long, needle-like teeth from end to end instead of lips. While she did have eyes and ears, they were very small and invisible to anyone who didn’t know exactly where to look. That flytrap head was attached by a short, round stem to her body which was a stark contrast to her face in that it was mostly human in shape. It was still green like her head, and was made out of plant matter, but like natural Venus flytraps one would find in nature, it lacked any leaves or branches and was instead entirely human shaped.
And she had a beautiful figure to boot. A slim, hourglass figure with a tiny waist, curvy hips, long, shapely legs, and moderately sizable, perfectly firm breasts. And due to the fact that plants and animals couldn’t cross-breed, and again because there had been so few of them to start with, like all plants, her genepool hadn’t been corrupted through generations of inter breeding with women with dicks. She was all woman, as the definition had once applied long ago. With the animals you would be hard pressed to find a woman who didn’t have a dick. That was just the norm now. Only a very few anomalies popped up here and there who didn’t have one. But as a plant she had no such appendage between her legs and that was the norm for her species.
It was both her beauty and her rarity that had attracted a certain wealthy businessman to her and made her accustomed to the finer things in life as his wife in the first place. If she had only known back then that she was nothing more than a trophy wife and that her husband would quite literally kick her to the curb once he found a new one who interested him even more, she would have taken precautions to ensure she didn’t end up sitting in the office of third rate courier service in a slum just outside of Rabbitropolis with a bunch of pathetic cockroaches slobbering all over her foot in apology for letting what would have been the perfect candidate for her little deal go out and get himself killed.
“You know what…? This isn’t doing it for me,” Vanessa said as she reached down quickly and grabbed one of the roaches by the arm, yanking him up in front of her.
“Miss Vanessa, wait! It wasn’t my fault!” the roach pleaded just before she tossed him into her mouth and chomped down on him.
The other two quickly scurried away from her, backing up towards the office door, eyeing her wearily. Vanessa wasn’t exactly like a natural Venus flytrap one would find growing in nature when it came to her method of eating either. Her ancestors had been humans who’d had themselves gene spliced. So like her human ancestors she had a throat and a stomach. Instead of dissolving the roach in her mouth she tilted her head back and swallowed him whole. Which was no easy feat considering these roaches were each four feet tall. But she’d gotten in quite a bit of practice in swallowing prey that size so it was no problem for her at least to gulp the little guy down until he was making a sizable, squirming bulge in her belly.
Vanessa sighed happily as she patted her new belly bulge with one hand and looked back down at the other two roaches. “Alright now… One of you explain to me exactly how our good Mr. Chip died the night before he was supposed to leave on the job, when I specifically asked you to keep an eye on him. And maybe if the explanation is suitable I won’t send the two of you down to join your coworker in my digestive juices.”
“It wasn’t our fault,” one of the roaches quickly answered. “We were keeping an eye on him just like you ordered. Everything was going fine at first. But then Mr. Chip decided to go to a bar and start drinking. So naturally, we followed him in. We all took a seat at a booth where we could see him at the bar and ordered drinks so as not to look too suspicious.”
“So you were drinking on the job,” Vanessa nodded. “This is already starting to make sense.”
“Just a few!” the roach quickly protested. “And we were really nursing them. Drinking real slow… But Mr. Chip… he was knocking them back one after the other. He just kept tossing back the drinks all night. Eventually we realized that he was getting way too drunk and we needed to do something to stop him. But you ordered us to make sure he didn’t know we were following him, so we couldn’t just go up to him and tell him to stop. That was when Cleveland got an idea. He suggested that maybe if we got someone to go proposition him, then Mr. Chip would stop drinking and go have sex instead.”
“Okay, that doesn’t sound like a horrible idea,” Vanessa admitted. “Which one of you is Cleveland?”
“Uhh… He’s in your stomach…” the other roach said.
“Ah… Pitty…” Vanessa said patting her belly again. Cleveland’s squirming was starting to die down in there. “So you found someone to hit him up for sex?”
“Cleveland found a hooker and paid her to go talk Mr. Chip into bed with her,” the first roach continued with a nod.
“Hold on… A hooker?” Vanessa asked confused.
“Yes ma’am. It’s a woman who has sex for money,” the roach answered.
“I know what a hooker is! I just didn’t realize there was anyone left who still did that sort of thing… Who would pay for sex when most people will give it if you just ask?”
“Well this girl was special,” the roach continued. “She didn’t have a dick. And you know how hard that is to find… She was some kind of lizard… I think her name was Cleo or something like that? Anyways, Cleveland offered her a bank roll if she could get Mr. Chip to stop drinking and just fuck her for the rest of the night. She agreed and when she approached Mr. Chip we thought things were going to be all fine and dandy. You know, seeing as Mr. Chip was a lizard as well… We figured she would be perfect for him.”
“That would imply that she wasn’t perfect for him…” Vanessa said in one of her ‘not amused’ tones. The roaches both shivered at the sound of it. They knew that tone all too well. That was the tone of voice Vanessa spoke in right before she ate one of her henchmen.
“Well, umm… no… She wasn’t…” the roach admitted.
“What was the problem?” Vanessa asked.
“We looked into it afterwards… Turns out the hooker was a type of lizard called a green anole, and Mr. Chip was a bearded dragon.”
“I don’t understand why that’s a problem,” Vanessa said shaking her head.
“Oh, well… bearded dragons actually eat anoles. They are called feeder lizards,” the roach explained. “But I mean, we didn’t think to check on something like that at the time. Half the people in this town feed on the other half of the people in this town and we all get along just fine. People don’t normally get eaten under regular circumstances, you know? But I guess Mr. Chip was a little too drunk and I guess he was looking at her and thinking she would be pretty tasty…”
Vanessa held up a hand to stop him while rubbing herself between the eyes with the other. She could feel a headache starting to come on already. “So you are telling me you had a very drunk carnivore sitting at the bar getting drunker by the minute… A ruthless, cold blooded one at that… And you tried to hook him up with a girl without even checking to see if she was his natural prey? Are you seriously that stupid? What did you even just tell me? People don’t normally get eaten under regular circumstances? Come here.”
“What?” the roach asked a little bit confused and a little bit worried.
“I said come here,” Vanessa repeated, beckoning him forward with a finger. “I want to show you something.”
The roach cautiously stepped forward, approaching her slowly. The moment he was within reach, Vanessa grabbed him, moving with speeds even the roach’s reflexes couldn’t match, and pulled him up off of his feet. “People don’t normally get eaten under regular circumstances?! Is that what you just said? You work here! How many of you filthy little bugs do I eat on a daily basis? Answer me that?”
“Uhh… Several?” the roach asked, flinching and expecting to be gobbled up right there on the spot. But instead of going into Vanessa’s mouth she set him down on top of her desk. His legs were shaking as he did his best to remain standing and not run away the moment her hand had released its grip on him.
“Do you see my coffee cup there?” Vanessa asked.
The roach looked down at the mug of coffee sitting on the desk beside him and nodded.
“Taste it.”
“Excuse me, ma’am?” the roach asked.
“I said taste it,” Vanessa ordered sternly.
He nodded and picked up the coffee cup, raising it to his mouth with shaky hands, and took a sip.
“How is it?” Vanessa then asked.
“It’s… good…” the roach answered, not sure what she wanted from him but far too afraid to insult her tastes by saying her coffee wasn’t good.
“It’s not too hot for you?” Vanessa asked.
“No ma’am. It’s… it’s cold,” the roach admitted.
“How cold is it?” Vanessa asked.
“Ice cold,” the roach answered.
“That’s right,” Vanessa nodded. “My coffee is ice cold. I just had that cup brought in here before I called you in. Do you think my coffee should have gotten that cold in the small amount of time you have been standing here explaining yourself? If it was a fresh cup, like I asked for, should it have gotten that cold that quickly?”
“No ma’am,” the roach shook his head.
“I see…” Vanessa said musing over his answer. “But I asked for a fresh cup… If a fresh cup shouldn’t have gotten that cold that quickly, what explanation could there be for why my coffee is so cold?”
“It… wasn’t a fresh cup…” the roach answered slowly.
“Oh is that what happened…?” Vanessa asked then pressed the button on her desk intercom. “Patty, will you come in here for a moment?”
A moment later the office door opened and a female cockroach stepped inside. “Yes ma’am?” she asked.
“Will you come over here, Patty?” Vanessa asked. “Hop up on the desk next to, uhh…”
“Houston,” the roach on her desk answered.
“Hop up here next to Houston,” Vanessa nodded.
Patty nodded and scurried over and up onto Vanessa’s desk, taking a place beside Houston. “What can I do for you ma’am?” she asked sweetly.
“Patty dear, you’ve been my secretary for how long now?” Vanessa asked.
“Two months, ma’am,” Patty answered.
Vanessa nodded. “And in that time, you have learned how I like my coffee, haven’t you?”
“I believe so,” Patty nodded.
“Well you see, now we have a problem,” Vanessa frowned. “Because I like my coffee fresh and hot. And if you know how I like my coffee then when I asked you to bring me a cup, you should have brought me a cup of fresh, hot coffee. But Houston here says that this coffee is not a fresh cup. He says it is ice cold.”
“What?! That’s not possible!” Patty protested. “I made that coffee fresh just the way you like it! The same way I make it for you every day! I promise!”
“Well that can only mean one thing,” Vanessa said shaking her head. “It means one of you is lying to me. Either you are lying to me about bringing me fresh coffee, or Houston is lying to me about the coffee not being fresh. Now you know I won’t tolerate my staff lying to me. So I’m afraid I’m going to have to eat one of you now. So which one of you is it? Which one of you is lying to me?”
“What?! No! I didn’t do it! He’s lying to you!” Patty shouted, pointing accusingly at Houston.
“Ma’am, wait… I could be mistaken… I mean… it’s possible that the coffee did get this cold while we were standing here talking. There is no need to punish anyone over this…” Houston said at the same time.
“Hold on… So you’re saying it was a fresh cup? But you just said it wasn’t? Which is it, Houston? Are you saying you were just lying to me?” Vanessa asked.
“What?! No that’s not what I’m saying!” Houston quickly argued.
“So then Patty is lying to me?” Vanessa asked.
“I’m not!” Patty protested angrily.
“No! I’m saying there was a mistake!” Houston tried to argue.
“A mistake?” Vanessa asked suspiciously. “As in Patty only thought she brought me a fresh cup but she mistakenly brought me an old one? I guess that’s not so bad. Everyone makes mistakes…”
“Right! That’s all it was… A mistake,” Houston nodded eagerly.
Vanessa then turned her attention onto Patty. “So is that what this is, Patty? It’s just a mistake? Do you think you might have possibly grabbed the wrong cup on accident?”
“I… I guess it’s possible…” Patty nodded.
“Thank you, Patty. That’s all I needed to know,” Vanessa smiled.
“So then, everything’s okay?” Patty asked a little unsure.
“Everyone makes mistakes, right?” Vanessa asked with a shrug.
“Right. Everyone makes mistakes,” Patty nodded just before Vanessa’s jaws chomped down around her. The girl could be heard screaming from inside Vanessa’s mouth as she tilted her head back and started to swallow. Houston shivered unhappily as the screams continued to be heard as Patty slowly slid down Vanessa’s throat. The sight of the young secretary creating a roach shaped bulge in the flytrap’s throat as she continued to slide downward sent a chill down his exoskeleton. Vanessa knew just how disturbing the sight of what was happening was to the roach so she swallowed the girl down as slowly as possible until finally Patty was bloating her stomach out even farther than it already was and at last the screams were muffled enough that they could no longer hear them.
Smiling down at Houston still standing on her desk she said, “Do you see that? I just ate my secretary because she made a simple mistake. So what were you saying about people not normally getting eaten under regular circumstances?”
“Uhh… I…” Houston stammered trying to find the right words but Vanessa was already tired of listening to him. He tried to run when he saw her hand coming for him but he wasn’t fast enough. Before Houston had time to process what was actually happening he was already in Vanessa’s mouth and taking the plunge down her throat to join Patty and Cleveland.
“Oh god…” Vanessa sighed, resting both hands on her stomach. “I’m so fucking stuffed… The rest of this story had better be good. Because I don’t even know if I can fit you in there with the rest of them at this point,” she said looking over at the last remaining roach. “What was your name again?”
“Portland,” the last roach answered from where he was trembling in the corner.
“Very well, Portland. Please continue… You bought Mr. Chip a hooker but he ate her? What happened then?”
“Well… he didn’t eat her right away,” Portland answered. “At first we thought he was going to take her back to his place and fuck her, like we wanted. So we started following from a distance to make sure they made it back. And they did… Then we snuck up and watched through the bedroom window to make sure things were going okay. And they were… But after a while we got tired of watching them fuck. Once you’ve seen one peep show you’ve seen them all. So then Houston was all like, hey I’ve got a pack of cigars. You guys want to go smoke them? And we were all down for that but we couldn’t just sit there and smoke them right under Mr. Chip’s bedroom window or he would smell the smoke. So we walked down to the street to smoke them.
“So there we were, standing on the street out in front of Mr. Chip’s front yard, smoking cigars, when suddenly we heard this loud crash. Like glass shattering. And it came from Mr. Chip’s house. So we ran back to see what had happened, and we found his bedroom window broken. We looked through it and there was this human in there with him now. Also the hooker was gone and Mr. Chip’s stomach was several sizes larger than it had been. I guess ate her while we were out smoking.”
“Hold on… Who was the human?” Vanessa asked.
“We looked into it. He’s apparently just some thug who beats people up for money,” Portland answered. “But he also lives with that hooker it seems, so I think he may be moonlighting as her pimp or something. But either way, we don’t know how he found out what was going on. Maybe he was following the hooker the same way we were following Mr. Chip… But the guy was an animal. And he was pissed… He grabs Mr. Chip by the throat and holds him up with one hand. Mr. Chip’s feet weren’t even touching the floor… Then he throws him clear across the room into the bedroom mirror. After that he jumps on Mr. Chip and just starts pounding him in the face with his fists over and over again. Then he pulls a drawer out of the dresser and starts pounding him in the head with that. Then he lifts up one side of the dresser itself, moves it over top of Mr. Chip’s head, and drops it on him. It was like some serious roid rage…
“But then he spots the broken glass from the mirror and picks up a shard and uses it to start slicing Mr. Chip’s stomach open. And I should point out that Mr. Chip is somehow still alive while he’s doing this. Oh god, the screaming was terrible… He ripped Mr. Chip’s stomach wide open and actually pulled the hooker out. And she was still alive! Uhh… Mr. Chip wasn’t after that point…”
Vanessa sighed and placed a hand over her face. “So you are telling me that Mr. Chip is dead because he was killed by an angry pimp after he ate a hooker? A hooker that you idiots set him up with without bothering to check if she was something he might want to eat? So in other words, if you idiots hadn’t set him up with that hooker he wouldn’t have eaten her and the pimp wouldn’t have killed him…”
“Well it sounds really bad when you say it like that…” Portland admitted. “Are you going to eat me now?”
“No, I’m not going to eat you,” Vanessa sighed, shaking her head. “These three are already threatening to ruin my figure as it is…” she said patting her belly. “But at least tell me you can find this pimp again.”
“Yeah, I can find him. His name is Bugsy. Like I said, we already found out where he and the hooker are shacking up together. Do you want me to take some men and go kill him for you?”
“No. I think he might actually serve as a good replacement for Mr. Chip if he’s anything like what you described,” Vanessa said, a smile starting to grace her face once more. “Do you remember my associate, Donald Snipe?”
“Yeah, he’s the guy we shipped all those weird eggs for,” Portland nodded.
Vanessa nodded in agreement. “Put together a folder on our dear Mr. Bugsy and deliver it to him. Tell him that his boyfriend is cheating on him and I thought this might be just the thug to rectify the situation.”
“Alright,” Portland nodded and left the room.
Once he was gone Vanessa pressed the button on her intercom again. “Patty, I need you to… Oh… Wait…” Vanessa chuckled to herself and rubbed her belly as she looked down at it. “I forgot for a second there… I was going to tell you to cancel my lunch because I already ate a working lunch, but you already know that, don’t you?”
She then picked up the phone on her desk and dialed the number for Donald’s boyfriend. “Hi there, Lee. This is Vanessa. So I’ve been thinking… When are we going to stop playing this little game and just do something about it? No, I’m not joking. I’m looking to get fucked and you were the first person who came to mind… Yeah? How’s my place sound? Tonight?”
Mr. Chip had been perfect and losing him had been quite a loss, but all of the new pieces were falling into place already so it wasn’t too much of a setback. Now she just hoped Donald wouldn’t take too long to hire this Bugsy guy to take care of Lee for cheating on him. She wanted to see what Mr. Bugsy was made of with her own eyes. Hopefully he would take care of Lee while they were together. It would be the perfect opportunity to offer him the job. Plus she didn’t want to have sex with that slime ball, Lee, any longer than she had to…
And with that taken care of there was only one thing left to do. She needed to hire a new secretary. Patty had a daughter who could use a job, didn’t she? Maybe she would last longer than her mother had… Vanessa hoped not. Patty had been unusually delicious and she was hoping it ran in the family.
This has been a Yiffpunk prelude story. Look for the official Yiffpunk novel, coming soon.
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