#folks the bad stuff is really creeping up on me again
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new image (letterboxd screenshot) to show my therapist just dropped
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ARRANGED - “Take care of you” - Draco M. X Reader - PART 6
Draco was very busy the next couple of days. He went off looking for a new house for you both to live in. He insisted you be apart of the process, but you wanted to stay home instead. The idea of you living on your own officially slightly stressed you out.
You had always been provided things you needed; not that you doubted Draco couldn’t/wouldn’t provide for you, but things would be a lot more different now. Your mind was still mixed up after all that had happened; you’ve felt completely left behind in life, you felt like you were a background character in your own movie.
You and Draco got rid of all of the things that reminded you of Nicholas. Including a Daily Prophet snippet:
The Daily Prophet
Nicholas Heckons, a past lover of Y/N Malfoy speaks out against her current husband, Draco Malfoy. He claims she’s “brainwashed” and “manipulated”.
He also claims Malfoy is “violent” and “short-tempered” also very controlling of Y/N. Here’s the latest word.
“I feel bad for them both really, Y/N, stupid and naive. Draco will have to get used to that soon, really,” Nicholas Heckons stated to our press.
“I suppose they’re each others perfect match, I’ve tried to convince Y/N that Draco is a load of rubbish, but of course, she cheated on me with him. I wouldn’t expect her to listen to me.” claimed Heckons.
Well there you have it, folks. Are Draco and Y/N a match made in Heaven; or Hell?
“Bloody Git.” Draco mumbled to himself, trashing the magical moving newspaper into a trash bag.
“Don’t sweat it. He’s probably embarrassed.” You shrugged, tossing an old Quidditch jersey of Nicholas’. "It's bullshit. He's a load of bullshit." Draco swore. You walked over to him, crouching to his level, as he was sitting on the floor. You ran your hands through his hair, and smiled at him.
All the anger seemed to slip away from him, he smiled, too.
"You never told me if you found a new house," You stated to Draco. His eyes lit up again, and he took your hand and stood up, pulling you up with him. "I wanted to show you, Y/N. I know you say this stuff causes some stress, but I found one I've fallen in love with, I just want you to be in love with it, too." Draco confessed. You took a deep breath, and looked at him. You nodded. "Well, let's see."
Draco's hands quickly shot down to your waist, picking you up and throwing you over his shoulder, "Dray!" You gasped from surprise. You could hear his charming laughter. He walked with you over his shoulder to the bedroom door, where he set you down. He motioned for you to go out to the hallway of the manor, you both walked down the stairs and out to the entryway.
One of the employees of Lucius’ stops you both. His dark smile creeps on his pale boney face. “And where will you two be off to?” He croaks.
“We’re looking at the home I’ve picked.” Draco said sternly.
"How do I know you and this blood traitor aren't planning another escape?" The guard asked.
"Are you using your brain? Father has told you all to back off, we've gained his trust," Draco scoffed. The guard balled his fists in anger. "Now, do we have a problem, or do I need to get my father?"
The guard rolled his eyes, and stepped aside. "I am keeping my eye on you, Malfoy."
"That's Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy to you." Draco spat, as he took your hand and drag out out the front door. You finally could take a deep breath.
"That son of a bitch. We've travelled without guards before, what the hell was he thinking?" Draco huffed. "I'm not sure Dray," You sighed. Draco smiled down at you as you walked towards the Manor's extravagant gate. "I love it when you call me that."
You and Draco had apparated to the new home he had picked. It was gorgeous, made entirely out of brick, just like the Malfoy Manor. There was a tall, dark green fence surrounding the home, a large front yard, perfect to decorate with lush landscape, like large trees and bushes. You assumed there'd be a large backyard as well, you already dreamed of having a perfect garden, like Narcissa's. Draco could have all the flowers he wanted.
"What do you think?" Draco asked, smirking down at you, admiring the view as well. "Draco, it's- it's perfect." You voiced. "I mean, we could really build a life here, what did your father think?"
Draco shrugged, his hands in his pockets, looking at the greying-clouds. It smelled like rain. "He didn't react much, I am not even sure why he accompanies me." He admitted. You looked up at him, with affection in your eyes. Draco had clearly lacked a healthy father figure; and he's coming to terms with it and unfortunately, dealing with the aftermath.
When you're a kid, you tend to not notice things you are missing in your childhood. Thing's that are essential, almost nourishing for your growth emotionally. Draco was thrown to be in the Dark Lord's army at such a young age; even before that, forced under beliefs that might've not been his natural and true mindset. These were things you wished you'd realized before. He has a thick wall surrounding him; as thick and protective as it might seem, it didn't take much for it to melt away like ice. His silver eyes were glassy, he seemed stressed. You were hoping moving into your own home; just you and him may help his uneasiness.
"He may just miss having you around," You alluded; not sounding entirely truthful. Draco scoffed. You bit your bottom lip, but he laughed light heartedly. You laughed too, to avoid awkwardness.
"Unfortunately, a family is still moving out, we can't see the inside." Draco said gloomily. You could tell he cherished this home; and you did as well. It was just a waiting game. "Shall we go back to the Manor?" He proposed. You smiled and interlinked your arm in his and nodded. You both apparated back to the Manor.
-
You both walked into the Manor from door to find Lucius and Narcissa talking. They seemed very grave. Lucius looked at you and Draco, with a destructive look in his eyes. "Father." Draco greeted without emotion. "Draco. I've heard from one of my guards you have some sort of, oh; what should I say, Narcissa? Attitude problem?" Lucius recollected. Draco inhaled. "He is the one who gave us a problem." You spoke up. Draco's head snapped in your direction, his arm guided you to be behind him. You reluctantly obliged.
"Bark and no bite, Ms. Y/N?" Lucius chuckled mockingly. "Y/N is speaking the truth, father." Draco stated. His ears were turning red, and a vein in his neck that always pops when he's angry was visible.
"That guard was being a pain in the ass, accusing us of planning an escape!"
"I don't care what he was fucking saying, you must learn respect, Draco!" Lucius' voiced echoed off of the Manor walls. Draco flinched, Narcissa winced at the noise level of his voice, looking empathetic towards Draco and I.
Lucius stayed quiet for a moment. He inhaled a deep breath. "I clearly need to rethink you both leaving the Manor. You clearly aren't ready." Lucius voiced, turning away from you and Draco, facing the fireplace.
"What the hell? You can't keep us here forever. We are not your prisoners." I blurt out. Lucius swiftly turns to my direction and draws his wand, pointing it towards me. "You! You are the one who was venomous to my son's mind!." You drew your wand out as well, but Lucius performed an Expelliarmus charm, disarming you. You gulped and backed up, Draco immediately jumped in front of you, guarding you.
"That is enough!" Draco bellowed, his hand tightly wrapped around the base of his wand. Sparks flew out of Lucius' wand, you immediately recognized that it was the crucio curse.
"Protego totalum!" Draco cried, and blocked the curse.
"Lucius he is your son!" Narcissa bawled, throwing her body onto his arm. He looked down at his desperate lover, begging him to stop the violence against their own blood.
"I wasn't aiming for him, Narcissa."
Lucius lurched towards you and Draco. Draco's eyes were dark, looking up at his father. Lucius promptly shoved him out of the way, Draco toppled onto the floor.
"Draco!" You screamed, reaching out for him, but Lucius grabbed you by the base of your neck, pulling you towards him.
"Crucio!" Exclaimed Lucius, his wand pointing towards you.
"Y/N!" Draco yelled, but it was too late.
It felt like electricity was shooting through your body; you felt like you were on fire, as if a firework had been set off inside of your body. Traveling through each limb, making it excruciatingly painful. Your body jolted to the floor. You tried to scream and bellow in pain; but you couldn't. Your body folded onto itself.
"You son of a bitch!" Draco yelled again, he ran towards you, Lucius had his wand pointed towards him. "Leave her!" He began to say another spell until Narcissa's voice rang across the room, "Petrificus Totalus!"
You flinched, expecting you to be paralyzed, and unable to defend yourself, on top of being in this amount of intense pain, but you heard a large thump to the floor.
You felt so frail, you could barely lift your head up off of the floor, only to see Lucius completely paralyzed.
Narcissa was still from the casting position she was in previously, trying to catch her breath.
"He needs.... He needs time children, please go up to your room. Y/N, dear, are you okay?" She said, all in-between long, slow breaths.
"I don't know.." You admitted honestly.
“Draco, I will take care of you father here, please take care of Y/N.” Narcissa waved you both off.
Draco lifted you off of the floor, bridal style. You instantly cling to him. You look up and see a tear rolling down his cheek. A bruise was forming on his face from where he had hit the floor. “Draco, your face,” You said softly, your hand landing in his bruised cheek bone. “I am the least of my worries, Y/N. Especially right now.” Draco replied. His grip on your tightened. You arrived to your bedroom. Draco gently placed you on the bed.
He quickly went to his dresser, rummaging through what sounded like glass bottles. Draco finally found a small bottle containing a thin, red liquid. He handed it to you. You were still weak, and slowly raised your hand up to grab it.
“What is this?” You asked with a rasp to your voice.
“Wiggenweld.” Draco said, he seemed uptight. “A healing potion.” He added. You nodded and popped off the cork. You brought the bottle to your lips and downed the potion. A warm, numbing feeling went over you; then the numbing had gone away. Your pain was gone, you were no longer weak.
“I feel so much better, thank you.” You bummed to the platinum boy.
Draco seemed to be spaced out. He wasn’t facing towards you, he was instead looking outside of his window.
“It shouldn’t have even happened.” Draco stressed. “I should’ve been to take the curse.”
You shook your head. “Dray, I’m fine.” you had insisted, getting up from the bed, spinning around slowly to show him you’re safe. Draco stepped towards you, and placed his hands on your waist. His silver eyes meet yours. You’re unable to speak, like you’re in a trance.
“Your protection is my responsibility,” Draco began. “From now on, I promise I will protect you, but now I need to take care of you.” His voice was low, it was in a tone you’d never heard before.
“I need you to take care of me, Dray.” You say seductively. Your hands land on his chest, his hand remain on your sides, but are now slowly running up and down.
He looked at your eyes, then your lips. He held you closer to him, tightening his grip. You smiled up at him and stood up on your tip toes and connected your lips to his. It wasn’t quick, and simple like the ones you’ve had in the past. It was slow, and sensual. Draco was hungry for you, his teeth grazed your bottom lip, making you gasped lightly. He took this as an opportunity to slip his tongue toward yours. He backed up up onto the bed again.
You felt goosebumps on every inch of your body. Draco hovered over you.
“Let me take care of you.”
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Murder on the Warfstache Express
Part 8: What the Engineer Didn't Hear
((Abe's investigation hits a new hitch when it turns out there's been a theft on the train.
Link to the previous chapter, Part 7: Incriminating Investigating here if you need it, plus one for the whole series.))
Abe led the way into the luggage car, briefly pausing in the space between the two train cars to cast a look out the locked doors to either side. The sight of the billowing snow confirming the blizzard was still going strong out there, and the chill in the air encouraged him to get a move on already (or maybe that was one of the others behind him).
Inside the luggage car he held his lantern high so that it would cast its light as far as possible—which wasn’t very far at all, not when it caught on the narrow racks of metal shelves to either side of the walkway and left deep shadows between them that only disappeared as he passed by just to take their place again soon after.
Without the noise of the engine or the rumble and rattle of the wheels below, it was quiet enough to hear the creak of their footsteps, the groan of metal cooling beneath the onslaught of snow, and a dozen other small, insignificant sounds suddenly magnified in the stillness.
And yet Abe didn’t feel the same creeping sense of being watched as he had the first time he walked through here in the darkness with Benjamin. Maybe it was the difference of having his lantern and Illinois’s behind him, bringing up the rear of the group, instead of just a small lighter. Maybe it was having been here before, or knowing what he was dealing with this time around, although it seemed like knowing a murderer was on the train should have been worse than trying to work out why the train had suddenly stopped without warning.
Or maybe, that small voice in the back of Abe’s mind that always waited until moments like this to speak up, there was something there then that isn’t here now.
Abe slowed, taking more time to scan each row of shelves as he passed, like he could somehow spot a difference among the luggage and packages stowed here and there, and asked over his shoulder, “Where’s this thing you wanted to check, Professor?”
“Up near the front of the car,” she said. “I didn’t really want it stored that close to the engine, but it wouldn’t exactly fit on the shelves.”
Oh, right, now that Abe thought about it he did vaguely remember the conductor/engineer Peter pointing out the huge crate to him earlier, the one covered in chains and locks. As much as Abe wanted to take a peek at what she had stashed in there, he figured it would take her some time to get it open, time he could make use of while he was here.
“You two mind going ahead?” Abe asked, stepping aside in the narrow space between two racks of metal shelving. “I’ll be right there, I just need to check something real quick.”
“Looking for that weapons safe, huh?” Illinois asked.
The detective shrugged without a word, but they both gave him a knowing look before continuing on toward the front of the car, the professor wondering aloud where she put her keys.
It wasn’t a bad guess, and if Abe thought he could get the thing open and finally get his gun back without the conductor’s help he probably would have been at it already. Instead, he quickly doubled back to the first occupied shelf and checked the name tag on the suitcase there before moving on to the next.
“Haven’t had your fill of going through folks’ underwear yet?” Wilford asked, Abe hating himself for how much the man’s voice made him jump. Somehow, impossibly, Abe had almost forgotten he was there, which seemed to be Wilford’s cue to try and give him a heart attack. “I don’t know, it gets kind of old after a while, doesn’t it, when everyone packs the same kind of stuff?”
“Not everyone,” Abe said. “All those rooms we checked, and there was one without any luggage at all. Well, two—why didn’t you bring anything on this trip?”
“I brought myself, that seems like enough to me,” Wilford said with a shrug. “Everything else will sort itself out when it needs to, I’m sure.”
“…Sure. But why would a normal person not bring at least a change of clothes or something on an overnight trip?” Abe asked, before realizing he was asking the wrong person that kind of question. “Even if you’re not planning on staying at your destination long, you’d bring a toothbrush or hairbrush or change of underwear or something, right? More than just an ID, a letter, and a gun is what I’m saying.”
“Unless you left in a hurry and didn’t have time to pack,” Wilford said.
“Okay, maybe—”
“Or you go back and forth between two places so much you have what you need at both.”
“Okay, sure, that might be possible, but—”
“Or you’re a spy, and everything you bring with you is an extra risk of blowing your cover!”
Abe opened his mouth to shoot down that idea and then paused, realizing that with as little as he knew about Agent Harold Apless, that one might actually be true. Actually, all of Wilford’s suggestions were plausible enough, which both annoyed and disturbed Abe equally.
Since when did Wilford make sense?
“All the time!” Wilford protested. “I don’t know where people get the idea that I don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Stop doing that,” Abe hissed through gritted teeth, and Wilford shrugged and turned away, the detective’s flask going to his mouth again. “And stop stealing my stuff!”
Abe tried to snatch his flask back, but Wilford evaded him and moved further down the car. The detective almost followed him when he heard the professor’s voice from the front of the car, a cry of dismay and horror.
“Everything okay up there?” he called, like he didn’t already know the answer.
“No, it is not okay!” the professor shouted, and he swore he heard her stamp her foot before starting a rant of some kind whose words he couldn’t quite hear.
Abe hesitated, and against his better judgement decided to delegate.
“You,” he said, pointing at Wilford. “Check the tags for everything here while I see what’s going on up there. Look for a Harold Apless—actually, look for any names that don’t match anyone we’ve seen on board this train. Could be he used an alias. Think you can handle that?”
“I don’t see why not,” Wilford drawled, raising his stolen flask as he did so.
Abe sighed, but he needed to go and see what had riled up the professor in case it turned out to be important.
Or in case it turned out to be another dead body.
The thought made Abe pick up the pace, and so he was just in time to see the door at the front of the car open and engineer/conductor Peter poke his head in, oversized wrench at the ready as he asked, “What’s going on in here?”
“What’s going on is someone’s been tampering with this crate!” Professor Beauregard pointed a finger at what at first glance appeared to be dark stains in the wooden panels, but as Abe approached, they became deep, long scorch marks, at least one on the side longer than his forearm. “What could even do this? A flamethrower, maybe? But the angles are all wrong, and if someone was trying to get inside they would go for the locks or just burn a hole through the wood, which would be a disaster of epic proportions—”
“Holes like that one, you mean?” Illinois asked, pointing out a perfectly round hole with charred edges, just about big enough to stick a finger in.
“Oh no, oh no oh no oh no,” Professor Beauregard moaned as she fumbled with her keys, only to drop them when the first lock gave way before she even put the key in. “This can’t be happening!”
“Someone picked the locks?” Abe said, but the professor answered by just yanking on one lock after the other, each one in turn proving to be open as the chains around the crate gave way and crashed to the floor. He looked at Peter, who was watching all of this with wide eyes, and asked, “Did you hear anyone in here at any point last night?”
“Uh…well, you and Benjamin came by,” Peter said slowly, wincing as another chain hit the floor.
“But did anyone else—”
Abe was distracted by the professor’s cry of relief as the very last lock, the one holding a chain around the center of the standing crate in place, proved to still be unlocked.
“They didn’t get in,” she said.
“Why stop at the last lock?” Illinois asked, and Professor Beauregard gave him a frantic look before snatching up her key ring and undoing the lock herself.
The professor pulled open the door and the three men leaned in behind her, all four sagging backwards when the contents of the box were revealed—Beauregard with relief, and the other three with disappointment.
Abe, Illinois, and Peter could all easily see over the professor’s head, but after that buildup there was only one thing in what now seemed to be a comically oversized crate, just a single, palm-sized crystal. Just some jewel like you would use for decoration, held in place by a series of supports to keep it from being bumped or knocked around during transit. Those supports and cushioning around the sides were the only explanation for the size of the crate, but it hardly looked like it was worth all the effort.
It was just a rock.
Just a single crystal that emitted a soft blue light which the longer they stared at it, the more it seemed to draw the rest of the light of the train car in, their lanterns dimming by comparison with that beautiful, mesmerizing sight.
And then the professor closed the crate, breaking the spell and driving back the strange darkness that flickered in the corner of the eye like dust motes until it was like it had never been there at all.
“Seems like a lot of effort to go through for just a shiny rock,” Abe commented, already forgetting how it had seemed to pull at him, pull at the occupied hole in his heart.
“Oh, believe me, it’s never ‘just’ a rock,” Illinois said, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth at some thought.
“What, are you a geologist too?” Abe asked.
“This hole,” Professor Beauregard muttered, ignoring both of them while she tapped on the hole that Illinois had pointed out. “Based on the angle and penetration, it must have…Oh! Oh, sugar!”
“Sugar?” Abe repeated.
“It hit the crystal! Whatever ‘it’ was, a flame or a bullet or some other projectile, there must have been some kind of transfer of kinetic energy that reacted with the already overexcited particles already contained within the crystalline structure, leading to a massive discharge,” the professor said in a burst and looked around, only to be disappointed when those around her failed to realize the gravity of her words. “Right, of course, none of you know—well, of course you wouldn’t know, you absolutely shouldn’t know, but—oh, what am I allowed to say…”
“If it has something to do with the murder or the other things going on, then I’d say all of it,” Abe said.
The engineer started and stared at him. “Hold up, did you say ‘murder’? We haven’t even been stopped in the snow an hour yet, what are you people doing back there?!”
“About that stopping in the snow thing…” Professor Beauregard hissed and, coming to some kind of decision, said, “This stone might have knocked out all the power on the train and caused the blackout that got us stuck in the snow.”
In the ensuing silence, she shrugged and said, “My bad?”
Abe considered the overabundance of ways he could respond to something like that, then with what felt like a heroic effort of will, managed to narrow it down to one he thought might actually be helpful. “Does that mean you might know how to fix the blackout then?”
“Oh! Hm…” The professor paused to regard the idea. “Well, I mean how hard could it be? It’s got to be easier than jury-rigging a blaster from an esoteric and little understood source of energy of unknown origin.”
“See, you would think that,” the engineer said, “but some of the wiring and whatnot on this train can be a bit fiddly, if you know what I mean.”
“That’s my favorite kind!” The professor beamed in the lantern light without a trace of sarcasm, leaving Abe to suspect that she was just the sort to enjoy a challenge.
Not that he had much room to comment there himself, but he still felt the need to stop the engineer before she could pull him back up front toward the engine compartment.
“Hold on a second, whatever your name is.”
“Peter Pilotsson,” the engineer offered, pointing at the name tag on his shirt.
“Yeah, like I’m going to remember that,” Abe scoffed. “Before you get to playing with your fiddly bits, I have some questions for you. Starting with how the hell you didn’t hear any of this happening.”
He gestured toward the obvious burn marks and holes on and around the crate.
“Hard to hear anything over the sound of the train engine going,” Peter pointed out. “Well, you know, when it’s actually going.”
“You were literally one car away, just on the other side of this wall!” Abe struck said wall as he spoke and was rewarded with a satisfying thump and a numbness in his hand that more or less went away when he shook it. “You were in the engine car when the power went out, weren’t you?”
“Of course I was,” Peter answered quickly, shifting his grip back and forth on the oversized wrench in his hands as he did so for lack of anything else to do with his hands. “That’s the only reason I was able to stop the train before we plowed right into the snowbank, remember? I was so busy with that, and over the screech of the brakes anything could have been going on behind me for all I knew.”
“And yet we could hear the gunshots on our end of the train,” Abe mused, before stopping himself. Had they, though? Even if the gunshots he heard weren’t just a figment of his fevered dreams, there certainly hadn’t been enough of them to account for all of the damage visible just in this one area.
He raised the lantern a little higher, the better to take in the strange burns.
No, if these were the result of someone shooting, then it was with a gun Abe didn’t know. Maybe something like the blaster the professor had stowed back in her room, or…
Abe reached toward his coat pocket with his free hand, but froze before he could touch Happy’s gun as the lantern’s light caught something else he had failed to notice until now with the crate taking all of the attention.
“What the hell?!” Abe rushed over to the safe in the wall, the very same safe that the engineer/conductor had stowed the detective’s gun while spouting all of that nonsense about protocol and safety and standard operating procedures, that safe.
That very open, very empty, safe.
Abe sputtered, gesturing at the useless hunk of metal with both hands so that the lantern swung around wildly, sending the lighting and shadows in the car into absolute chaos. “Where. The Hell. Is my gun?!”
“Well, that’s not good,” Peter said slowly, Abe’s hands flexing with the urge to wrap themselves around the man’s neck. “How’d that happen, do you think?”
“’How’d that’…what do you think happened?! Someone broke into the safe you promised me was the most secure thing on this train—”
“Which it definitely is,” Peter interrupted. “What with being the only safe on the train and all.”
This was it. Abe was finally going to be the one to commit a murder.
“Did you even lock the damn thing?!”
“Of course I locked it,” the engineer protested. “Someone must have cracked it, somehow. You know, put a listening thing to the tumblers and heard them roll into place, I hear thieves can do that.”
“And you somehow didn’t notice this happening? You somehow didn’t notice the safe standing wide open for who knows how long?” Abe growled.
“Well, it’s dark enough you didn’t notice it either when you were here earlier,” Peter pointed out. “And how was I supposed to hear someone cracking the safe over the train engine and all the shooting, anyway?”
“So you did hear the shooting,” Illinois said and the engineer quickly shook his head.
“Nope, so how was I supposed to hear someone opening a safe if I couldn’t even hear all that happening?” Peter asked, gesturing at the marks all around the crate feet away from the door.
Said gesture was done with his wrench, which for a moment seemed to glisten wetly in the light of the lantern, its edges given a rusty hue by the glow of the fire.
Abe blinked and narrowed his eyes, but as far as he could tell from where he stood it was just a trick of the light.
The same couldn’t be said for the splatter on the floor, once it finally caught the detective’s eye. The lanternlight gave the small drops between the crate and the safe an oily sheen, but when Abe knelt down and brought his finger to his nose after touching the stuff there was no mistaking that scent.
“Blood,” Abe announced, standing up again.
“Not a whole lot of it,” Illinois said. While Peter and the professor had taken a step back at the word, the adventurer was scanning his surroundings in search of more and, like Abe, finding none of it. “Of course, it’s hard to judge if the wounded person was able to staunch the bleeding quickly, but you would expect a major hit to an artery or a gunshot wound to leave more of a trace.”
“Not entirely sure I would expect anything like that,” Peter admitted.
“Depends on where you're hit,” Abe muttered, the familiar pain in his chest sensing the opportunity to make itself known again. He rubbed the blood between his fingers, thinking to himself that the blood couldn’t have been here that long. Combine that with the empty safe and the damaged crate, and it was easy enough to draw the connection. He glanced at Peter and asked, "What else was in that safe, besides my gun?"
"Nothing," Peter said, shrugging at Abe's noise of disbelief. "What can I tell you? No one else had anything that needed to be put away."
"No one—are you kidding me?!" Abe sputtered. "Sure, I wasn't exactly hiding my gun holster, but did you even check anyone else? Hell, Warfstache will pull a gun or a knife if he gets a little bored, did you even try to take his weapons?"
Not that he thought the conductor would have been successful (or even alive) if he tried, but it was the principle of the thing, damn it.
"Who?" Peter asked.
"Wilford!" Abe looked around and realized that the man was still in the back of the car checking tags, or more likely had gotten bored and wandered off again. "Guy about yay high, mustache, pink and yellow, obviously trouble and not all there..."
Peter mimicked the motions Abe made while he was describing Wilford before recognition flashed in his eyes. "Oh yeah, that guy! No, I don't remember him having a gun or anything like that back at the station."
"Are you sure you're thinking of the right guy?" Abe prompted.
"I just remember he didn't really get the whole ticket thing. Tried to give me everything but one near every time I asked, but I told him, 'teddy bears and bottles of wine are nice and all, but you gotta have a ticket if you want to board my train.' Not like it's hard to get one these days, right?" Peter deflated a little as he added, "That's when he threw a snowball at me."
Yeah, that sounded like Warfstache.
“Point is, someone was hit with something—whether a bullet, a knife, a blunt object, or a badly timed nosebleed, we don’t know—and could still walk away, or else they’d still be here,” Abe said.
“They could have been carried away,” the professor said, but Abe shook his head.
“Whatever happened here likely went down just before the train stopped, right? You said it yourself, your rock over there getting damaged probably knocked out the power, and Peter hit the brakes when that happened,” Abe ticked off the order of events on his fingers as he spoke. “Train stops, we all wake up and are looking out in the hall, meaning one of us would have noticed someone carrying a dead or incapacitated body out of this car even without the lights. With Peter in the engine car, the only other place they could have taken the body is outside, and we would have noticed tracks when we went out earlier. Plus, we’ve only got one body accounted for, and I saw Happy go into his room after the lights went out, so he can’t have been dead then. Whoever’s blood this is, losing it didn’t stop them from getting the hell out of this car before Benjamin and I came through earlier.”
“That’s…actually a pretty reasonable line of logic,” Professor Beauregard said, her surprise putting a bit of a damper on the compliment but not stopping Abe from taking it anyway. “But you’re sure you saw the man?”
“I’m as sure as—” Abe hesitated, and not just because he realized he didn’t exactly have a lot of comparisons to make in that department these days.
It had been so dark, with just his lighter at the time. He had seen the door of the neighboring compartment slide shut, but had he actually seen Happy in that moment? Or had someone else entered his room?
Had he been inches away from the murderer without realizing it?
“Everyone was shouting and looking out of their rooms when the train stopped, someone else had to have seen or heard him too,” Abe said, his confidence fading when Illinois and the professor shared a look. He thought for a moment and snapped his fingers. “Mack! He was right across the hall, and I had my lighter out—if anyone else saw Happy at the same time, it would have been him.”
“Not entirely sure you want to go around pinning your hopes on that guy,” Illinois noted before shrugging. “But you do you. I take it you’re going to go question him next then?”
Abe hesitated. He did need to question the others, and Mack did make a logical next choice, but before that…
“You,” Abe said, pointing at the conductor/engineer. “Are you really going to stick with the story that you didn’t hear any of what went on in this car?”
“…Yes, I think I will,” Peter said, after a long and obvious pause to consider his options. “Don’t see why I shouldn’t, because I didn’t.”
“I’ll tell you why,” Abe said, closing the distance between them so his finger was prodding the man’s chest and their noses were nearly touching. “Because I don’t believe it for even a second. I’ve been at this long enough that I’ve got plenty of experience sniffing out bullshit, not that it takes much to smell the stuff all over you.”
In fact, the man reeked of grease and oil from the engine, but for a split-second Abe caught that familiar copper tang and his eyes went to the oversized wrench resting uneasily on Peter’s shoulder.
This close, there was no mistaking anything for tricks of light or his imagination.
“If you decide you want to tell me the truth, you come and find me—and you better hope you do before I find it for myself,” Abe said, stepping back and leaving the engineer shaking in his boots.
Maybe the threat would be enough to loosen the man’s tongue in time, but for now the professor stepped in and reminded them that she needed to get to work if they wanted to get this train up and running again anytime soon.
“Think I’ll stay with them, if that’s alright,” Illinois said, as easy and unbothered as someone commenting on the weather and not a person contemplating staying behind to keep an eye on a potential murderer. “Safety in numbers and all that. Speaking of, will that be a problem for you?”
“I prefer to work alone,” Abe lied, eye twitching at the sound of humming coming from the other end of the car. “…But I’ll make do with what I’ve got. Too many witnesses to question and too many leads to find to wait around until the prof’s got the lights back on. Let me know if you three find anything else up here.”
Illinois nodded, his trailing, “Will do,” following Abe as he once again made their way through the baggage car, back toward the source of the humming and the others.
Abe stopped on the way though, roughly halfway down the car, to hold his lantern closer to a nick in the side of one of the metal luggage racks. He’d seen enough bullets and the paths they’d taken to recognize the marking, to be able to turn and guess where it might have been fired from: right around the dark opening of the safe where his gun was last seen.
"Oh, someone's being clever," Wilford said, leaning against the nicked shelf only for Abe to grab him and move him out of the way. "What, not even a thank you?"
“You find any luggage that might have belonged to Happy?” Abe asked as he followed the line in the other direction and began to study the boxes and trunks on the shelves.
“Nope,” Wilford answered. “Did find this, though.”
Abe glanced at the postcard Wilford held up with a proud smile, and read aloud, “Missing you more every day, XOXO Herr Ring?”
“Addressed to a Norbert Moses,” Wilford added, before glancing at the postcard himself with a little wince. “Might be a little late on that one, buddy. But there you go, not one but two names that don’t belong to anyone else on this train!...I think. I’m going to be honest, I’ve already forgotten who half these people are.”
“Where did you find that?” Abe asked.
Wilford shrugged. “On the floor, right after you told me to look for stuff. Someone went and stepped on it, see?”
He flipped the postcard around to show both an image of a red fish leaping up into the stars and the very obvious shoeprint on top of it, Wilford giving the detective a very meaning stare.
“Could be anyone’s shoeprint,” Abe said, getting a scoff out of Wilford as he went back to examining the area around the nicked shelf. “And that doesn’t really help us. It’s just a kitschy postcard that anyone could have dropped.”
“I don’t know, seems like a really important clue that deserves a, ‘good job Wilford’ or a ‘you really saved this investigation, Warfstache,’” Wilford said, imitating the detective’s voice. When Abe failed to respond, he sighed and tucked the postcard into his back pocket, muttering under his breath as he did so before he asked, “And what are you looking for that’s oh so important? Looking to steal some better clothes, maybe?”
“No, I—what’s wrong with my clothes?” Abe asked and Wilford made a face that suggested even he realized there was no good place to start there. “Look, if someone fired a gun from there, and it grazed this shelf here, then it should have hit somewhere around…”
Abe trailed off, because the longer he looked the more obvious it became that there was no endpoint here. Either his line of sight was off, or…
Or, he realized as he looked down at the blood underfoot, someone took it with them, the hard way.
And he didn’t have to think long and hard to guess who that might have been.
Wilford followed his gaze downward and said, “Not me to judge, but you really need to stop stepping on all these clues, detective.”
((End of Part 8. Thanks for reading!
On the names here: Herr Ring (and other variations) appeared on the USA website, and as for Norbert Moses, well...Memento mori.
Link to Part 9: Misplaced Motives.
Tag list: @silver-owl413 @asteriuszenith @withjust-a-bite @blackaquokat @catgirlwarrior @neverisadork @luna1350 @oh-so-creepy @95fangirl @a-bit-dapper @randomartdudette @cactipresident @hotcocoachia @purple-star-eyes @shyinspiredartist @avispate @autumnrambles @authorracheljoy @liafoxyfox@hidinginmybochard))
#markiplier#fanfiction#wkm detective#professor beauregard#ahwm illinois#peter pilotsson#wilford warfstache#murder on the warfstache express#it's never just a rock#that looks like it belongs in a museum
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Respite--An Outsiders fic
“You sleep at your folks’ last night?”
Discomfort creeps up his esophagus. “Nah.”
Johnny wakes, and sleeps, and wakes again. There's a cycle to his couch-crashing, but he always feels a lap behind.
Hey hi hello! Welcome to my first (published) Outsiders fic. CW: Brief verbal/physical abuse of a minor, mentions of alcoholism. Not extensively detailed or graphic, but keep yourselves safe.
We're gonna hit it with some homey comfort and a touch of angst for flair, folks. Here we go!
The Curtis place is separate from the outside world.
Here, it’s quiet. Johnny usually can’t stand the stale, tense silences lining the walls of his house, but this quiet just–isn’t that. It’s full, somehow, with the rustling of turning newspaper pages and the soft drone of the refrigerator in the background. And the inevitable clattering pots and pans from Soda’s attempts at cooking, of course.
The screen door slams, and a haze of cigarette smoke announces Dallas’ presence as he ambles into the room. “Hey, Johnnycakes.” He kicks up his feet in the recliner. “You stayin’ the night?”
“Probably.”
“Sweet deal.” Dally frowns at the television. “What’re you watching?”
Johnny shrugs. “Dunno. Was on when I got here. Haven’t really been paying attention.”
“It’s Antiques Roadshow,” Soda calls from the kitchen. “Pony’s convinced he’s got a winning baseball card that’s gonna put him through college.”
“It could!” Pony says, indignant over the commentary of an appraiser examining a dusty trombone case, sans trombone. “Sometimes they show sports stuff, and most of the time it’s worth at least a couple hundred bucks.” Disgruntled, he adds, “Which I keep tellin’ them, but all they wanna watch is football.”
Darry pokes his head out from the kitchen entryway. There’s sawdust mixed in with the flour in his hair. “And I’m telling you the only thing that’s gonna put you through college are your grades, little buddy. You finish your homework yet?”
“Pretty much.”
Darry raises an eyebrow.
Pony throws his hands in the air. “Alright, alright, I’ll go do the rest of it. Hey, Johnny, holler if they start looking over trading cards, yeah?”
“Sure.”
As soon as Pony’s out of sight, Dallas snatches the remote up and changes the channel. An old stick-’em-up western rattles through the crackling screen. Johnny thumbs through a pack of cards, half-watching two gunslingers trading leveled stares across the wavering heat. Dallas flicks a napkin scrap at him.
“Deal me in, kid. Or are you playing fifty-two card pick-up?”
“Might be once we’re finished,” Johnny says, dividing the cards between them. “And you chuck ‘em all over the place.”
Dallas raises a wry eyebrow. “Don’t bet your milk money on that one.”
When Johnny whips him in poker, the house erupts with so much noise it drags Ponyboy out of his essay-induced stupor.
*****
Johnny wakes to a hand on his shoulder. Blearily, he sits up, maybe a little faster than necessary. Soda’s standing over him, his hand now gone. Johnny’s skin feels suddenly cold without it.
“Hey,” Soda whispers. “You need to be home by now?”
Johnny glances at the clock on the wall, remembers it got broke last week from one of Soda and Steve’s wrestling matches, and digs out his watch. Six-thirty. Shit.
He pulls himself up with a smothered sigh and makes quick work of collecting his things. “I better,” he says, tying his blackened shoe laces. “Thanks, Soda. Tell Darry I said it, too.”
Soda shoots him a thumbs-up. Before Johnny can slip out the door, he says, “You sure you gotta go? We can keep you here, if you’d rather. You know what Two’ll do if your ma shows up.”
“Yeah,” Johnny says, but he knows his face says otherwise. “I just…nobody else will clean, so.”
“Yeah.” Soda sighs, smiles, and slugs Johnny in the shoulder. “But it’s no use running to a bad appointment, huh? Take the scenic route.”
“Sure, I’ll do a lap around your house. Should be scenic enough.”
Soda laughs. “Get outta here, Cade.”
He doesn’t have to tell Johnny twice. He’s already late. He ignores Soda’s advice and takes a shortcut through the lot back to his house, partly because he’s gotta slip inside before his folks notice and partly because dawdling in the streets means getting jumped (not that many socs are cruising for bait at this hour). The early morning dew seeps through his sneakers as he braces to climb through his bedroom window. He lands as soft as he can manage and works his way through the house, cleaning as he goes. There’s no room in the trash for the drained beer bottles littering the couch, so he bags it up and drags it outside.
When he steps back inside, his mother’s waiting for him.
Her eyes are roaming, coagulus, like they’re made of gelatin in their sockets. Not sober, then, but coming off it enough to recognize him. He shifts in his soggy sneakers, hand itching for his backpack, a jacket, anything. Instead, he braces.
“You been back at that Curtis place?” Her voice is ragged, like a rusty blade against a telephone wire. Last night was a fighting night. A sobbing one, too, by the rings around her eyes.
“No’m.”
“Where you been, then?”
“The lot.”
“Bullshit.” She spits. “You’re playing house with those kiss-asses.” He doesn’t–won’t–respond, and her jaw clenches. “Isn’t that right? You’d rather rob them blind than be grateful for what you’ve got here.”
“No’m.”
“Don’t you contradict me.” She reaches for him and he steps back. It’s a mistake; her knuckles flash against his cheek in a slap. “You think you’re so damn smart. Them Curtis boys have nothing to their name for a rag like you. They’ll be in the lock-up by winter.”
She said the same thing last year, and the year before that. Johnny doesn’t bother taking note.
His silence has gone on too long. He has to remember to match her temper, but he can’t. His bones ache.
Her hand is like iron around his bicep. She leans in close, and he can smell the liquor and stale coffee on her breath. “You think they’ll keep taking you back? Go on, then. Their parents thought they were so high and mighty, it’s only natural for the sons to inherit it, too.”
“I can clean the kitchen.”
She throws him down by his hair. “God help me for such an ungrateful son.” A kick lands home in his ribs. He scrambles to get up, to get to the sink. The water’s scalding on his cracked skin. “I’ll give you something to whine about.”
But she must be too bleary to follow through, because her footsteps thud up the stairs, cursing him all the way. Johnny scrubs until his hands go numb, and then he takes out the trash again.
*****
The next morning hails a vicious wind.
“Incoming,” a voice calls, before an arm is slung around his shoulders.
“Hey, Two.”
“Hey yourself, punk. You beat up any socs today?”
“Not yet.”
“Eh, you’ll get there.” Two-bit ruffles his hair and they make their way down the sidewalk. When they stop to let a herd of cars pass by, Two-Bit’s gaze finds him more closely.
“You sleep at your folks’ last night?”
Discomfort creeps up his esophagus. “Nah.”
“You weren’t at Soda’s.” No, he wasn’t. Johnny tries not to leech too many nights in a row. There may not be a schedule to his couch-crashing, but there are limits. He tries to make up for it. If he’s got an extra five bucks, he’ll slip it in the tin bank in the back of Darry’s closet. Cash is hard to come by with no job and a constant cycle of beer runs for his father, so other nights he dries the dishes.
“The lot,” he says, eyes darting away to avoid Two-Bit’s frown. He’s not doing this right now.
“Yeah,” Two-Bit says slowly. His hand comes up to feel Johnny’s forehead and Johnny bats it away. He doesn’t like when Two-Bit gets serious. It’s murky, unnatural. “You know my ma don’t mind making up an extra bed.”
“Bet she wouldn’t mind you making your bed, either,” Johnny says, and a flash of playfulness returns to Two-Bits eyes.
“Man,” he says, as the cars clear and they cross the street. Two-Bit pauses on the other side to flip off a particularly rambunctious Mustang. “She’d think I’d undergone a traumatic event. Got early Alzheimer's or something.”
Johnny lets himself scoff, and laugh, and doesn’t question how better to hide the rings around his eyes. It’s only gonna get colder, he thinks darkly, so he might as well get them tattooed on now.
*****
Buck’s is the opposite of quiet. The minute the door opens he’s flooded with wobbly light and warbling music loud enough to make him shout at the stranger silhouetted before him.
“What?” The stranger is shouting, too, but Johnny guesses it has more to do with the fog in his eyes than Hank Williams’ dulcet tones.
“Dallas!”
“Oh, fuck him,” the stranger drawls, and slams the door in his face. Johnny sighs.
He should go. He should probably, definitely go.
The wind whips a collection of ripping trash bags into the street like clattering tumbleweeds. From a cloudy window, he can see a silent game of pool. Someone picks up the eight-ball and chucks it into a beer pong table, sending booze sloshing. The apparent champion of beer pong clobbers him.
Johnny’s feet stay rooted to the spot, mesmerized, so he moves the only other set of limbs he’s got left and pounds on the door. One, two beats. Three.
The door catapults open. “--ucking girl scouts, we’re not buying shit,” Buck snarls, but at least it’s Buck. Better chance of being recognized, anyways. He blinks at Johnny. “Whaddaya want?”
“Is Dally here?”
“No. Go away.”
“Wait–” Johnny sticks his foot in the door, ouch, and fails to shut his trap. “Can I just, uh.”
“Spit it out, kid.”
“Um. I’m supposed to meet him, to–pay him back, for–can I just wait upstairs?”
Buck rolls his eyes. “Don’t go spelunking up there, y’hear?” The door is graciously removed from Johnny’s foot and he follows Buck inside. Standing surrounded by the ruckus is dizzying, and he presses through the bodies towards the stairs before he disorients himself. He prays no one is shacking up in Dally’s room and knocks for good measure, but miraculously, it’s empty. He shuts the door behind him and leans against it.
He’s almost asleep when the door knocks into his back.
“What the–Johnny?��
He scrambles to his feet, rubbing his eyes at the figure above him. “Hey, Dally.”
“The hell you sitting watch at the door for?” Dallas asks, collapsing onto the bed with a cigarette balanced between his lips mid-light.
“Fell asleep,” Johnny shrugs.
Dallas grunts. “Buck said you were here to pay up.” He looks at Johnny over his lighter. “We both know you don’t owe me shit, so what gives?”
“Lot’s cold. Didn’t want to bug anyone.”
“So you’re botherin’ me, huh?” Johnny’s face must morph into something aggrieved, because Dallas snorts and swipes a hand through his hair. “You know I don’t mind, kid, wipe that look off your face. I’m crashing,” he adds, puffing down the cigarette and crushing it out beneath his boot, “Extra jacket’s in the drawer.”
“What?”
“For a blanket, man,” Dallas says, like Johnny’s a little too slow on the catch-up. “You want the floor or the bed?”
Johnny pulls open half-filled drawyers until he finds Dallas’ leather jacket, the sheepskin matted but soft beneath his fingers. “Floor’s fine.”
Dallas rolls his eyes. “No it ain’t. C’mere, I don’t bite.”
Johnny settles on one side of the twin mattress, back to Dally and the coat beneath his head. This isn’t the first time they’ve done this, but small as he is, Johnny’s taller now than he used to be. They make it work, spines brushing, Johnny swept into a dreamless haze by the sound of Dally’s slow exhales and the dilapidated country swing reverberating below.
*****
“Man, I’ll beat his fucking head in,” Steve says, lip curling as he prods at the lump forming on Johnny’s forehead. “He do this last night?”
“This morning,” Johnny says, and reigns in a wince. Steve’s not exactly known for his gentle bedside manner, but the DX has a stocked first aid kit, which is all he needs. He’s sitting on the counter and feeling stupidly small while Steve–dare he say–fusses around him.
“I swear on his fresh-dug grave, Johnny. He’s gonna kill you one day.”
“Don’t I know it,” Johnny mutters, misery creeping in. He smashes it down. “It ain’t so bad, really. Just slap some ice on it or something.”
Steve clicks his teeth. “Yeah, all right. Soda?”
“No, I’ll–” But he should’ve known Steve would blab to Soda the second he got a chance. Johnny figured Soda wasn’t working today seeing as he’d yet to mother-hen circles around him, but he must be putzing in the back.
“Wait here.” Steve wanders into the back garage, hollering. “Sodapop! The kid’s here.”
“Ponyboy?” Soda comes back into view with Steve, greased towel over one shoulder. His eyes land on Johnny. “Johnnycakes! You–well, shit.” He turns to Steve. “Can you grab some ice?”
“That was supposed to be your job,” Steve retorts, but he snatches Soda’s towel and cracks open the freezer.
“Soc or your old man?” Soda asks, clearing the space between them in two long strides and leaning in close to Johnny’s face. His brow pinches as he resumes Steve’s prodding with much gentler hands.
“Him,” Johnny says. It’s getting old, honestly, admitting he can’t hold his own against a sorry bastard unfit to walk most nights. Soda hums.
“Did he get you anywhere else?”
“Nah.”
Soda raises an eyebrow as Steve returns, ice wrapped in the work towel. Johnny presses it to his face. “It’s fine.”
Soda looks unconvinced but relents. “You’re coming over for dinner tonight?” It’s phrased like a question, but Johnny knows there’s no arguing. He doesn’t want to refuse anyways, not tonight, but if he did there’d be guilty hell to pay.
“Only if you’re not cooking,” he hops off the counter and lets the smile play up his lips at Soda’s mock offense.
“Well, excuse me for enjoying the subtle art of presentation,” he says. “You’re in luck, though. Darry’s making chicken gravy.”
Johnny can practically feel his stomach growling. “Catch you then, man,” he says, and wishes the whir of A/C could follow him out the door.
*****
The rumble of a pickup warns its slowing advancement on him. Johnny shirks to the curb as it idles to a crawl, hackles raised. His blade is heavy and warm in his pocket. He can’t read the plates in the foggy light of fallen dusk.
“Need a ride?” The driver calls, and he just about shakes his teeth, he’s so riled. Then the driver leans out the rolled-down window and he can make out a familiar jawline, a permanent cowlick. “Johnny? You headed to ours?”
Darry. Johnny’s shoulders sink with relief, and he lets his hands fall slack in his pockets.
“Yeah,” he calls, and climbs in the cab. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it.” Darry glances at him sideways as he signals himself back into the right lane. Johnny’s pulse matches the brief patter of the blinker. “You shouldn’t walk by yourself this time of night.” The way he says it–not bitten out or tensed, like he does with Ponyboy, but softer, almost apologetic–proves they both know Johnny’s well aware of what trouble he could bring. Darry worries about Pony’s casual shirking of danger, but Johnny.
Johnny doesn’t need a lecture.
It sparks a strange warmth within him, the knowledge that Darry cares. He doesn’t know how to hold it in his hands next to his blade and bottle caps.
“I’m alright,” he says, watching trees flit by. Wondering whether a soc would’ve been hiding behind any one of them, had he kept going. A small, rational quadrant of his brain knows there likely wouldn’t have been, but safety breeds his freedom to speculate. He’d rather waste time hypothesizing than prove his theories, anyways.
Darry hums and turns on the radio. Old jukebox rock ambles through the station.
There lives another part of him. A deeper and steady calm that thrums through his veins any time danger is confirmed. The part that hooks his fingers around his blade and trusts in it. That flips up his jacket collar and sneers, kicks the scared puppy in him aside for something rougher to unearth itself across his features. The part that knows, unequivocally, that he will never be made a slick-mouthed soc’s ragdoll again. He doesn’t think about how he’d stop it, only that when he’s backed into a corner, a primal instinct quivers down his spine, itching for release.
Darry’s right to be more worried about Ponyboy than him.
“How was school?” Darry asks. The Curtis folks used to ask him the same thing. Darry’s filling their shoes as best he can–better than anyone else Johnny knows–but it still feels uncanny hearing the same phrases coming out of his mouth.
“Not bad. Had to dissect a crayfish in biology.”
“Oh yeah?” Darry smiles. “I remember doing that. We had to do deer hearts too, during hunting season. Dad and some other families brought them in.”
“Did you cut ‘em open?”
“I stuck my fingers through the arteries and everything. The smell hung around the department for days.”
Johnny scrunches his nose. “Gross.”
“Yeah. Nice step up from worms, though.”
They pull into the driveway. Johnny makes to get out, but Darry doesn’t move, only unbuckles and lets the keys slip out of the ignition. He turns to face Johnny. “I opened the tin bank today.”
Dread makes room in his stomach. Not enough, it’s not enough. They cannot afford groceries, not with a revolving door of strays.
“Soda and Ponyboy said they haven’t put anything in.”
He’s going to get a job. He’ll get a job doing–something. Someone will hire a good-for-nothing greaser, and if they don’t, he’ll have Dallas teach him how to hustle pool.
Darry’s gaze is piercing. “Have you been adding to it?”
He swallows. “Yeah. I eat a lot, man.”
Darry huffs a laugh, shaking his head. “Have you met Soda? Two-Bit? No offense, but you eat like a bird compared to them. You–” he stops, sighs a little. “You don’t owe us anything, kiddo.”
That’s a load of bullshit if Johnny’s ever heard some, but arguing with Darry is firmly against his self-preservation complex. Besides, it’s easier to quietly disagree than to register the option that maybe the Curtis’ really are just that stupid good.
“Johnny?”
Or, worse, that they’re right.
“Thanks, man.” He lets Darry share a smile with him and they pop the doors.
“No more sneaking us your lunch money,” Darry says as he locks the truck. “You want to help out, do what I tell Ponyboy. Finish school, get a scholarship. Go make a future.”
Johnny watches as he walks up the sidewalk and to the front door. He doesn’t think about his future past the current month. Darry gave his away, and here he is saying all this…stuff, like there’s a changed life somewhere in Johnny’s deck of cards. Maybe it’s up his sleeve, he thinks wryly, as he follows Darry into the house. The swell of warmth and banter and steam from the hot stove envelope him and he lets himself settle into it like a second coat.
Dallas demands a round of blackjack and Two-Bit slaps a cold beer in his hand to hold against his still swollen head, and while Steve and Soda make a righteous mess of being Darry’s sioux-chefs, Ponyboy collapses at his feet with a book in hand and a chewed pencil in his mouth. He tilts his head back to look up at Johnny.
“Wanna go bum a movie tomorrow?”
“Sure.”
The drone of the television scores their slow dispersion into the night, save for Johnny, letting the couch springs dig into his back as he watches occasional passing headlights trace beams up the walls. Here, it’s quiet.
He rests.
*****
The first episode of Antiques Roadshow didn’t air in the U.S. until 1997, but we’re gonna pretend that’s just not the case because I said so and think it’s cute. God bless public television programming.
Thank you so much for reading, and please drop a comment or a reblog below! They help so much, and whether it's a thesis or a keyboard smash, each notification truly makes my week.
#the outsiders#the outsiders fanfiction#hurt/comfort#abuse tw#johnny cade#sodapop curtis#steve randle#darry curtis#dally winston#dallas winston#two bit mathews#ponyboy curtis#our gang looks out for one another it's alright
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Porter Gage Voice Lines
“Blammo!”
I got your "sensor anomaly" right here!
Keep your irradiated ass away from me!
{throwing a grenade} Blammo!
Shit, that's bright. Some people have no manners.
Aw god, I think I just went blind in one eye...
Aww, look at how nice and clean this is, and I here am, dirtying the place up.
You think the maid service here is taking on new clients? They do a bang-up job.
Yeah, this is fine. I wasn't planning on sleeping tonight anyway.
You, uhh, you getting the creeps? Yeah, me neither.
Well, this is filthy. And not the fun kind.
Ever seen a dust angel? Bet you I could make one.
Somebody really needs to work on their redecorating skills.
Ever seen a grenade shoved up a brahmin's backside? Kinda looks like this...
I can't lie - I've made messes bigger than this in my day.
Nope... Just... nope. Nasty.
I may not know what any of this shit does, but I know if it's shiny, it's worth somethin'.
I ain't ever been much good with machines, or tech, or... whatever the fuck this all is.
We ain't dead, right? I'm actually seeing this?
Well, shit. Guess I needed a bath anyway.
You get caught, there's liable to be a fight. I ain't complainin', just sayin'.
Look, I know I complain about stuff but, do we really gotta go in there?
Well, this beats hoofin' it. Let's fly.
Can't lie - if you break something, I'm likely to laugh.
You need that? I could always hold on to it for you...
Blammo. That's what you get for pissing off the Overboss.
You sure you got everything? There's a few more rocks you haven't picked up yet.
You look like shit. More than usual, I mean. Took a few too many rads...
Heh, most folks I know can't even read. Glad you're not most folks.
Why don't you just chop your arms off and give those away, too?
Need a bandage for that bleeding heart of yours?
Why not invite 'em over for dinner while you're at it. Maybe hand 'em a knife and ask 'em to stab you in the back...
Even if it don't get you anywhere, it's funny as hell.
Here? Like, right here? I'm kidding. Go.
And that's why you start off by shooting them in the face.
So many chumps, so little time...
Oh man, good thing this place exists. Our rock shortage is solved!
On the good side, this is where they keep all the fun toys. On the bad side, everyone else knows it too.
Believe it or not, this is still more civilized than some places I've lived.
Ever feel the tiniest bit hurt that the Institute hasn't tried to replace you with a synth? I mean, c'mon, I'm important... I'm worth replacing.
I always thought it was better to take hostages for ransom, rather than, y'know, eating... but to each his own.
Hey, what do you know. Another big monument to shit that doesn't matter anymore.
Oh, great. These clowns again?
No question that some shit was built to last. Maybe the wrong shit, but still.
What do you call it when this thing is still around, only there ain't no one to remember what it's for? Is that what they call irony?
Yeah, suppose I needed a break from actually having a good time anyway. You know where to find me.
Looks like someone forgot to spray for bugs...
Get your blood somewhere else, vermin!
Dog(meat) got his ass kicked, didn't he?
You ever wonder why these things got so damn big? Like they weren't disgusting enough...
One of these bugs ever takes me down, you tell people I died from tripping over my gun, falling off a cliff... Anything. It'd be less embarrassing.
I ain't saying I've been desperate enough to eat mole rat, but... well, I ain't sayin' it.
Cook anything long enough, and it doesn't taste so bad. Molerat might be the exception to that.
Hope you can hold your liquor, 'cause I ain't carrying you.
I've seen too many guys get wasted because they were wasted. You get me?
Think about it - if beer is still good after 200 years, is it really something you want to be drinking?
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02/19/24, afternoon
Life is so busy, in good ways and in bad, but it's SO busy, that even the good ways start feeling bad.
Just too much to do and not enough time or money to do them.
I've got books, Death Stranding, Ed comes out for Street Fighter 6 in eight days, FF7 Rebirth comes out in 10, I need a new Digimon deck cause my friends just get mad against the two I play right now, and I keep discovering new games I enjoy at work that other folks refuse to play with me. Movies and shows to watch too- need to re-watch the 90's animated X-Men since we're getting proper new episodes- very hype about that.
Legends and Lattes was a good book I borrowed from a friend. He picked up the prequel and gave it to me to read first because I've been reading a lot in my spare time cause it's free/cheap and figured I'd finish it quick, but I'm in the middle of The Archive Undying right now, which the same friend got me for Christmas, so now I feel slightly rushed to finish both fast.
Star Wars Unlimited, the new Star Wars TCG, seems interesting. I'm not especially big on Star Wars as a franchise, and I only played one game with the Darth Vader starter against the Luke starter, but I think the game has good bones- took a lot of good aspects of other TCGs and made something pretty unique that feels interactive, very tempo-based, and difficult to power creep. Bonus that it's designed with drafting and sealed play in mind, which makes it very accessible to new players that may not be interested in constructed play. Unfortunately, no one else I normally play games with is interested in playing with me, and I don't really have time to introduce more friends into my life atm, so that may go unexplored for a while.
Similar situation with Dune Imperium Uprising. Played it at a staff game night once, and been hooked on it since, but haven't been able to play again cause none of my friends are interested- plus it's, like, a four hour game and I don't own my own copy, and if I wanna buy one myself, it's gonna be like, $60+. Woof.
At least with Digimon, a lot of my costs are offset by generous friends that throw chaff from their bulk at me.
On the subject of card games, MtG's siren song has been calling me lately. My day job has me babysitting a bunch of other folks playing card games and board games all day, so I spend a lot of my time watching other people play Magic, and I've been feeling the itch. I might try to pick up a Commander deck and give it a shot.
I'd rather be playing Lorcana, which scratches a similar itch to Magic, but it's just so hard to get my hands on product. I have like, PART of a Belle deck, but with no Belle. She was $13 a pop for like, five minutes, and then the price suddenly shot back up to $20-something before I could spare the scratch to pick up a playset. Still better than the $38-something she was before, but still out of budget unless I save up a little at a time for a long time- not even to mention other Steel-Sapphire staples like Hades, Giant Tinker Bell, Let it Go, A Whole New World and Grab Your Sword. Product has been so scarce though that I think my friends have more or less given up on Lorcana entirely at this point anyway.
Trying to get together with folks when I can to flip some old YuGiOh stuff I've still got, but haven't been successful so far. Was prepped to meet with someone a few weeks ago, and then got COVID and had to put it off. :/
But yeah, no time, not enough money. When I'm not at the day job I'm drawing, and I also have to do cooking and cleaning and laundry and such on those days as well.
Or doing this cause I need a neutral party to vent my feelings and frustrations to. Bleh.
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ST LOUIS BLUES: THE MUSICAL
Welp I'm probably going to regret this sooner or later but I might as well make this blog so that my hockey talk doesn't entirely get blended with my LGBTQ+ talk so uh...
Hello! I'm Shadow. I'm a 17 year old queer kid who just wants to hang out with other hockey fans. I primarily root for the Washington Capitals and the St Louis Blues.
Anyways let's just get the important stuff overwith 😅
Starting off with the most important disclaimer, I do want to emphasize that some players I talk about and post about do include the most controversial ones (ex. Patrick Kane, Alex Ovechkin).
I want to make it clear that while I support some players *on* the ice, that doesn't mean I support them *off* the ice and vise versa. Still, if seeing *any* of those players makes you uncomfortable whatsoever, it might be in your best interests to tag specific players or to just not follow at all.
I also talk about the Chicago Blackhawks, a LOT, regardless of if it's me hating on them or specific players, me glorifying specific players, or just straight up mentions. I will also talk a lot about their rival and my main team, the St Louis Blues. Again, if that's not your thing you might want to filter the "chicago blackhawks" tag. This is a heads up for both Hawks fans and detractors.
Secondly, who can interact?
Well, since it's a hockey blog, I allow hockey fans of any team, any kind to interact! Casual, diehard, hell even bandwagons are welcome!
I'm also an artist, and I really wanna get to know most other hockey artists, so if you're a hockey fan and an artist feel free to interact! (Note: the account must be mostly SFW).
I am VERY MUCH open to seeing other Blues and Caps fans, especially considering there's not many on hockeyblr and I will admit I get pretty lonely hehe.
That said, I also wanna meet rivals of said teams, especially Hawks fans, Pens fans, Flyers fans and Avs fans.
As for who can't interact..
I will block freely overall, but in particular fuck off if you're bigoted (racist, sexist, queerphobic- including terfs and exclusionists- ableist, islamphobic, antisemetic, etc) anti-vaxx, anti-abortion, supports/involved in crypto/NFTs or if you're active in anti-recovery spaces (such as pro-ed spaces). Though knowing hockeyblr, this hopefully won't be an issue, but I'm putting it out there just in case.
Additionally, don't interact at all if you gatekeep fans of any kind (The only fans we gatekeep are bigots and creeps folks!), wish injury or even *death* on any players, are a gossip blog or confession blog, harass any fan of any team or you genuinely believe someone is a shitty person over the team they root for (Ex. believing every bruins fan is racist, believing every hawks fan is a rape apologist, etc). Hating a hockey team isn't a bad thing but harassing a fan *over* said hockey team is *always* bad no matter how you look at it. ...though this probably won't matter because odds are I have you blocked already lol.
RPF blogs and fanfiction blogs can interact. However, this blog is not an RPF or fanfiction blog. Please don't tag my posts as "hockey fic" or "ship".
Incest shippers and pedophilia shippers on the other hand... please stay away from me.
I'm a minor, 17 years old to be exact, and because of this I would prefer if NSFW accounts didn't interact. And if you don't want minors interacting with you overall, you might wanna block me as well for both our sakes. Remember, DNIs go both ways!
This account is a safe space for POC, Queer folks, women, disabled folks, neurodivergent folks and other minorities. If you can't handle that, get lost.
Lastly, blogs with no posts combined with no avatar or banner, or blogs that have nothing but a stock image/stolen photo of a white woman as a profile picture combined with a name and nothing else will be blocked on sight, as chances are you're a bot. No exceptions. Blogs tagged as "Mature" may also be blocked, as half the time I'll think you're NSFW.
Again, I block freely, and I will block folks even if they aren't on my DNI. If you're blocked, don't take it personally.
TAGGING SYSTEM:
+Stick to the Status Quo+ - Player hate. Will be tagged as +Stick to the Status Quo: [player name] Hate+
+Let's go tear up someone's lawn+ - Team hate. Will be tagged as +Let's go tear up someone's lawn: [team name] Hate+.
+Champions one and all+ - Player ramblings/praise. Will be tagged as +Champions one and all: [player name]+
+Welcome to my Candy Store+ - Asks.
+Getcha Head in the Game+ - General Hockey Rambling.
+And there's your final bell+ - Rant/vent, or otherwise serious posts.
+We're gonna rock the house+ - Reblog.
+Shut up Heather!+ - Not hockey related.
+I hope you enjoy the show+ - Anything related to the St Louis Blues or the Washington Capitals and their players (including current or former).
+But I don't own a motorbike+ - Art, page decor, userboxes, you get it.
Shit you should probably look at (no pressure):
Umich Rumors (TW: Abuse mentions)
Why censoring the names of players is a bad idea.
The Sexualization of Hockey Players. (TW: Sexual harassment).
In case you're curious on where I stand on Patrick Kane, read these (Archived versions. Heads up the images in the second link are broken for some reason).
Main blog and the account I follow/like from: @shadowstarlightwitch
Disability and more: @thecringepunkarchives
General fandom, fanfiction and art blog: @thatonedemonnamedlucifer (16+ only)
#pinned post#st louis blues#washington capitals#hockey blog#hockeyblr#capitals#blues#hockey fandom#sports blog#hockey tag#nhl hockey#nhl#hockey
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Maaaaan sometimes I have to think about all the internalized racism I just HAD as a child like how I just knew that society saw me as less then stupid dirty ugly etc or even then I was like SURPRISINGLY pretty or smart despite or for being a brown/mexican person and it just fucks me up.
#Like i know im not the only one whos been though this a lot of people especially marginalized folks#gotta unpack so much as adults both just to be better people and get self love#but It just fucks me up so bad sometimes like we really have kids hating themselves ASAP#sorry i got to thinking about people who are creeps and fetishize OR only date specific groups of people and I JUST got messed up again#and remebered a bunch of stuff
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Shimmering Moonbeams
Gender Neutral Pronouns
Requested by anonymous
Hey Law? You chirp.
Oh god, not again he thinks to himself. They must have hurt themselves again, and are calling for me to help. Law loves his job, the ability to study, care for and treat patients. But you...had a tendency to get yourself into bad situations, or be plain old clumsy. Sauntering over to him, you pull up a chair and plop right next to him. His bags and bloodshot eyes scream “go away” but that isn’t a deterrent for you.
“I know you’re a doctor and all, but do you know anything about the moon?”
The polar tang had surfaced the night before, and you desperately wanted to watch the moon with law. The moon had been shimmering against your window and you couldn’t help but wonder about it. Law gave you a smile, one that tugged on the edge of his cheeks. It seems that despite the late hours, he’s willing to entertain your questions.
“Well, why don’t we take this to a place where we can really observe it? You’re very lucky, the cycle says that there’s a full one tonight.” Your eyes light up with glee as you realize exactly what that means. Alone with your captain, the rest of the crew asleep. You practically drag him out of the room and towards the hatch outside. It’s a bit of a struggle as he still has notes he was trying to study, but he does reluctantly set them down and start keeping pace with you on his own. Your eager steps are still somewhat quiet, since you don’t want to wake anyone else on your way out and suddenly ruin the mood.
You open the door, the cool sea breeze blowing your hair, the moonlight illuminating your skin. With a yawn, Law follows right behind as the two of you head out onto the bridge. His hand in yours, you climb up to the very top of the polar tang, slipping a few times. Fortunately he’s there to catch you every time you come close to slipping, and you’re able to take a seat beside him atop the ship. Leaning back on your hands, you look up dreamily at the sky.
“Law, have you ever heard about the rabbit in the moon? It’s a folklore tale about a rabbit that lives in the moon, spending all its days pounding the ingredients for mochi!” Law chuckles and nods. “Yeah, I’ve heard of it. My folks used to tell me and my sister that story before bed. Why, think you can see him?” You smile a little and look down at the sea. “Not really, just wondering how much you knew. You’re so smart I wanted to test if that included myths and legends or if you’re all serious science and stuff.”
“Well, that’s one area I’m not as well versed in. There are still many things to learn and places to explore. However, I’ve made it a point to learn more from Nico Robin so I can be more well-rounded. I’m glad that you didn’t ask me if the moon was made of cheese. I would’ve rolled my eyes and asked you where you heard such a thing. Despite being the straight man, you can tell that Law is holding back a laugh.
You still can’t help but smile, playfully nudging his arm. “Obviously I wouldn’t, I’m not some little kid! I’m an adult and you gotta start treating me like it. I’m an adult and I have adult thoughts!” The words come out before you realize what else they could end up meaning. A blush soon sets in, and you see Law’s eyes go wide for a moment. Did he… bite his lip?
“T-That’s not what I meant! I meant that I can be interested in someone romantically…” You realize that once again you have put your foot in your mouth. Sweat starts to bead on your forehead, and thoughts swirl around your head. Did you just fuck up this friendship you have with him? Will he avoid you from now on?
Law sighs and places a hand over yours. “I know… you don’t have to keep going. I appreciate you too.” You let out the breath you didn’t know you were holding and relax a bit. Pain shoots through your back as you didn’t know you were clenching your shoulders. Creeping ever so slightly closer, your warm hand touches his cold precise one. With those words out of the way, you feel at ease and even happy being with him. He rubs his thumb over yours and nods to indicate you can lean against his shoulder.
“Law….since you say you appreciate me, does that mean you’ll go out with me? Glancing over, you can’t read his facial expression. It’s taut and emotionless, as if he never heard you. In his own mind, he is exhilarated that you just asked him that. “Yes, I would love to go out with you.” Smiling contently, you go back to relaxing and look up to the shining moon in the sky, it’s full glow matched only by the one on your warm cheeks.
#one piece#trafalgar law#trafalgar law x reader#law#law x reader#one piece imagine#one piece x reader#one piece imagines
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Journal - Chapter 4: Saint Denis
(This post is all of the journal pages and typed transcripts that were written specifically for this chapter. This post will not include stranger missions or side stuff.)
After The Joys of Civilization
We've moved again. More trouble with the Pinkertons. More trouble with them locals. More trouble all around.
Little Jack's been kidnapped, so we're trying to find him. Apparently some fella in Saint Denis,
Senor something or other, took umbrage to our presence and kidnapped him or, heaven forbid, worse. We burnt down Braithwaite Manor when we went hunting for him, in an almighty scrap.
Then we got spoken to again by Agent Milton. This time, he asked us for Dutch's head on a platter.
We got him to leave, but they ain't too pleased with us.
So we headed into Saint Denis to find little Jack. We was told he'd been kidnapped by some local gangster, this Italian feller called Bronte, a local tough guy.
We ain't found him, but he's found us. Dutch and I headed into town and I managed to get myself robbed by a bunch of children. This was a new low, even by my standards. Anyway, we found Mr Bronte and
are going to pay him a call.
We better get the boy back soon, not least because if we don't Abigail will kill the lot of us. All this after we burned down the Braithwaite Manor house looking for him and made some real enemies of ourselves back in that country.
We're now hiding deep in the swamps, trying not to get
eaten by wildlife or sunk too deep in the mud. I cannot decide which I like less - the swamps or the city. Both are full of parasites, reptiles and slime, but the swamp's prettier.
Dutch is trying to think of where we can run next, but in the meantime, we are deep in the swamps. Hiding in some disease ridden old plantation house, mostly swallowed up by nature.
Guess we will find Jack, get some money, then flee, but where?
These bastards ain't giving up. We're a long way east of land we know and far from real open country.
After Angelo Bronte, A Man of Honor
I always heard Saint Denis was one of the 7 wonders of the world. If this is so, I don't care much to see the other 6. It's a depressing place that shows you the only thing worse than people is a whole lot of people.
I have not ever met a lizard in a suit before, only now I have and his name is Angelo Bronte. He is either our salvation or our damnation. This city's strongman, arrived from Italy a few years ago and now knows and controls
everything and everyone. He had not harmed Jack, other than feeding him strange food, and Dutch seems to think that maybe we can get something from this oily dictator. Personally, I don't trust him more than I'd trust any hungry animal not to try and eat me, but for now, we are somewhat safe and hidden. Whole place gives me the creeps.
Mary wrote to me.
WANTS TO SEE ME AGAIN.
Oh, Mary, what fools we are, what a fool I am.
After Fatherhood and Other Dreams
Saw Mary and the awful Daddy, who has taken to drink, which unsurprisingly ain't improved him a whole lot. What a foul pig he is. Taken to hawking off family heirlooms and cursing the world for it. Still a stuck up son of a bitch.
Now Mr. Linton has passed away, I wonder what he wants for his daughter? Funny thing is, I love her and yet am a bad lot.
Old Daddy is a good, upright man and yet he
treats his daughter like a possession to be mistreated and abused as he sees fit. Strange creatures, men.
I don't know. All I know is that I love her and she both loves and detests me. It never worked before and it won't ever work now, yet it gnaws at me, the idea of it gnaws at me like a sickness.
I've got to give all that nonsense up. I'm an outlaw, a murderer, a man with a code different to ordinary folk, and Mary ain't never going to be for my world.
Optional
We went to a Vaudeville show in town.
Dancing from France. Quite a business. What is wrong with me? Do I really think I can retire someplace nice and live a normal life with a wife?
Am I a big enough dolt to believe that is possible?
After The Gilded Cage
My lord, now I have done everything. I went to a ball, like a fool in a fairy tale. The mayor of Saint Denis. Dutch got us invited by old Señor Bronte and off we trooped, trussed up like turkeys for Thanksgiving and waxed and polished and primped to within an inch of our lives. Bronte did not mingle with the other guests but lorded over the place like a Roman Emperor deciding who to have killed for his fun. Place was full of drunks, lunatics, liars and clowns. But the thing was kind of fun. Managed to not get into too much trouble and may have some business
opportunities on account of enquiries there. We shall see, I guess. Seeing Bill dressed up like an ambassador and awkward as a school girl was one of the funniest moments of my life. Met Evelyn Miller, the writer, which was amazing for Dutch. Met the mayor. Dutch and Hosea seem to think this dump is a world of possibilities. They want to look into the bank and some other business opportunities. We shall see. As long as we can keep ahead of the Pinkertons and Mr Cornwall and the rest of them for a while, maybe we shall be okay.
After American Fathers
Met that writer Evelyn Miller in the street. He remembered me from the party - apparently my petty crime did not go entirely unnoticed.
Better keep my head down a little better. He introduced me to a couple of Indians. Father and son. Son angry, father with an air of, of what exactly?
Of something both impressive and frightening and kind about him. A great man, defeated by powerful and awful forces? I do not know, but his eyes, his very manner spoke to me.
Somehow, I've agreed to help them.
Seems they, like us, have problems with that gilded ape, Leviticus Cornwall and his foul empire. We shall see how this pans out.
After Horsemen, Apocalypses
Kieran, that poor kid we spared from O'Driscoll's gang up in the mountains is dead, killed by the bastards. He saved my life and I could not save his. They chopped his head off and tried to kill the lot of us.
Mrs Adler fought braver than any of us. She is driven by powerful forces I scarcely understand. That's what love has done to her, I guess. I feel like an animal, living out in the mud here. Whole place gives me the creeps.
K. RIP t
After Urban Pleasures
Seems those of us who thought Angelo Bronte was a lizard in a suit was right and them as thought he was a gentleman thief eager to help us on our merry way was wrong. Bastard sent us into a trap in town. Told us to rob a trolley station - no money but the entire police force waiting for us. Dutch nearly died. Lenny fought real hard - the kid is good in a fight - and saved us. Dutch is planning some big escape for us all. Some grand master plan. Everything we are attempting here seems troubled. I hope we can get out of here ALIVE.
Right now, it don't seem likely. Dutch is raging about Bronte's deception or betrayal or whatever quite it was. Dutch don't like being made a fool of. Even Micah with all his teasing and needling plays it real cool with Dutch. I would not want to be Bronte right now.
I cannot see Dutch letting this pass.
After Revenge is a Dish Best Eaten
Went to teach Angelo Bronte a lesson. Taught him something, I guess. Taught him alligators have a nasty way about them. Dutch is torn between his dreams of escape and his need to prove something or other, I don't quite know what. Not sure he does. Wants us to make one last big haul of cash $$$, then flee for TAHITI. Retire and become farmers. Where the hell is Tahiti? I guess they don't have Pinkertons there, at least. All them years we dreamed of being ranchers out in virgin lands in the WEST.
Now it's bananas and coconuts and long boat rides. Guess anywhere the train can get to, the law can get to. Dutch probably has it right. This country really don't want folk like us no more.
From ocean to ocean, place is going to law abiding and decent and dulled and rigid, until folks have frozen themselves into nothingness.
The people in this city are worse and more desperate than the nastiest gun slinger I ever met.
They'd shoot you in the back and make you pay
for your own funeral. They throw shit on you for sport. They walk past the lost and starving like they can't see them. Keep feeling sick but I'm it's nothing. This damn swamp. Ain't natural.
Adios Bronte
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@darkestbeforethedawn16 asked: Also maybe a cute one shot about them moving in together
If I Go Universe - Move In With Me (Rick Flag x OC)
Summary: This is a story all about how Rick asked Delphia to move in with him.
Pairing: Rick Flag x OC (Delphia Holman)
Word Count: 1281
Warnings: FLUFF, rick flag being one soft man for his dee, one gun mention
Timeline: May 2017 (they've been together eight months at this point)
if i go universe
She was standing in his kitchen wearing nothing but one of his old army t-shirts. There was bacon frying on the stove and English muffins in the oven. Baked from scratch. She’d come through his door the night before with a massive bowl of dough in her arms — stating it was better to let it rise overnight. Soft folk music made her hum and bob her head from side to side as she monitored the bacon with a dutiful hand. That fire red hair was tied up in the messiest bun he’d ever seen. Several pieces fell around her shoulders — the hairtie barely containing it all.
He stood at the mouth of the hallway for a minute longer. Leaned with one shoulder against the wall and his arms crossed over his bare chest. It was his post mission, well deserved day off. He would go back into the office tomorrow and start up the debriefing paperwork. But right now, he was home. Washed of blood and grime and sweat — and waking up to the smell of bacon.
Rick called her when he got home. Knowing that she was already at her own apartment. It was late — nearing on three in the morning — but he needed to see her. Needed to feel her soft flesh instead of the cold, harsh metal of a gun. Needed to hear her sweet nothings instead of the deranged ramblings of Belle Reve’s worst. Needed her to sifen out the bad and keep the good that was left in him. Like drawing poison from a wound with her gentle kisses and warm embrace.
On some impulse and natural inclination, Rick’s eyes swept the main room of his apartment. What he was looking for he wasn’t entirely sure.
Wait — when did that blanket get on his couch? Right. Delphia brought it over a month ago. Claiming that he kept his place ridiculously cold and every good movie needed a good fuzzy blanket to cuddle under. When did that plant get placed on his windowsill? Oh — Delphia said the light was better than at her place and the little thing was dying. When did that box of recipes find a home on his kitchen counter? When did all those pairs of shoes get by his door?
His eyes found Delphia in the kitchen again. She was gently sashaying over to the fridge, sifting through the contents and pulling out various toppings for the english muffins.
How had it taken this long for him to notice that this woman was like fucking creep vine? Overtaking his apartment without him even really knowing. Her stuff was everywhere. She was everywhere. And he didn’t even mind. In fact, he liked it that way. He liked her blanket on the couch and her plant in the window and her shoes by the door. And he liked her. In the same place as him. Sleeping in the same bed. Sitting on the same couch. Watching the same movies. Drinking the same coffee and cheap booze.
He didn’t want to call her anymore and ask her to come over. He wanted her here. Always. He wanted to drive to work together in the morning and come back together at night. He wanted that fire red hair and blue eyes to be the last thing he saw before going to sleep and the first thing he saw when he woke up. He wanted all of her — always — forever.
“You done standing there, Colonel Flag?” Rick was slightly surprised to see her turned around, sleepy morning smile on her face and a hand on her hip. “You can start up the coffee if you wouldn’t mind?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, picking himself up from the wall and heading towards the coffee pot.
She pinched his hip as he scooped the grounds, flashing him a tired grin and a wink when he looked over. This was so nice. And good. And domestic. The bacon sizzled in the pan, the entire package nearly cooked because she knew how he liked his meat, as the coffee pot roared to life like a steam engine. The morning sun was coming in through the eastern window, the curtains pulled back just enough to let a beam of light stretch across the hardwood. And Delphia, with that messy hair and t-shirt down to her thighs, stood in that light as a lazy cat. Balanced with one foot on top of the other — head thrown back and eyes closed as she soaked in the heat. Rick leaned back against the counter with his arms crossed and hazel eyes softer than they had ever been.
His mouth opened before he even realized it, gentle words with a rough morning gravel tumbling from him like a waterfall: “Move in with me.”
“Hmm?” Delphia hummed back, lifting her head up to look at him with a lazy smile, “What’d you say?”
“I want you to move in with me.” He shrugged.
The oven timer went off. Delphia moved back across the kitchen to turn it off, then she pulled the english muffins from the oven to cool. Rick watched her work silently. She didn’t say anything for a minute. She went back to finishing breakfast. Pulling the last of the bacon from the pan and adding it to the pile on the counter. Another piece of hair fell from her bun and into her eyes. For a moment, nerves twisted in his gut. Forming a knot that made his hands sweat and his brow crumple.
Shit. Was that the wrong thing to say right now?
“You just gonna leave me hangin’ or what?” he asked through a nervous chuckle.
“Oh, sorry!” She looked over at him with a cheeky grin and his nerves dissipated as morning fog. “I was kinda waitin’ for a question — you did wanna ask me something right?”
Rick rolled his eyes as she laughed softly. She knew exactly what she was doing to him — and the weird thing was he didn’t mind. He didn’t mind one bit that she teased him and laughed at him and called him out on his bullshit. He wanted it, craved it even. Even when he was away from her, on some mission halfway across the world, he would do something stupid and he could just picture the way she would look at him. Head cocked to one side, lopsided grin, eyebrow quirked. Asking the silent question of the fuck was that? He would actually miss that look. God, he had it bad.
With a playful growl he snatched her around the waist and pulled her back into his front. Mouthing at her neck and digging his fingers into the flesh of her waist to make her feverish giggle ring in his ears.
Rick pressed his lips to the shell of her ear, Delphia panting in his arms from all her laughter, and whispered, “Will you move in with me?”
“Yes,” she replied breathlessly, “Thought you’d never ask.”
In two months, when her lease was up, the rest of Delphia Holman would take over his apartment. No longer the pad of a bachelor but covered in evidence that two people lived there. Her family pictures went up on the bookshelves. She dug out of storage some of his own. A wreath was hung up on his door. New curtains were put up. There was a hutch in the entryway from her old place that she liked too much to sell. There was hair all over the shower. The makeup she forgot to take off at night stained the pillow cases. And Rick Flag couldn’t be happier.
Taglist (if you would like to be tagged in future installations, just let me know!): @bbygrgu @a-reader-and-a-writer @slayerx147 @xoxabs88xox @kasey-puff @witchygagirl @the-pink-petite-princess @blooo0ooop @woodlandmouth @csigeoblue @rexorangecouny @h-hxgirl @thisisthewayrose @blondiekook @darkestbeforethedawn16 @runic-belova @weallhaveadestiny @oopsiedoopsie23 @nerdgrrlramblings @ocfairygodmother
#rick flag#colonel rick flag#rick flag fic#rick flag x delphia holman#rick flag x oc#rick flag fanfiction#rick flag fanfic#rick flag imagine#suicide squad fic#suicide squad fanfic#suicide squad fanfiction#suicide squad imagine#the suicide squad#joel kinnaman#joel kinnaman imagine#dceu imagine#dceu x reader#dceu fic#dc oc#ocappreciation
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Hi, can you help me? I really like my little pony dolls and ive been wanting to start a collection of all the generation four gals if I can (i would settle for the mane 6 and a few others), however i have no idea where to start or how to find any, and on amazon i have only find weird knockoffs that have hard silicon hair. I also want to have an archive of all thr launched dolls, both mlp and equestria girls, but again, i have no idea how to research or really do any of this, do id really really like some pointers, or if you dont have any, for you to point me to someone who does.
Hi! Oh gosh, sorry for the late reply!! I'm not great about checking my Asks, and I only seem to get notifications for messages about half the time! >.>
So... it's a funny thing! Because when I was building most of my early collection in the early 2000s, the way to do it was to buy big eBay lots, and sell/trade any extras you didn't want from there. But now with eBay prices skyrocketing, and more folks getting into collecting/flipping pony lots, prices are all over the place - mostly ridiculously high.
Prices for G4, at least, seem to still be pretty low! More people are selling than buying. So if you're looking for G4 ponies, I highly recommend looking for eBay lots. I've still gotten some good deals there, even on harder-to-find ponies like G4 Minty. There's a fair amount of people just flipping them from the thrift, or selling childhood/post-fandom collections, so you can get good prices for them still. (G1 is less so! And G3 seems to be creeping up as well.)
I also suggest Mercari! Mercari is, unlike Facebook pickups, generally assumed to be for mailing items, so although there's some stiff competition, you can still find good deals! You can use that as an app or on their website! (If you are good at IRL stuff, you could always try the thrift stores yourself, or try local flea markets/toy fairs/Facebook sales! G4 is plentiful among toy collectors, especially those who trade secondhand, and you might be able to get some deals!)
I'm curious about what hard silicon hair ponies you're finding! I took a quick look, and I think you may be seeing the Ponyville/blind bag figures, which are minis. When I look on Amazon I still see some G4 stuff, but it's mostly 3rd party sellers, so it's very expensive. I still scroll through the Amazon Warehouse from time to time - you won't find older ponies, but if there's any newer releases you like, they may have those a little cheaper with a banged-up box! I found a cool Cutie Mark Crew set for $6 on there recently!
The most well-organized and comprehensive site, at least for the first few years, was Strawberry Reef (here's her release list by year), but I believe she fell behind in the past few years, since it only goes up to 2013. (She may have skipped G4 in favor of G4.5? I see links for G5 stuff there now.) MLP Merch is keeping up admirably, but I'm not sure if they have a chronological guide. There may also be some stuff in the various MLP wikis, but I haven't done a lot of research on that yet!
I suggest eBay by and large, but I also suggest checking out the MLPArena - it's one of the last remaining pony forums, and there's still folks selling and trading there! MLPTP is also still going, but they seem to be less busy than the Arena. I'd suggest Facebook, but the crowd there is Real Bad, and a lot of the folks who've become popular there were previously banned for being scammers on the forums. So if you join MLP groups there, be wary, and pay very strictly with Paypal goods/services - no friends/family, no Facebook pay. (Neither will give you ANY level of buyer protection!) There was once a feedback group for Facebook, but it turned out that it was run by some of the same scammers who got banned from the forums.
I'm trying to think of what else to say - I've found some nice and cheap G4 ponies on instagram flash sales, and I've also found some overpriced G4 ponies there! It really just depends on who's selling and how popular/packed their sales are. Jupiter.magia, for example, is a very popular, friendly seller; I got some great basic G4 ponies from her! But her sales posts would get claims within like .05 seconds. Ditto for Kristwoforks, a popular thrift reseller. She does a lot of sales, and has a LOT of fans! (And then of course, there's the classic "super popular seller who everyone loves but will occasionally scam people out of their items and attack anyone who speaks up", which I've personally run into in the past, as well as witnessed my friends get scammed by multiple Big Names.) Instagram, sadly, isn't a real sales platform, so there's no protection if things go south; your only recourse is through Paypal, and there's no real way to leave feedback, so scammers thrive there, as they do on Facebook. You have to be very careful and mindful of your claim deadlines, so I generally warn beginning buyers away from there until they gain a little more experience, and can pick up when someone's giving off bad vibes. I've found most of my IG buys from people I follow; they'll say, 'oh I got this last week from X!' so I'll go follow X's page for their next sale; or Y will get their sale post boosted on my friend's story, so I'll go check them out too. It's much safer IMO to find sellers by this sort of word-of-mouth, because then you know someone who had at least one good interaction with them.
I gave you a LOT of information here, ha ha, but I'm doing my best to be comprehensive! You've decided to collect G4 at a very good time, because with the end of the series, folks are losing interest, and selling off their collections. Not everyone of course, but quite a few! I wish you the best of luck in your future collecting adventures! And feel free to pop back around if you get stuck or have more questions!
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Revelations
Pairing: Reaper/female Reader
Summary: You are an unfortunate soul who gets to know Reaper’s wrath, but things turn out quite differently from what one would assume.
Rating: 18+
Tags/Warnings: oneshot, choking, kind of breath-play, angst, masturbation
Word count: 4600
A/N: I had yet to write fem. reader with Reaper in this way and tbh I like it so much I just might continue this at some point. Anyway, enjoy~
***
One of the perks of working with Talon was the great pay at the end of the month, it really made for a comfortable life at a time at which the world was spiralling into chaos. And if you didn’t think too hard on what it was you did for a living, you could almost pretend like it was just another job like any other.
You distinctly remembered the day you signed the contract that forbade you to breathe a single word of the work you did for Talon to anybody. As cliché as it sounds, you needed the money and they promised a steady income. All in all you couldn’t complain.
“I’m surrounded by incompetent idiots!” The man in the middle of the room was seething, he grabbed a chair and threw it against the wall, leaving ugly tears in the wallpaper and bending one of the chair’s metal legs in the process. A hush fell over the room and its few inhabitants, your teammates stood still and nervous in the face of Reaper’s wrath.
Ah yes, the one downside to working here. Reaper was a man not known for his kindness or patience, if you worked with him you knew it was going to be a bad day. He usually operated alone, the only support he needed was someone to hack his way in for him. But some missions simply were too large scale for a single agent, just like the one you’d just finished an hour ago.
And now here you were in the debriefing room, Reaper yelling at various agents for the fuck up that happened.
You tried to melt into the shadows of the corner you were currently standing in, unwilling to take the blame for anything that had happened, you were just unfortunate enough to have gotten looped into this meeting even though all you’d done was some prior intel research work, you hadn’t even been a part of the team on the field.
“I’m done with this,” Reaper announced, his mask flitting over every individual red Talon helmet in front of him, “from now on I’ll operate alone again.”
You rolled your eyes under your helmet at his theatrics. Good, you thought, nobody wants to work with you anyway.
“You’re all getting a pay cut,” he growled and already moved to leave, but in your endless stupidity you just had to let your mouth speak before you knew any better.
“No!” You exclaimed, suddenly the center of attention in the room. Incredulous eyes were on you even though you couldn’t see any of the other agent’s faces. It was what you would have done, too. Hah, look at the idiot trying to object to Reaper, they were probably relieved that he would finally have someone to let all of his frustrations out on.
You tried to stand your ground, feet a shoulder width apart, head held high, but quivering as your heart started to beat frantically while you watched as Reaper stomped over to you. He was like a cloud of thunder rolling in towards a small city. Run, folks would say, get to cover. But there would be no escaping this particular thunderstorm.
With one final step he came to a stop in front of you, his massive frame accentuated by the light cream wallpaper behind him. He looked like the grim reaper himself, all that was missing was a scythe.
“What did you just say, agent?” Oh, he was pissed, you were so dead.
You swallowed around a very dry throat, your eyes glued to the empty eye sockets in his white skeletal mask, then tried to speak but it came out as a croak.
Reaper took a step closer to you, you only barely managed not to take one backward in fear.
“Speak up,” he barked, arms crossed in front of his chest.
“I just–you… I–” you stammered but were immediately interrupted by him.
“I asked you what you just said,” he hissed, and all the air left your lungs. He was going to make an example of you, wasn’t he?
You tried to straighten your spine and suppress the tremors currently running down your body.
“I… said ‘no’.” You tried to sound like you were sorry for being insubordinate, but it just came out as a whisper. What was he going to do with you now? The suspense left you shaking in your boots.
“You think you can say no to me?” The way Reaper’s voice had lowered made you nauseous, fear licked at your insides uncomfortably, but–what was this? Were you… blushing? The heat in your cheeks was startling you, what was happening?
“I’m–I’m sorry, sir.” You finally lowered your head in a sign of submission, hoping to appease him somewhat. It was just that you needed all the money you could get right now, most of the pay you got went straight to your sick brother who needed urgent care in one of the most prestigious–and expensive–hospitals in Zurich.
All of a sudden a clawed hand shot forward and grabbed you by the throat, pushing you into the wall behind and startling you so much you grasped at the hand holding you an inch from the ground. Reaper loomed over you, casting you both into shadow, you desperately tried to breathe through his choke hold but found it was becoming increasingly difficult.
He just stared at you with those dead eyes, features hidden from view just like yours at the moment.
“Everyone out,” he said, tone final and leaving no room for discussion–not that anyone was stupid enough to make the same mistake that you’d made. No one was going to save you anyway, Talon made sure that agents kept to themselves, operating in anonymity with the helmets agents were required to wear at all times.
From the corner of your eye you were able to see how everyone practically fled from the scene, not even sparing a last glance towards you, probably already arguing about who would get your stuff when you would be dead in like two minutes.
“Sir–” You tried to speak up but it was so hard to get enough air; you didn’t want to die, you couldn’t die–your brother would be doomed without your help.
“Tell me your name, agent.”
Oh fuck, he really meant business, huh?
You managed to whisper what he wanted to know, his hand on your throat squeezing just a little tighter in response.
The lack of oxygen in your blood was making you delirious, your heart was still frantically trying to keep you alive, darkness was creeping in at the edges of your vision, the man’s proximity confusing and terrifying and–arousing?
“Do you know what I’ll do with you now?”
Shit, when had he gotten so close? The blush on your cheeks deepened considerably, spreading further down to your chest. Why did he sound so ambiguous…
“You’re gonna kill me,” you gasped, trying to blink away the bright spots dancing in contrast to the shadows at the edge of your vision. A pathetic whimper escaped you at the pain of his claws digging into your skin, they were to be felt even through the padding of the armor you were wearing.
“You think I’ll let you off the hook so easily?” He pushed you even further up the wall, the pressure on your jaw and windpipe becoming unbearable.
“Please,” you breathed, pulling at his wrist in a futile attempt to get him off, but nothing was working. Contrary to his words he was killing you, you were convinced of it. As you rose up the wall, you thought that this was actually your very last moment, certain that Reaper was just toying with you.
Aside from the painful throbbing of a headache forming behind your eyes, there was still that persistent warmth spreading through your body. Up until now you’d had no idea that you could get turned on by being choked, but here you were, hanging onto life by a thread while a faceless mercenary was strangling you, and your body had no qualms about reminding you that you were yet very much alive. Thrilling, that was the right word for what it felt like to you. How fucked up was that?
The moment came, Reaper pushed into your personal space just a little more and his hand adjusted its grip just so, his claws brushing over your skin as it broke out in goosebumps and you were lost in a sea of pain and delirium, you forgot who it was currently pressing you against the wall of the bland debriefing room–and it had been so long since anyone touched you–that it forced a small moan from deep within you.
Immediately you stilled, a moment of clarity cleaving through your muddled senses, reminding you that this was not an appropriate response to being choked within an inch of your life by your team leader.
You watched in trepidation as his head, too close for comfort, tilted to the side just a little, felt his grip on you falter the slightest bit, as if your response had startled him just as much as it had you. And you weren’t surprised in the least. What the hell happened here?
To your great relief, he let you sink back down until your feet touched the floor again, alleviating some of the pain and discomfort in your upper body from straining against his hold so much.
Face hot from both arousal and humiliation, your visor started to fog up with the humidity of your hard breathing, making it hard to see through it, all the while hoping that maybe he decided to let you go after all. But he wasn’t moving away from you, nor was his hand leaving its place around your neck.
The vibration of his dark voice, modulated by that mask, shook you to the core as he hummed in thought and intrigue, the sensation going straight between your legs. You clenched your knees together to make it a little more bearable, hot arousal was making itself known in your core, pulsing in the rhythm of your heartbeat.
Damnit, why did this turn you on so much? A small sob was bubbling up in your chest, you didn’t want to enjoy how Reaper was treating you, but your body thought otherwise. He was still staring at you, his scrutiny was starting to become unbearably intense and mortifying, but oh how you enjoyed it.
“You like this,” he observed suddenly, and you wanted to die of shame at his comment, because it was true. Why, oh why was it true?
You tried to turn your head to the side, but he used his hand on your neck to keep you in position, you were no match for his sheer strength; it made you weak in the knees.
“You like being manhandled. A little… roughed up.” His voice had taken on a raspy, hoarse quality and it did nothing to soothe the fire that had started to burn through you. Images of him pushing you against the wall, clawing the clothes from your body bombarded you, of him just bending you over the big meeting table and having his way with you.
Another feeble moan left you as you rubbed your thighs together, trying to get some kind of friction against your core. But of course it didn’t help, you doubted anything could help right now but the things you wanted Reaper to do to you. At the same time you were way too afraid to voice these desires, sure that the mercenary would simply dismiss you, humiliating you even further. You were glad that the helmet hid your fierce blush and glassy eyes.
You watched him through your lashes, he was still looking at you in an expectant kind of way, was he waiting for you to confirm his theory, that you wanted to be ‘roughed up’ by him? Oh, he was so right, but no way in hell were you going to say it, not if you were still sane enough to bear in mind the consequences. What good would it do you, he’d probably laugh at your pathetic desire for something he would never give you in the first place. So you stayed silent on the face of his inquisitive stare.
Suddenly you were pressed against the wall again, but this time by both his hands on your shoulders, evidently he was done waiting now, the moment was gone.
Relief and disappointment warred within you, the latter leaving a sour taste in your mouth.
“Next time you object to my orders in front of the team you’ll face much worse,” Reaper spoke dark and dangerously, “got it?”
With a frantic nod you sagged against the wall when he finally released you.
Without another word he simply turned and left through the door, not even bothering to close it again.
As you stood there staring after him, you wondered what the hell had just happened and why that insistent throbbing in your nether regions didn’t seem to want to stop. Something was seriously wrong with you, it was a miracle that he had left you pretty much unscathed, aside from your hurt pride.
***
It was late in the night when you finally retired for the day, your joints ached and your muscles were sore from a long day of wearing your armor. You entered the communal showers alone, the only upside of staying up so late, you figured.
As you removed your armor, your thoughts wandered to Reaper and what he had done just a few hours ago. Goosebumps rose on your skin when the cool air of the changing room hit you, or was it the memory of being held by a strong hand around your neck? Probably a bit of both, you shouldn’t let what happened get to you so much, especially now that you’d had a little time to let your mind shift focus from the feelings and urges that the man had invoked.
A small shiver ran down your spine, goodness, you really had let yourself get carried away there, you needed to make sure it would never happen again. Best to stay as far away from Reaper as possible.
Curiously, you stepped in front of one of the mirrors hung above the sinks in the shower room, your eyes immediately landed on your neck and your mouth fell open in shock at the dark angry marks you found there. You touched your skin with two slightly shaking fingers, tilting your head and tracing the bruise from the front to the side where there were additional scratches left by sharp claws.
A small shuffling sound behind made you clutch your chest in fright and turn around, but there was nothing to be seen, you were still alone in the room. Must have been your frayed mind playing tricks.
With a deep breath you grabbed a towel and went into one of the shower stalls to turn on the water on the hottest setting. Mist was soon rising from the tiled floor where the water was disappearing down the drain, giving you the signal that it was finally warm enough.
When the hot water hit your shoulders you sighed in pleasure, the warmth always helped you relax and soothe your aches from a long work day, today was no different. As you closed your eyes to let the water run over your head as well, you let the serenity of the darkness and warmth hold you for just a moment.
Talon’s standard soaps, shampoos and shower gels had a very distinct marketed-for-men-smell, like they had only been chosen with the male part of the organization in mind. And unfortunately, as you started to soap yourself up, it started to have an effect on you; you were getting aroused again, just the thought of a man with you–it had been so long since you’d had any form of physical contact like that–you really yearned for someone’s touch.
With a small sigh you lathered up your chest, went up and over your breasts, enjoying the feel of the slippery bubbles against your wet skin and how nice it felt when you brushed over your nipples. Closing your eyes and pretending it was somebody else–some faceless Talon grunt–you went even further with one hand down your stomach, swirling a finger around your belly button and finally cleaned yourself between the legs.
Oh yes, this was nice. Pent up frustration from earlier brought you to full arousal in an instant, two fingers found your clit and the last thing on your mind was cleaning yourself. The hand that was still at your chest was going higher, first over your left and then your right shoulder before it caressed your neck.
It was like you’d touched an open wire; electricity ran through your entire body, connecting every nerve ending and lighting them on fire. Pure heat gathered in your abdomen, your fingers pressing into the bruises on your skin and feeding that electric current with a mixture of pleasure and pain. A small part of you was raising its voice in alarm but there would be another time and place to reflect upon what you were currently doing, right now you needed release–badly.
Slowly, the faceless Talon grunt in your mind started to change, his red mask was losing its color, revealing white bone surrounded by black leather flowing down into a long coat, his gloves became sharp talons gouging into your skin. Your fingernails were a poor imitation for the claws you remembered though, and you whimpered with want for the original.
Still, that orgasm you’d been working on was fast approaching, the sensations bombarding you as the water was running down your body, your hand wrapped around your own neck and you rubbed yourself fiercely between the legs.
Just as you leaned against the shower wall to completely let yourself go, there was this shuffling sound again, ripping you from the cusp of that climax and flooding you with adrenaline and fear of being caught masturbating in the shower. With wide eyes you tried to see through the mist that had accumulated during your shower, but it was nigh impossible to see further than a few feet in front of you.
Then you heard them, heavy steps were moving over the tiled floor, growing louder with every footfall.
Petrified, you stayed very still, your hands not moving from where you were still touching yourself, convinced that their position on your body would not be mistaken for what you were actually doing. This person would pass your shower stall and go about their business… right?
But you actually knew that this was not an agent going to take a shower at two in the morning, those footsteps could only belong to one person. The question was, what was he doing here?
Like a deer caught in the headlights, you didn’t move a muscle until Reaper stopped right in front of you, the dark, vague outline of his broad shoulders slowly cutting through the milky-white mist. You didn’t dare breathe as he came forward, one hand extending towards you, but ultimately landing on the shower controls. The water turned off and left you standing in deafening silence, leaving only the mist to keep you warm.
Shivering, you blinked through wet lashes at the mercenary towering above you, his hand still next to your arm on the shower wall, unmoving and menacing. His mask was staring at your face blankly until it turned downwards and landed on your hand still wrapped around your neck. As if his gaze burned you there, you dropped that hand and used your forearm to hide your chest from his view.
“So it was you,” he growled in his otherworldly raspy voice that was reverberating in the small shower stall around you, intimately close.
Right, he hadn’t seen your face in the briefing room, but the marks on your neck gave away that it had been indeed you whom he had strangled. And now he had found you, not only with your hand between your legs, but also with your other in mimicry of his fist around your throat.
Talk about awkward.
“S–Sir,” you stuttered, unsure of what was happening or his intention of cornering you in the shower in the early morning hours. You tried with all your might to suppress the urge to apologize, you’d already told him you were sorry for speaking out of turn earlier, there was no need to do it again. Also, it should have been him apologizing for surprising you like this, while you were naked in the shower, alone, helpless, vulnerable.
Again you shivered, the true extent of your circumstance beating you down like an oversized sledgehammer.
Had Reaper come to finish what he’d started, was he going to strangle you to death? Or–and you were really hopeful it was true–had he come because of how he had noticed how turned on you’d been and wanted to lend a hand?
There was only one way to find out.
Tentatively, and with shaking fingers, you resumed your ministrations on your clit, rubbing it in very small circles, trying to override the fear still lodged in your brain with the pleasure created by the friction, while staring back at Reaper through half-lidded eyes wet from the water.
Again his mask tilted down and down until he saw you working yourself up. Your pulse spiked when he took a small step towards you, his heavy boots stomping wetly against the ground and blocking the exit of the shower stall.
You barely managed to keep your eyes open, but they went wide again when you felt his gloved hand against your throat. This time it was even more intense without your armor in the way. Would it hurt you even more like this, without that protective barrier between your soft skin and his sharp talons?
You couldn’t help yourself and moaned quietly, feeling your own voice vibrate against his palm that was not yet pressing or squeezing, it was just resting there on your windpipe, a reminder that this was in fact real and happening.
The hand between your legs sped up a bit with arousal, Reaper’s presence driving you into a frenzy. There was just something about the danger he exuded, the threat of violence and death that short-circuited your brain and turned your body into goo. How he just held you, loosely, but with that unmistakable strength underneath that grip, it made you shiver in delight, wrung a small whimper from you.
Now if he just squeezed a little, made it hard to breathe–you needed to feel that lightheadedness, the darkness creeping in at the edges of your vision, to lay your life in his hands. You needed more.
“Please,” you whispered, barely audible, but you knew he’d heard when you finally felt that pressure on your throat, wringing another moan from you as you lay your head against the wall. A few spare drops of water ran down your face, you felt his gloved palm slicked up by the water on your skin, could smell the leather even over the shampoo you’d used.
Cold was creeping in around you know, it ghosted over your wet skin, leaving goosebumps wherever it touched, small shivers racked your body, your knees were shaking. But on the inside you were burning up, a blush had formed on your cheeks, the result of his proximity and just the fact that he was looking at you, while you were pleasuring yourself, no less. Goodness, you wanted him to fuck you so badly, it made you whine desperately, speed up your fingers against your clit, and your free hand hold onto the wall behind.
Just a few more seconds and you’d come, you knew it in your bones, in the way your hips were undulating and how the heel of your hand was now pressed against that bundle of nerves and how you’d slid those two fingers inside your hot core in search of that spot.
But still you needed more. You had Reaper here with you and you needed him to choke you, leave it up to him if he wanted you to live or die. Give away all control, wanting to know if he deemed you worthy of his mercy.
When had you become such a frantic mess?
Were you that desperate to die? Reaper wasn’t known for his kindness after all, the possibility of him just fucking killing you was very high. And this was what was turning you on so much you would have slid down the shower wall if it hadn’t been for Reaper holding you by the neck.
Freshly wet eyes were staring at the man before you–his cold, dead mask–you tried to blink away the stubborn tears flowing freely down your cheeks, hoping he would not notice them on your already wet face, while you were angry at your emotional response.
Angry and so turned on.
“Harder,” you gasped and immediately closed your eyes in bliss when he generously gave you what you craved so badly. A papercut fine scratch made your breath catch, one of his claws must have broken your skin.
It took only one more thrust of your fingers, one hard press against your clit and you came with a sob, your body going rigid for a few heartbeats before going completely slack in Reaper’s grip.
The pressure on your neck had abated somewhat, Reaper gave you the chance to catch some much needed air, and you sucked it in greedily, panting like a dog through a dry mouth.
Heat had spread through your entire body, the cool kiss of the air against your skin barely feasible to your blissed out senses. The only sensation you were aware of was Reaper’s hand, just holding fast enough to keep you on your feet.
Somehow you couldn’t look at him anymore, the reality of the situation slowly creeping along your conscious and making you aware of how fucked up it was what just happened. With the awareness came the awkwardness, the slow panic of self-conscious fear–the need to say something, to get away. But at the same time you were speechless, still incredulous that what happened actually happened.
With a final deep breath you closed your eyes and before you could open them again the presence of the man’s hand had disappeared, and when you did manage to look again, so had the rest of him. Just vanished into thin air.
There was no trace of Reaper at all, no sound of heavy footsteps or the swishing of his leather cloak, nothing.
As you used the wall for support to stabilize yourself, you risked a glance outside the shower stall, searching for any sign that he had been indeed in here. There was no way you’d only imagined it all, it had been way too real; cold fingertips felt along your neck where his hand had been only seconds ago, then reached up to wipe at your still wet eyes.
You were slowly going insane, that must have been it.
Wrapping a towel around your rapidly cooling body, you tip-toed into the changing room to dry off completely. As you passed the mirrors, you had to stop and stare for a moment–there was a very small cut on your neck now, the blood already dried, but as you scratched at it there was new red liquid oozing out.
So it hadn’t been your imagination after all.
Huh.
–end.
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Out of My League [Part 1]
Pairing: High school!Spencer Reid x Popular!Reader
Word count: 3.7k (god i don’t shut up do i)
Summary: Spencer begins tutoring you in chemistry, and the two of you bond (I would say no pun intended but fuck it that was GOOD so I’ll say pun intended)
Warning(s): Mentions of bullying, mental illness, some swearing, I made one joke about herpes??? sorry if thats a sore spot with anyone, light angst and pining, Reader POV
Author’s Note: Here it is, folks!! The first official part! I’ so grateful for all the feedback I got on the prologue, I’m glad y’all are liking it, I hope you like this part just as much!! Next part I’m gonna have some baby spencer, and by that I mean whole ass adult spencer that just looks baby
[Previous Part] [Series Masterlist]
You absolutely despised chemistry. It’s boring. It’s simultaneously stupid and ridiculously complicated. You weren’t dumb, you were a decent student in all your other classes, but science was never your strong suit. You preferred literature over litmus paper any day. Unfortunately, your failing grade was bringing down your entire GPA, just below the requirement for you to stay on the cheerleading squad. Your coach recommended you get a tutor, or else you were off the team. So you went to the library to see the peer tutoring program, and all of them were booked. The next best thing would be the kid genius in your class. He was probably a better first choice, honestly, but you figured he’d be booked with other students too.
He wasn’t like other kids in your class, not just because he actually cared and was a good student, he was also twelve years old. The kid was a prodigy. He was bullied a lot because of this because no one really understood him. That’s probably why he looked so terrified when you approached him after class one day.
“Hey, Spencer!”
His eyes grew wide as he stared back at you, saying nothing.
“I was just wondering if you were available for tutoring?”
“Oh, uh, um, y-yeah, in chemistry?”
“Yeah, what are your rates like? Like say we do an hour every other day, how much would that be?”
“Oh! N-no charge.”
“Really?”
“The first couple of sessions can be a trial run, I don’t want your money if you’re not benefiting from it.”
That made you smile, this kid was so nice and you just wished that people actually cared about that instead of the dumb shit they bullied him for. Sure, he was skinny and short and dorky and you know, a literal twelve-year-old boy, but if someone would take time to know him, they’d see he’s a good kid.
“That’s sweet of you, but I don’t wanna waste your time if you have other students.”
“I don’t, so that shouldn’t be a problem.”
“Great! Are you free after school today?”
He nodded and avoided all eye contact before scurrying out of the room to his next class.
~~~
You met up later in the library. You greeted each other politely with simple hi’s and hey’s and nothing more. Then it was time to pour over your books for an hour and try to force the puzzle pieces into place and hope something finally clicked. Balancing molecular equations physically hurt. Just when you thought you got it all right, Spencer reminded you that you still had to balance the oxygen, which was always bonded with something else, which threw off the whole equation. Every time you made a mistake you just let out a groan and set your head on the table.
“It’s a lot of math, a lot of people have a hard time with it, don’t feel bad.”
“I’m so fucking stupid.”
“You’re not! It’s an easy mistake.”
“You don’t make mistakes like that.”
“That’s because I’ve been taking advanced math classes for the past two years, I’m good at this stuff.”
“You’re good at everything, you're a literal genius.”
“There are people who aren’t geniuses who are good at this sort of thing, just look at Johnny Abrams in our class. He answers every question Mrs. Gustin asks and I once saw him put his backpack on his car’s roof and start driving ‘cuz he forgot it was there. He’s just been practicing. That’s why we’re here, right?”
He always reassured you. Always told you that you weren’t stupid. You weren’t dumb. He always smiled when you got questions right and told you you were doing a good job. When your hour was up, you said goodbye and went home.
Spencer’s mini lectures aside, most of your sessions were sparse in the conversation department. The first time he went off on a side about some chemistry facts, you couldn’t keep up. You just sat there, jaw hanging while he went into detail about saponification, which wasn’t even in this lesson.
“Sorry, I’m rambling.”
“Did we learn that in class? Cuz if we did, I’m screwed.”
“No, not yet at least.”
“How do you just… know that?”
Spencer avoided your eyes once again, something he did more than spouting random facts, “I read a lot.”
That’s how it happened the first time. All it took was you asking one question about different types of reactions for him to launch into another spiel. You figured you’d have to know it at some point, so you started writing down whatever you could catch from his fast-paced speech, taking notes in bullet points.
“And that-- Oh. Y-You don’t need to do that, that’s not even on the curriculum.”
“Well, I gotta keep up with you somehow, right?” You glanced up from your page and flashed an almost challenging smirk as you saw him stifle a smile as he avoided all eye contact with you, as per usual. He then cleared his throat and got back to the actually assigned chapter.
The more he went off on tangents, the more he realized you weren’t stopping him. He was actually able to make chemistry sound interesting to you, which is strange, but it was easier to understand through how he explained it all. Something told you that he wasn’t used to having someone listen to what he said, because he just lit up when he talked about this stuff. He was clearly passionate about it, so why would you make him feel bad about it? He always apologized, but you always reassured him it was no big deal.
You didn’t know it at the time, but the kid was falling hard. This pretty, older girl was paying attention to him and didn’t think he was annoying? The bar may have been on the floor for young Spencer, but you were perfect to him. Eventually, he was able to look you in the eyes when you spoke to one another, he even smiled at you when you joked with him. That was another thing: you joked with one another now. You both warmed up to one another as your sessions continued. You said hi to each other in the hallways, you ruffled his hair as a greeting, he accepted your high-five requests every time you got something right.
You still didn’t talk outside of class much, which is why he was caught so far off guard by you calling his name from across the cafeteria as you approached his table.
“Hey, dude! Is it cool if we squeeze in an extra session today? I got a test tomorrow.”
“Y-Yeah, no problem, but, uh, it’s Thursday. Don’t you have practice after school?”
You did. And you had to be there because you had a competition this weekend.
“Yeah, I was wondering if we could meet after?”
“When does it end?”
“Five.”
“Library closes at four.”
“I know, but would it be too much of a hassle if I just… Pick you up tonight and we head back to my house to study?”
You could physically see his brain shut down in his eyes. After he realized he needed to respond, he picked his jaw up off the floor and gulped hard.
“Or you can stay after and hang out at practice and I can just drive you home?”
“Y-Yeah, um, yeah, tha-that works, I can, uh, yeah, we can do that.”
Spencer brought his books and homework and tried his hardest to not make it obvious he was staring at you while you danced. You looked like you were having so much fun and he loved seeing you happy and smiling with your friends like that, it was hard for him to look away and focus long enough to read a sentence, which is saying something, considering it does not take him long to read a sentence.
After practice wrapped up, you told him to go wait by your car while you changed out of your uniform. The girls in the locker room were talking just as loudly as always, only this time, it was about something you actually cared about hearing.
“I mean, really, what was that little creep doing watching us today?” You heard one girl sneer.
“So fucking gross, I don’t wanna know where his prepubescent head was.” Another girl laughed.
You had to step in. You had to say something.
“I’m his ride home. He’s my chemistry tutor and I have a test tomorrow, so back off the kid, he didn’t do shit to you anyway.”
The squad learned to watch their mouths around you after that.
~~~
The neon glow of the golden arches shone through your car’s windows as you pulled into the McDonald’s drive-thru line.
“This isn’t your house,” noted Spencer, sounding confused.
You grinned, “Oh, shit… no way! Wow! I’m so glad my tutor is a genius! I would have never guessed this was not my family home!”
He let himself laugh for a moment, “Okay, okay, fine. Why are we here?”
“Uh… to get food? Duh.”
“But what about your food at home?”
“My mom’s visiting my dad, he works in D.C., and I haven’t gotten a chance to go grocery shopping this week, so I can’t cook for you. What do you want?”
“You don’t have to get me anything.”
“No, I insist, it’s almost dinner time. Lemme get you something. As a thank you for squeezing in an extra cramming sesh?”
“It’s fine! Really.”
“Hey, Reid, come on,” you attempt to stifle a stupid giggle as you gesture to the rather large window displaying the playroom inside, “you are a guest in my home!”
Spencer shakes his head and chuckles, but doesn’t dare let you think he found you funny, “I’ll have chicken nuggets.”
“Happy meal?”
He tried to look offended at your clarification, but he quickly dropped the facade, “Yes. Extra fries, please.”
“Of course, buddy.” You pulled up further to the ordering station, catching a glimpse at the menu and the ads they had displayed on it, “Oh no way! They have Strawberry Shortcake toys! I used to collect those when I was a kid!”
Spencer saw the look on your face and couldn’t help but smile at your childlike excitement, “Do you want my happy meal toy?”
You bit your lip and hesitated before throwing all shame to the wind and saying yes. Because it was Spencer. He got excited over chemistry, he had no right to judge you on your old Strawberry Shortcake doll collection.
After you got your food, you drove back to your house, and you ate together at your kitchen island while Spencer quizzed you on the last chapter. He had asked you eighteen questions so far, and you had answered all of them correctly.
“Okay, this last one is for the Strawberry Shortcake--”
“Her name is Orange Blossom.”
“Whatever, this last one is for the Orange Blossom toy: Which type of reaction is represented by this equation?” He showed you his notebook where he had written a molecular equation.
“Substitution.”
“Correct! Now balance it.”
Your shoulders slouched as the pride drained from your body.
“Please don’t make me.”
“This is going to be on the test, Y/N, you have to know it.”
“What’s one wrong question, really?”
“You and I both know she’s not going to put just one balancing question on the test.”
“Fine.” You grumbled, grabbing a pencil and sliding his notebook closer to you. You worked it out after a few minutes, but everything looked right, and judging by Spencer’s proud grin, everything was.
He reached for the figurine, still in the plastic bag, and handed it to you, “You’re gonna do great tomorrow, Y/N.”
You took Orange Blossom from his hands and danced around the kitchen with it, overwhelmed with the sudden feeling of confidence you gained from nailing this practice session. You heard Spencer’s small laugh from behind you, causing you to turn around and face the boy as he lovingly mocked you.
Studying at your place became a regular thing after that, even when your mom was home. She loved him. She always invited him for dinner if she was home. He rarely took her up on the offer, but it was nice having him around the house with you. Study sessions turned into just plain hanging out. You spent more time bonding over Doctor Who than chemistry some nights, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.
~~~
When Alexa Lisben invited him to meet her at the football field you were skeptical. You had good reason to be. She was never very nice to you or Spencer. You were able to be civil with her for the sake of the cheerleading squad, but something about her just didn’t sit right with you. You tried to warn him, but he wouldn’t listen. He seemed offended at the notion that Alexa would do something horrible to him. How dare you imply that the only reason someone would be interested in him would be to pull a fucked up prank?
“I’m not like you, Y/N, I don’t have a line of people waiting around for a date, no one’s ever had a crush on me before, and-and now that someone other than you is being nice to me, you’re telling me that they have some sort of ulterior motive?”
“Spencer. I know these girls, I’ve seen the guys they go for--”
“And I’m not like them?”
“No! You’re a sweet kid, you’re nothing like those guys and they’re gonna take advantage of that.”
“I really wish everyone would stop saying I’m just a kid!”
“You’re not! That came out wrong--”
“Listen, Y/N, I’m going whether you want me to or not, so if you really want to keep babying me, by all means, stay after and wait with me.”
“I don’t wanna baby you!”
“So stop it!”
You didn’t want to fight with him anymore, you weren’t his mother. “Ok, Spencer, fine. I’m sorry. You should go. How about you meet me in the library after and you can tell me all about it over McDonald’s? My treat.”
He warmed up and agreed.
So you waited in the library until four, and then you started to get worried. You went to grab something from your gym locker before you left to look for him and heard some girls from the squad gossiping about “the little dork.” Your blood started to boil as you heard the way they talked about Spencer. Your jaw only clenched harder as you recognized one of the girls’ voices as Alexa Lisben’s.
You poked your head around the lockers that divided the aisles and tried to manage a calm voice, “Hey Alexa? Spencer actually said he was meeting up with you today, do you know where he is?”
She just laughed and said, “I can’t believe you actually care about that loser.”
“He’s my friend.” All attempts to remain level-headed were tossed aside, “Where the fuck is he, what did you do to him?”
You could feel yourself starting to cry. It’s your fault, you weren’t there, you tried to warn him, but now you don’t know where he is or what he’s thinking or--
“Check the field.”
You sprinted out to the football field and saw him stripped down to his briefs, blindfolded, and tied to a goal post. You could kill Alexa. You actually considered turning right around and unleashing hell on that locker room, but your friend needed help. He was crying so hard he didn’t hear you coming until you called his name. You immediately went to untie him and grab his clothes from the fence beside him.
“You were right.” He sniffled, “I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t apologize, I’m not mad, I’m sorry, I should have been there, I could have helped you--”
“No, you couldn’t. There were too many people.”
“How many were there? Who did this?”
“Y/N, please--”
“No, Spencer, tell me what happened.”
“I don’t wanna talk about it!”
You know when to stop, so you just shut your mouth while he got dressed, “Get in the car, I’m taking you home.”
You didn’t say a word to him as he buckled his seatbelt and you could tell he appreciated it. You just drove to McDonald’s and got him his usual. You parked in the parking lot and ate your food in almost silence, save for the radio in the background.
“You don’t have to tell me what exactly happened, you could pretend none of this ever happened, I won’t mind, it’s okay, but I just need you to know, Spencer, say the word and she’s dead. I have so much dirt on her, you have no idea, I can destroy her.”
“Don’t.”
“Okay, I won’t. At least give me names. I will personally make sure none of those boys ever get a date again.”
“Y/N, please.”
“I’m serious, I’ll tell everyone they have herpes.”
“I know you are and that’s what scares me, please don’t, I don’t wanna make things worse.”
You decide to drop it because if he doesn’t wanna talk about it, he needs a distraction.
After you finish your food, you ask him “Your house or mine?”
“Yours. Please.”
You drove back to your house and got yourselves set up on the couch in front of the TV, turning on an episode of Doctor Who that you had recorded. You made him popcorn as he curled up on your couch, clutching a pillow. You were mostly quiet for the rest of the night, but when you did talk, it was to ask him a question about the show or if any of the science was accurate. It was the best you could do to keep him mind off things. Eventually, he fell asleep and you felt too bad to wake him. He got up by himself around midnight, jolting awake as if from a nightmare, and considering how the last few hours had been for him, it probably was one.
“Hey, bud, I’m here, it’s me.” You didn’t touch him, knowing he got overstimulated sometimes when he got really stressed, but he felt around for you on the couch next to him, needing to know you were really there this time. You patted his hand when it reached across the cushion for you.
“What time is it?”
“Way too late for you to be here, let’s get you home.”
He nodded, slowly rising to his feet and looking for his backpack, which you reminded him he had left in the car. Your hand hovered above his head for a moment before he lazily drifted into you as he walked. You took this as an okay to touch him, so you ruffled his hair before loosely slinging an arm around his shoulders as you guided him to your car.
The drive back to Spencer’s wasn’t too long, thankfully, because you were sure his parents would be furious with him and the kid’s been through enough today. You wanted to take all the heat without making them think you kidnapped him. The lights were still on when you pulled into the driveway. They were probably worried sick about him.
When you knocked on the door, a frantic woman with short blonde hair opened it. When she saw Spencer, she grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him into the house, never breaking eye contact with you.
“Who are you? What are you doing with my son?”
“He didn’t do anything wrong, Mrs. Reid. I’m Y/N, he’s been tutoring me.”
“How do you know me? Spencer, what did you tell her?” She looked at him and back at you, “Get off my property and stay away from us!”
“Mom, she’s a fr--”
“Go up to your room, don’t come out.” She didn’t sound like an angry parent reprimanding her son, she sounded almost... scared.
A million alarms were going off in your head, and you needed to try to get through to her, “Ma’am, I’m sorry, he was helping me study and we lost track of time, it’s not his fault.”
“I don’t care, I don’t know you, get off my property!”
You decided it was best not to argue, so you hurried back to your car and drove home as quickly as possible so you could shower and go to bed and pray that Spencer would be okay tonight.
~~~
Your phone rang early the next morning. You rolled out of bed to answer it, sprinting to the hall table to take it off the stand. Checking the caller ID, you realized it was from a number you didn’t recognize. Answering it, you heard Spencer’s voice on the other side.
“Hello, this is Spencer, is Y/N home?”
“Yes, you woke me up on a Saturday morning, where else am I gonna be, kid?” Your voice was scratchy as you struggled to fight off the sleep still clawing at your throat.
“Sorry about that. I was just calling to apologize for last night.”
“No, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”
“N-No, I’m not in trouble, I just wanted to explain why my mother was all--”
“She was worried, I get it.”
“N- she… My mother is a paranoid schizophrenic, she doesn’t do well with strangers. She doesn’t even remember what she said to you last night, she was having one of her episodes. She was just confused.”
You didn’t know how to respond. You were so shocked by his sudden revelations, you just stayed silent. You didn’t want him to think he scared you, so you had to say something. And apparently, that something was “Oh.”
“She wanted to apologize, but she’s just a bit embarrassed, so I called for her.”
“N-No, it’s okay, I…” It was suddenly so hard to say you understood because while it made sense to you, you wouldn’t fully understand what he or his mom was going through, you didn’t understand it, but Spencer didn’t seem to mind. He was just glad it didn’t bother you. After the events of yesterday, he couldn’t afford to lose you.
“Tell her I’m sorry I scared her.”
“Will do. She said you could come over so she could apologize personally and meet her if you want.”
“I’d love to. And Spence?”
You felt him take pause. You never called him that before, “Yeah?”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I didn’t wanna scare you.”
“You wouldn’t scare me, dude, you can tell me anything.”
“Really?”
“I promise. I’ll see you Monday?”
Spencer nodded, but you couldn’t see him, so he spoke up through the lump in his throat, “See you Monday.”
Taglist ~~~~~~
(Lmk if you wanna be added!!)
@lawnmoa @ellvswriting @reidsmyhusband-emilysmymistress @baby-pogue @rottenearly
#spencer reid#spencer reid x reader#spencer reid imagine#mgg#mgg fanfiction#mgg x reader#mgg smut#matthew gray gubler#matthew gray gubler fanfiction#matthew gray gubler x reader#matthew gray gubler imagine#criminal minds#criminal minds imagine#criminal minds fanfiction#cm#cm fan fiction#cm imagine
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Gwenpool: Desperate Misanthrope's Confused Angst
Showtime
Ms. Pool woke up in a familiar room. Not in Krakoa - there are no mutants around. This isn’t a story about that. Look, honestly, without an actual Gwenpool series and the constant breaks in her comics appearance I can’t even begin to give a fuck. I cancelled my marvel universe subbie. I might get back to my stories but single issues are iffy. I read fast and don’t pore over the artwork. So I get 10 minutes of entertainment for….FIVE DOLLARS? When did this happen? Jeezus.
Who even reads comics anymore?
Anyway, long story short, Gwen got out of bed and recognized the room as her old one from the “old times.” The dark times. The ‘not running around in pink and white outfits and shooting people’ times. She panicked (Been there. It is what it is though). The only way out of trauma is through.
She dressed in old clothes, immediately hit by old smells, she couldn’t help but cry. Was it all a dream? Have I gone insane (again)? All the usual self doubts cropped up. I mean, really, if you think this kind of thing didn’t pass through her mind regularly why don’t you transport yourself to a comic book universe?
Oh, you can’t?
Oh. It isn’t actually possible for you and I’m stupid for suggesting it. So, yeah. If it actually happened and you kept that attitude then the logical assumption for a normie is a mental breakdown. Trick for Gwen, though, is it's probably always been both real and her being nuts.
So she goes downstairs to the kitchen to figure out why this is happening and Evil Gwen is having cereal. Let's say cocoa puffs. I’ve been thinking about those recently. You ever remember cereal as something worth cherishing. Not as just bullshit that TV convinced you to want? God damn, now I want Cookie Crisp. Cookie Crisp wasn’t even ever that good. Why do I want Cookie Crisp?
So also sitting around the table were the faceless versions of her father, mother, and her brother. Just chilling. No BD. Seen Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind?
Yes, I know that references aren’t jokes - fuck you, I’m painting a picture and I CAN’T PAINT, THAT’S WHY THIS ISN’T A COMIC. Fucks sake. Anyway. So, Gwen is so creeped out that she just sits her butt down by Evil Gwen as if she’s the comforting presence here.
Her name’s too long. Let’s call Evil Gwen uh…….Gren. You know, like Grendel from Beowulf. I haven’t actually read Beowulf and this is all a little confusing but I'm solving problems here. Writing this is harder for me than you would think so it’s best to keep things flowing off the cuff. That’s the Gwenpool™ style anyway, isn’t it? Are you laughing yet? IMPROV. “YES AND” MY SHIT, READER!
“So, you ever really look into the retconned past thing, hun?” Gren said, moving her tongue around her food. Being gross as an attempt to be properly evil. She swallowed before continuing. “This is all I could really put together on short notice but i’m pretty sure what the future people created, all that stuff to try and trick you, it was all bullshit.”
“What do you mean? Are you trying to convince me to go all psycho like you again?” Gwen asked, exasperated, realizing she was now back in the whole ‘fuck with Gwen to decide her fate’ song and dance routine from the end of her first arc.
“Nah, not really.” Gren said. A hammer appeared in her hands out of nowhere and Gren swung it into their fake father’s head, snapping his neck..
“DAD!” Gwen instinctively cried as she saw her father’s body slump to the floor. Gren slapped Gwen’s face. “That’s it,” Gren said, “this is what the trick was.This is a poorly created character in a fictional story. Meant to manipulate you into attaching your concept of “father” to it. Even his finished version in the original comics run wasn’t THAT well drawn. Your dad read like a boomer’s idea of a responsible parent. You were going through a mental crisis and struggling to find purpose in life and his genius idea was get a shitty low paying job and suck it up?”
Gren turned to their brother, pushed his face to the table and smashed the back of his skull. . “Brother dearest, too. Going right along with their victim blaming. He gaslighted you as if what you were going through was just you being ‘irresponsible.’ Bitch, people working a minimum wage job aren’t somehow not impoverished and miserable because they get some of that ‘honest work’ that folks keep badgering on about. Minimum wage work is occupied by many physically and mentally disabled people held hostage; they’re people society only pretends to care about. Then they turn it all into you acting like some world ending threat. No questions about what drove you to the edge in the first place. You are just ‘unstable,’ so you’re just a problem to be solved. They say, ‘Let’s all solve this girl being upset and on edge by ruining her concept of self, reality, and memory.’ Brilliant!”
Gwen barely processed this in horror. Gren then slit the poor facsimile of their mother’s throat while continuing to rant, “You see people die all the time, Gwen. Half of the time you are doing the killing. You do it because it’s in a story. In a story the NPCs don’t matter and, after all, your original schtick in the story was to be kill-crazy. The non-marketable characters can be replaced or retconned at the stroke of the artist’s pen.” Gren leans forward as she pulls a Gwenpool mask over Gwens face. “Then the writers convince you that you have some middle class milk toast family and you take abuse and subsume your emotional needs because the problem MUST be you. You aren’t ‘normal’ so you have to be fixed.”
Gwen wiped her eyes over the mask and sighed. A bit of fire filled her gut as she stared at Gren. “So fucking what? You want me to go on a killing spree and be a big time villain to get myself a nice, shiny permanent big bad status? That’s how I stay around right? Just build my legacy on bodies?”
Gren scoffed “You already lost that fight, girly. Where do you think we are? Because this ain’t Marvel Comics.”
Confused, Gwen blinked and tried reaching for the page margins, finding nothing. Wait….why was everything on this page so ill defined and undetailed? Wait? Why was the story in kinda wobbly third person past tense?
Gwen sighed “Oh. I’m in a fanfic. I guess the publishing fight is for another day eh?”
“My advice, personally,” Gren stated, “is that you consider the lobster.”
“Wait, what the fuck?”
Gren pulled aside the kitchen curtains revealing the face of a giant lobster, its claws tapping on the glass. The lobster muttering gutterally about personal responsibility.
“Because there’s a couple thousand giant lobsters outside that would like to claw you until you read their book.”
--
Scared of Girls
On the rooftop, Gren shoved a high powered rifle into Gwen’s hands while she handled the close range threats. So, this conversation they’re about to have is important. Sniping puts Gwen into a sort of zen space, so that’s a better task to keep her focused, after all.
“So, what? You wanted me to internalize that my “origin story” is bullshit? Okay, what does that accomplish, then?” Gwen asked in a bit of a deadpan. She was so tired today. Not really feeling her happy go lucky energy. More like a “happy go fucky” energy. It was hard to always be on a knife's edge. Still the rifle’s kick into her shoulder was satisfying as she blew through two of the creepy looking lobsters at once. “Also, why the lobsters?”
Gren considered this. “Okay, last question first, I had to experiment a lot and do a lot of research to construct this place for your learning and healing in fanfic form....These buddies are a failed experiment of mine that I repurposed because the fic needed more action. Isn’t that right, giant enemy crap?” As she peppers the nearest goon with a hail of shotgun pellets the entire throng of them burst out, sharply muttering about divine symbols.
“As for what I'm trying to teach you, it’s that you aren’t reaching your potential.” Gren grumpily huffed.
“Duh,” Gwen reloads, “I mean you just killed a mannequin version of the voice in my head that says that to me every day.” one of those crustaceans talks about feminine symbolism while she decides on her next target.
“Not like fake daddy’s ‘Be a responsible member of society by paying your taxes’ type of potential. I mean your creative and emotional potential.” Gren flipped off the slavering throng of monsters, noticing they were starting to keep their distance from the roof.
“I never did finish that fanfic idea I had.” Gwen mused.
“God, don’t mention that,” Gren thrusts a finger at Gwenpool. “Not that I don’t respect fanfic, but when comic book writers make you and Kamala squee about fanfiction to try and relate to “the kids” it comes across as so condescending.”
“Really? I mean…..I'm sure it’s meant as support for the concept?”
“Most fucking superhero comics are just legalized fanfiction! The people who created the characters are either long gone or working on someone else’s characters! They just think they are so much better because they got fucking paid. They can’t imagine themselves as on the same playing field as fanficcers even though most of them have the same level of connection to the roots of the work as anyone else.” Gren groused loudly as she seemed to pull Reed Richards out of nowhere.
Confused, Reed looked around until his eyes met Gwen’s.“Oh great, you again.” Reed groaned as he turned to survey the piles of lobster gibs while Gwen cheered the lobster forces’ retreat with a resounding “EDF, EDF!”. The scattered creatures skittered amongst the bland scenery. It looked like a suburban neighborhood but someone forgot to color in the sky….or write that the sky had color. A castle hung out in the distance breaking up the generic normalcy and lay cloaked in shadow despite being surrounded by an endless white void.
“And…..black….you?” Reed pointed to Gren, raising an eyebrow.
“Yeah, I have an evil future self….well I stopped that future so it’s an….evil...alternate timeline self?” Gwen said with a nervous chuckle, abandoning the kill quest for the minute and rested her rifle on the roof.
“Ah. Yeah I’ve been down that road. It’s a rather common occurrence. Multiverse being what it is.” Reed laughed heartily while putting his hands on his hips.
“I’m not sure I’m evil, honestly,” Gren interjected. “I think I’m just really fucking grumpy and I’m slightly more gung-ho on the homicide. Considering Gwen’s already one of the more kill crazy characters on the roster it’s not that much of a distinction.” Gren flipped her cape. “My main distinction is I don’t like that meme from The Incredibles! You can just make it so the cape detaches automatically when it’s pulled hard enough!”
“You could still have it tangled up around your face.” Reed pointed out in his standard know-it-all fashion.
“Don’t make me go into fuck wife mode, stretch.” Gren spat. “Okay, anyway, so I brought him here to illustrate a point. Reed. Explain particle physics to me as a laymen.”
“Huh...i’m not sure why but okay. Particle physics (also known as high energy physics) is a branch of physics that studies the nature of the particles that constitute matter and radiation. Although the word particle can refer to various types of very small objects (e.g. protons, gas particles, or even household dust), particle physics usually investigates the irreducibly smallest detectable particles and the fundamental interactions necessary to explain their behaviour. In current understanding, these elementary particles are excitations of the quantum fields that also govern their interactions. The currently dominant theory explaining these fundamental particles and fields, along with their dynamics, is called the Standard Model. Thus, modern particle physics generally investigates the Standard Model and its various possible extensions, e.g. to the newest "known" particle, the Higgs boson, or even to the oldest known force field, gravity.” Reed rattled this off rather mechanically.
Gren then took out her phone and showed Gwen the Wikipedia article on “Particle Physics,” which is naturally the same words that Reed had regurgitated above, just without any formatting and, again, on a phone.
“Reed can’t be a genius in any subject unless he’s written by a genius in that subject. That’s how stories work. Everyone is limited by the understanding and capabilities of the writer. Same with your origin story and all the people you’ve interacted with. If you are as ‘meta’ as you think you are then you have to realize that you aren’t actually talking to people. You are talking to the writer. Dr. Strange didn’t rewrite your existence to be a part of the Marvel Universe. As far as most of Marvel continuity goes Dr. Strange was never there and doesn’t know or care about his MCU casting…..Hey Reed, buzz off please before the conversation pivots to why you haven’t cured all known diseases.”
Reed looked a little surprised but then pulled out a teleportation device (of course he has one) and blipped away with a shrug.
“How awkward is that going to be when he enters the MCU after Kamala is already introduced with a very similar power set?” Gwen chuckled.
“Keep up the way you’ve been going and you’ll never see it. I’m not exactly expecting a young blonde girl casting call for Deadpool 3 and that’s your best bet.” Gren snarked. Gwen winced with a sigh.
“I don’t get what I'm doing wrong. I have a fanbase comparable to some of the characters that have already shown up but I can’t even get comics written about me most of the time. An MCU push seems unlikely. They would literally have to deal with completely recontextualizing my powers and gimmick”
“Let’s ask her what you should do.” Gren motioned her way to the suddenly appearing long hair future Gwen, looming over them like The Attack of the 50 foot Woman for some reason. Dwarfing the roof they are on. Let’s call her BIGwen!
--
Gold Guns Girls
As BIGwen acclimated to her surroundings she stubbed her toe on a car, dramatically flipping it so that it took out a few more lobsters before caving in a nearby house. The lamentations about clean rooms soaring as the remaining couple dozen of them attempt to clean up some of the bodies of their fallen kin. The large and sort-of-in-charge Gwen hissed in pain and adjusted her boot. Getting her balance as best as possible she muttered curses that traveled rather well considering the lung capacity of a giant.
“You know,” Gren started, “I wasn’t expecting much from our previous uses of the ‘make her big for emphasis’ trick, but it really does only work as a vague ghostly background element. I didn’t just want it to be ‘oh, here's a third Gwen for the conversation, though. Would lack umph.”
“ Yeah, I get it, but staring at my own giant taint is unsettling.” Gwen muttered.
“I’d still, hit it.” Gren grinned, then immediately got punched in the arm. “OWWW! Look, I’m the evil one here and we’re in a fanfic. I’m allowed to make internet fetish jokes.”
“And I’m allowed to hit you for it.”.
“Dirty lampshading goody two shoes. Don’t act like half your fanbase isn’t thirsty. It’s “insert current year argument”, all art is sexy to someone.” Gren complained back,rubbing her arm before hopping off the roof. Gwen followed while listening as patiently as she could considering how many changes in topic her evil-caped self is going through to get to her point. “This chick is the reason you’ve been on the path of good girl. Some vague idea that in the future everything will work out for the best. HEY, DOWN HERE, BIG SHOW!” Gren waved at BIGwen and she looked down curiously.
“Yeah what??” BIGwen responded in a booming and agitated tone. Honestly, being in this fic made every version of Gwen a little grumpy.
“How’s she supposed to be a popular hero that makes it into the MCU and has a stable publication history?” Gren asked.
“Fuck if I know.” Came BIGwen’s response. “Have you tried growing your hair out?”
“Rub it in,” Gwen muttered under her breath, “I’m not gonna lie, I’m kind of depressed now.” Gwen said as she sat on an abandoned car.
Gren hopped on the roof of the car, patting Gwen’s shoulder before squatting with enough force to flex the car’s shocks like a rocking chair just to amuse herself. “Future “good” Gwen wasn’t an actual plot point, it was a call to action to the fans to make fanfic like this and support the character outside of the actual Canon. Chris didn’t trust that Marvel would treat the character right. That, and your obsession with getting a new book, are both the writer’s attempt to turn a marketing tactic into fan engagement. If you want to be real then that makes the fans want you to be real even more, too.”
Gwen sighs heavily and leans her chin on one hand. “I mean...the time traveling through the life of an NPC fan complete with a Never Ending Story reference was a bit sappy even by the standard we sometimes set...damn it it really was just kind of a fan manipulation trick wasn’t it?”
BIGwen Sat down on the street next to them and crossed her legs. “Hey, little me. Don’t get too down. I mean it worked for the most part. You have a healthy cult following. Characters have survived on less and there are worse things to be known for then as a fan first character”
“But I have to fight for attention all the damn time, though. It’s so easy for Wade with his fucking meme bullshit. He even gets runoff enthusiasm from me. Jeff the land shark is all over Oldpool online” Gwen felt rather heavy and tired all of a sudden. Marvel editorial forcing a gun to your head is not a fun way to be.
“All that fight is hell on the fanbase too.” Gren sighed. “Advocating for shit, getting crumbs and being expected to accept it while Disney lavishes all the attention based on some bullshit numbers game. Even if you make it into the MCU will it be a Batroc style cameo with obligatory ‘killed off in case we don’t feel like paying the actor again later.’ Will it be an emotionally rounded character or an ambush bug style joke? The thing is. You're Not the one fighting and you never were.”
“The fuck do you mean?”
“This version of her doesn’t know?” BIGwen whimpered.
“You aren’t real, Gwen.”
--
Head Like a Haunted House
“No….we aren’t having this conversation. Fuck you fuck you i’m not a fucking Nihlist and i’m not going to do this right now.” Gwen said as she scrambled off of the car and pulled out some guns. BIGwen then picked her up off the ground.
“You need to hear this, Gwen,” BIGwen boomed. “The gimmick has run its course. It’s fucking with your canon. You’re never going to be a marketable character keeping up a half fourth-wall Kayfabe”
Gren climbed onto BIGwen’s Shoulders and perched over Gwen all menacing like. “You need to listen. I’ve been trying to ease you into this. Making things more meta slowly until you were ready but it was never going to be easy.”
One of Gwen’s guns was fired from it’s holster and pierced one of BIGwen’s fingers. BIGwen screamed and her grip loosened. Soon Gwen was on the move running up her arm and firing at Gren, who dodged like the nimble and cute badass she is. “Don’t do this Gwen. Just because it doesn’t matter to the comic version of you doesn’t mean it doesn’t matter.”
“I’m a real person god damn it! I read the comics out there! I came in! That’s why I know shit I shouldn't know. That’s what I am! THAT’S ALL I AM!” Gwen shrieked as she pulled out a sword from hammer-space and decapitated BIGwen. Suddenly a mess of colored streamers and a pile of Mickey Mouse merch tumbled out. Look, I am busy right now. Gwen is still slashing at my ass. I'm not going to explain it.
For some reason now the remaining lobsters were helping Gren. For Gwen’s own good you understand. This is proof that I’m right for some reason.
Gwen pulled out a revolver, firing pumpkin sized holes in lobsters who were still wailing about self actualization. She fully planned on shoving a sword up her evil self’s ass and getting rid of this doppelganger shit for good. Which is total bullshit by the way. She totally just cut off Gren’s leg because what the fuck you mean I’m not real? I’m going to be real all over your corpse.
Gren didn’t really think that was even a good comeback and also thought you should probably say it instead of meta willing the smack talk into existence, otherwise this fanfic is going to read like trash. Also, Gren’s leg wasn’t actually cut off. In a puff of smoke it is revealed that the cut off leg is a log and her leg is fine. Gren is a ninja now, believe it.
Gwen proceeded to do a sick ass CQC judo throw on Gren and then grab her cape and wrap it around her face like Reed suggested. Callbacks for the win! Callbacks to Checkov’s gun ideas always lead to victory in fights! She then totally shot at her and such.
But the bullet was caught by the cape because the cape was a symbiote! That’s right Gren is also GRENOM!...boy that sounds stupid. Anywho, the cape was no longer around her face and the fight continued and Gren now ALSO had extra powers and special wizard-symbiote armor (that would only show up in the MCU version if Marvel finally got the Sony characters back). The meta powers work like shit in text but this would be really good in CGI or animation if Marvel wanted to adapt this fic and give the writer lots of money. Gren still has more experience with them, though, and Gwen can’t really just kill her way out of this fic so she has to just let the story play out.
…...eh?....oh Gwen’s crying. I love/am you girl but we gotta work on the crying. Fucks sake this is harder than I thought. I’m depressed now too. Well I'll try to get the writing back on track so you guys can see what is going on. Even the lobsters are minding their manners now. Chill vibes, guys.
“The marvel character page for Gwenpool says, and I quote:
Gwenpool arrived in the Marvel Universe from the “real world,” but has wasted no time in making the most of her time in her fictional universe. Using her knowledge of comics to her advantage, Gwenpool causes and solves problems for her fellow heroes.”
Gren drags a lobster corpse slowly toward Gwen and sits on its tail as she talks to her. Taking her time to really scrape the lobster against the ground, smearing the gore on the pavement. Not that it was heavy for her or anything. Totally still has that symbiote, which would make moving it easy. Totally wasn’t a detail added in the second revision of the fic slightly before the lobsters were added.
“The words “Real world” are in quotation marks in that wiki. Real people don’t make it into comics because fiction isn’t real. Half of your versions barely make use of the ‘real person’ gimmick because it’s too meta by half and not every writer wants to waste time justifying it. So they just treat it like Deadpool’s medium awareness. Which it mostly is.”
“I really am just a fucking rip off distaff character.” Gwen moans. “Just a Gwen combined with a Pool. I’m worse than the Batman who laughs. I never mattered because I was never real”
“Fuck don’t say that. You were made with love and care by a team of creators who took a weird offshoot idea and built out a compelling metafiction idea and a likeable protagonist off of it. They just didn’t have the time and foresight to go far enough.” Gren sighed.
“Far enough?” Gwen sniffed as she was pulled up to her feet and dragged toward one of the big castles. As they walked Gren kicked along a Mickey Mouse doll that had rolled out of BIGwen’s severed head. Every time it bounced it cheerfully said ‘hahah. I love you!’
“Too much haha, not enough trauma. You’re not just a joke character.” Gren said as she kicked the Mickey doll into the big front door of the castle. The shadowy thing of course lighting up and being all fantasy and shit as the door opened.
“Well I did end both of my comic runs pretty mopey.”
“Damn right you did. When the jokes run thin they run to your real bread and butter. You’re an empathy machine.” As Gren shoves Gwen through the gate they are swallowed up in the castle, going dark again. “Let’s getcha sad clown on.”
--
Never there
“See, what evil me should have been telling you about in the original run is how to find meaning and purpose when technically nothing means anything. Comic book characters live in a world without real death and suffering. It’s all a puppet show version of real pain and real emotion meant to bring that out of an audience.” Gren opined as they walked through a black void to a couch floating in a nothing area lit only by the static of an old TV.
“Can we turn on a light?” Gwen asked as she sat on the couch. Gren sat on another recliner that suddenly appeared and put her feet up.
“Fuck off. Ambiance is a thing. We aren’t having a ‘lights on with something fun on the TV’ conversation. So look, I am not really ‘evil gwen.’ I’m half an author insert and half a plot device. If we are talking about the reality of the story you are basically talking to yourself. I am speaking about the things you don’t want to admit to yourself. You know, you’ve seen this kind of story sorta... right?” Gren picked up the remote and frustratedly changed channels between a bunch of vaguely illustrative footage on the TV, not finding anything that worked. A lot of black and white footage of trains for some reason. Just what comes to mind when I think of documentary footage? Weird.
“I am not sure how to illustrate this shit visually and this is a text story anyway so I would have to explain the illustration,” Gren griped.
“I basically get it. It’s not that uncommon a trope.” Gwen nodded.
“Because of the level of meta we are on right now we have to really acknowledge that you are basically an author insert, too. I mean, to a certain extent every version of you is more the writer that is working with your character at the time than a set character.” Gren said as she settled on a visual of Gwen being pushed out the window by her own narration text in the original comic run. When all else fails, resort to footage from the last story. That way people can look it up online!
“Right here is where the character crystallized in the mind of the author of the current fic we are in. A vague suicide metaphor wrapped up in the flavor of self destructive escapism. Your parents in the story thought it was a suicide attempt on at least some level. This is serious business. Not just a girl who doesn’t like work and can’t finish her fanfic. In this comic you are built on this understanding. The writer of this fic has ADHD and autism. So his version of you more or less has it, too. Writers bring themselves with them into their work.”
Gwen nods and takes a deep breath. “I….I can feel it. Like the world is closing around you. You aren’t built for anything that anyone wants from you. The one thing you really believe in, the one thing that really defines you, the stories in your head…..it’s just not enough.
You can’t trust you’ll ever make it with writing because you can barely write. You barely have the energy to do anything but wish that you weren’t you. What if someone actually listened? Actually believed in you and whisked you away somewhere else where the world would fit your needs? What if you were someplace you could be someone else, someone strong and confident?”
“Yeah. Like a funny anti hero in a comic for instance.” Gren nodded. “But the original comics sort of left the theme on the table. They were captured by the misconception of Gwen as the problem and not a person who needed help. All that desperation that real fans of the character might feel just bundled up into love for this character that really ‘gets’ them but Marvel doesn’t ‘get’ the character. They won't use her. They won’t go past vaguely gesturing at her mental issues and moving on. They saved the angst for Wandavision.” Gren scoffs.
“I mean the show was okay but they literally have a character built entirely on the theme of escapism and trauma. One that’s custom built for mind-screw visuals and reality bending plots and they think she’s just a lazy fangirl who really likes guns that they can sit beside Deadpool sometimes and stick in the X-Men’s bloated background character roster when they don’t need her.”
Gren leads Gwen off the couch and deeper into the void where a door to a bedroom waits. A room like her own, absolutely slopping over with old toys of comic book characters. An unclean messy space in a run-down house that smells faintly of cigarette smoke. Huddled in bed, reading an 80s era X-men comic with a flashlight, is a 12 year old Gwen.
“This is never going to be canon but this is the version of Gwen in this fic. She can’t stop crying at school. Things that shouldn’t be hard are so hard and she can’t explain why. Everyone says she’s making excuses. Meanwhile her mother is fucked out of her mind on pain killers and her step father killed himself last year ‘cleaning his gun’ while drunk. You know exactly what is on her mind right now?” Gren says as she gestures at the girl.
“I wish the superheroes would save me from this.”
“They won’t. They can’t. They were never meant to.” Gren Slams the door loudly on the scene.
“That is the emotional core of Gwenpool in this fic. The desperation that so many of the fans down here in the fucking muck of the real world feel. Poor and emotionally unfulfilled. Confused and vulnerable. If Disney and Marvel gave two fucking shits about people like that they wouldn’t waste as many stories as they do. They wouldn’t just use untold wealth to make expensive escapist stories with the military. Their gestures toward progressive ideas that they occasionally make in their stories would be THE ENTIRE POINT of their stories and the actual thing they used that money for instead of lobbying the government to keep Mickey Mouse out of the public domain.
“Disney has the power yet they save a fucking miniscule fraction of who they could. Saving people doesn’t make money.”
--
When I Get To The Green Building
Gren stormed through the void. The scene disintegrated around her as Gwen followed. Both now in a bit of a sour mood but with newfound determination.
“Come to think of it. Why is the fucking Hulk getting to fight for social justice in the comics? Why are they making a gay alternate universe Captain America? Why are they grasping at straws so hard to find characters that get to advocate and I am just sitting on a fucking island being grumpy?” Gwen groused. “I’m pretty sure I’m pansexual….at least in this fic. I could advocate for a bunch of shit at once.”
“You have a youth fanbase, a unique story and you technically aren’t an alternate universe version of fucking anything no matter how many people still think you are a Stacey. They made a fucking ‘for the fans’ character and then neglected it. Presumably because some fucking money making metric didn’t pan out despite the comics just being an MCU test kitchen and IP farm anyway.”
“You’re a fucking check mark on a ledger. I don’t even know if anyone technically created Gwenpool as a whole and Disney/Marvel can give the character to whoever they want to do whatever they want completely separate from what the fanbase wants and needs because she isn’t established. The IP landlords have spoken. The fans haven’t risen to enough ‘buy my merch’ calls to action to invest more resources. So tease endlessly until that changes.”
“Gah. Now I'm actually as pissed as you are.” Gwen said as she started fiddling with her guns. “Who do I kill?”
“We can’t do shit. You’re not even a character at this point. You are a meme for an underused character.” Gren smirked all evil like. “See but that’s it. You aren’t just a meme. You’re a MEME.”
“Uhm...I don't follow.”
“Like the concept of Justice. Gwenpool is an idea. Defined entirely by how people who engage with the idea choose to engage with it. The IP law means Disney owns Gwenpool but they don’t own how Gwenpool is perceived. Just like we as a people decide what justice is through popular consent we also decide what Gwenpool is. You see they made a character for the fans…..in my opinion that means the fans can do as they like with it even if it makes Disney uncomfortable.”
“I mean they can’t even stop porn of their characters just because of the sheer volume of the problem. I suppose people could do whatever.” Gwen nodded.
“Exactly. So the fans should just fucking Occupy Gwenpool!” Gren said as she flipped her cape dramatically with a mad smile on her face. That’s right. She was Dirtbag Leftist Gwen all along!
“Squat on that IP. Make Gwenpool a mental health advocate. Make her an LGBTQ activist. Make her fight for social and financial justice so hard that Bruce Banner looks like a poser. Make her talk shit about politicians who put their career ahead of the people. Do all the shit that makes the comicsgate crowd sad. Keep politics in our stories! Rally around that pink and white ass so hard they have to notice and then tie it all to the fact that Disney has great power and with great power they take no responsibility for how shitty the world is.”
“ If they are going to fuck Gwenpool fans they gotta learn Gwenpool fans fuck back. We have already proven we can make all kinds of cool shit. Let’s get serious and make more, harder, faster! Get a hashtag or some shit. They can't DMCA all of us! GWEN IS OURS WE JUST HAVE TO REACH OUT AND TAKE IT. Then they either respect the character and her fans or they just hit a PR disaster.”
“Marvel/Disney neglects fan focused cult character themed protest movements. Proves they are only progressive when it makes them money. They’re so worried about Mickey ending up in the public domain? We’re the public domain! After our entire lives stannin their characters and buyin their merch building them from an animation house into a juggernaut they are just another weight on top of the boot on our necks. They have to take responsibility!” At this point Gren is pretty much ranting maniacally and neglecting the actual writing of the story so this is Gwen taking over to wrap up.
Guys I may not be ‘the real Gwen’ but really, isn’t the version of Gwen that actually came from the real world all of us? Isn’t Gwenpool really the Gwens we made along the way? We could easily bring a little heroism and chaos to the real world (at least to the internet) if we really tried. Put the fear of God into some IP landlords and fight for some cool people that society is screwing over, too.
Prove that even in the fandom abyss people aren’t as powerless as they seem. Use that internet comic fan mobbing for something besides giving Zack more money. Disney is gearing up for their next IP fight for Mickey in 2024. Seems like a fine time for IP themed protests. For now we just need to spread the word that our needs are more important than their profits.
It’s been real. It’s been long. It’s been a real long time coming…..
But I finally finished my fanfic.
See ya, true believers.
#gwenpool#fanfic#deconstruction#outofloveiswear#fortheoriginalwritersnotmarvelordisney#tw mental health#tw mentions of suicide#tw mentions of drug abuse#tw violence#tw gun violence
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I just watched Space Sweepers and GOOD LORDS I am not okay. That was wonderful and had so much more heart that I ever thought omg.
Below the cut is me live blogging this shit. And by shit I mean all the feels and slakjdflkasjdlfadkjgmawefhdkshinbal. I'll be okay eventually. That was glorious but when I tell you I Cried-I was Not Prepared.
- Oh no, is it his child? His sister? Yall throwing the trauma and we’ve JUST started
- My dude, I know you have bigger problems, but your socks. Plz fix them, or let me show you how to darn them -I say as I hem a garment while watching this movie-
- Omg your socks
- ALL THE LANGUAGES, I both love this and its hurting my head, but I mostly just FREAKING LOVE IT
- Oh all the swearing xD
- How did they make that little chase scene so freaking cool?
- Ha. Bubble gum. Nice.
- OMG YOUR SOCKS BBY BOI YOUR SOCKS
- I love the robot, Bubs?
- Dude has had his ass handed to him, bro are you okay?
- This kid is freaking adorable
- *gets left by crew and chased by child* omg *looses rock paper scissors* OMG XD
- This fool is adorable and I cant deal with it.
- HARIBO FTW! *immediately wants gummies* damnit.
- HOW IS SHE HEALING THE PLANT!?!?!
- ‘you cant be scared’ okay mr. jumps at everything
- Is captain, can fly, knows smartphone and tech stuff, claims no tech knowledge… what are you hiding from my guy?
- The voice modulator O.O
- Why wouldn’t you give him a high five?
- Panic drinks soda. Same.
- Omg theyre bonding over art, and im in love. This kid is going to steal everyones heart, huh?
- The police? The not police?
- I love Captain Jang, shes freaking awesome.
- Someone give this dude like 5 minutes to cry and calm down, bro is on panic mode 24/7
- Never mind, im on panic mode.
- Its 40minutes in and im kinda attached to these idiots already. How?
- The double mask / aviators combo is cracking me up, but like also, is a look. Pandemic brain approves
- The baby saved the babies!
- Uh whats with killer droids with the human face?
- Oh these idiots are found family-ing and im like *freaking heart eyes*
- Pierre is an idiot and I love him.
- Them selling tomatoes omg its adorable.
- Ffs, theyre child soldiers
- Kim Tae-ho’s back story? RIP MY HEART OUT WHY DON’T YOU IT WOULD HURT LESS. Imma die with all this traumatic backstory shit, my heart cant take it… no wonder Song took this role. Omg.
- Yeah, thanks I didn’t need whats left of my heart, thanks. Like I could FEEL THIS DUDES TRAUMA AT THE BEGINNING BUT GODDAMN. The bracelet tracker thingy. I just. My freaking heart. Cant. Take. This.
- Tiger’s sewing, yet Tae-ho is just holes-in-socks-rampaging through the pain.
- Never mind, Tiger’s rampaging.
- Richard, we get it, youre the bad guy, day-um.
- omg the tension.
- So theyre gonna die with an hour left, you cant fool me. Idk how this;ll get better, but also fuck.
- Kot-nim gonna fix the whole ship isn’t she?!
- Omg wtf
- Wow so theyre all just straight up amazing? Im more in love
- Twist of fate? Dude, no, I hope they find you and end you you creep
- Ahhhh, the sweet moments, its K I L L I N G ME
- Folks my infertile ass is having a really hard time with this movie and these very sweet moments
- Song as the grieving but protective dad type is too much for me, okay? Okay.
- Can he go back to the physical slap stick humor plz
- Okay thank you for the mini water fight
- Oh I don’t trust it. We have trust issues folks. Brace yourselves!
- Annnnd break my heart again with the reunion
- Tae-ho, my heart
- Omg, I knew it. But some how this feels worse?
- Yes, yes, its worse. Tae-ho and I are retraumatized, thanks
- He’s going to adopt Kot-nim. Right? At the end of this. Right? After they kill James the bad-y, right?!?!?! RIGHT!?!
- HOW IS THERE 40 minutes LEFT
- I’ve never hated Richard so freaking much omg
- Kill him. Kill him. Kill him.
- He’s closer now, stab him! Get him! (the father-figure-loki that sits on my shoulder agrees with me!)
- That was a brutal 3 minutes, thanks film
- Why am I Abso-fucking-lutely not surprised that he has a giant projection of himself over the space city?
- Oh my heart. At least they don’t blame him for still trying to find his daughter.
- I don’t have a heart any more, theres just a fucking crater now
- Song’s crying. IM CRYING. MOVIE. STAWP
- I love Bubs with all my heart.
- Tae-ho. Tae-ho! TAE-HO BUDDY
- Is this were Luke lost his hand?
- Tae-ho and Kot-nim finally high five, thank you
- Tae-ho to save the day with his flying, immediately gets knocked out. Ya know. You can let him have a moment, please.
- What is going on? How is this chick super powered?
- Tiger? *flails*
- Is he gonna do what I think…yes. Yes he is.
- OMG HE DID IT. AND BUBS GETS A HAND OMG
- “Captain Jang! C’est moi!” HAVE I MENTIONED THAT I LOVE PIERRE!?!
- Was that one space sweeper guy in Descendants of the Sun?
- HOW IS HE STILL ALIVE!?! Damn the close up was terrifying.
- No Captain Jang!
- BUBS!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- This guy is like a goddamn tick
- Omg. Omg. Omg. Omg.
- Theyre self-sacrificing!?! I am CRYING
- The moment I just had thinking they were all dead.
- OMG BUBS YES YESSSSSSS
- Pierre! Omg you’re adorable
- He’s gonna have a moment with Su-ni? IMMA CRY AGAIN
- This hurts worse than when I thought they all died.
- Theyre so beautiful. Their family.
- Im so happy for Bubs
- Bby boi bought 10 pairs of shoes. GOOD.
#Space Sweepers#this was AMAZING#but also basically broke me#Song Joong ki you damn near broke me with this#I loved this but I cried so much#BlackIrisPosts watches
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