𝐀𝐍𝐘𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐁𝐔𝐓 𝐘𝐎𝐔 ━━ ❛ 𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐆𝐔𝐄 ❜
chapter no. 000!
𝗈𝗈𝗈. ⠀CONTENT : angst-ish. reader is lowk insecure and paige is lowk not good at reassurance (its for the plot trussst)
𝗈𝗈𝗈. ⠀ WORD COUNT : 637
𝗈𝗈𝗈. ⠀AUTHORS NOTE : lmk if yall like this or not!
THERE WAS A TIME WHERE PAIGE KISSING YOU, having you underneath her warm lips, was the best thing that could happen to you. you loved how human it was. how natural it felt for her to be on top of you, her body heat engulfing you. whenever you were together; it was like you entered a little bubble…one where only you and her existed.
but everything is temporary, (including humanity, apparently) because one november night, she had you pinned against her bed and all you can think about is how much you hate the feeling. you’re alone together now, in the private comfort of her apartment. the blinds were drawn shut but it wouldn’t matter because by now midnight had already rolled in and everyone looking in was most likely sleeping. you had her to yourself, finally –– nothing about the setting was unusual, most of the alone time you and paige had was past 11pm. she only loved you in the dark.
but it wasn’t enough anymore.
perhaps you had gotten greedy, finding yourself wanting to hold her hand in less private spaces. you’d been with her for months, six to be exact, and yet it felt pointless. she wouldn’t tell anyone. she said she loved you but she couldn’t tell anyone. and it didn’t help that she was possibly the biggest flirt most likely ever. she pulled away, noticing your lack of usual enthusiasm.
“is something wrong?” three words that jump started the end of the relationship—if you could even call it that. it was inauspicious at best, nonexistent at worst. that was your greatest fear when it came to the two of you––that there was really nothing there. those three, almost dismissive words, completely shattered you.
you bite your tongue but it’s futile. when you open your mouth again the words escape before you even realize it, much less stop yourself from saying them. “why did you say that?”
“cause you’re being weird and i wanna know what’s up?” she says in an obvious tone, confused as to why you’d even question her motives for trying to know what’s wrong with her girlfriend.
“no, not that.” you sigh, realizing your vagueness. “earlier.”
paige’s confused expression doesn’t lift for even a moment, in fact, it seems to increase.
“to the girl at the shop. when she asked if you had a girlfriend.” you reply simply, annoyed that the situation clearly meant nothing to her when it meant everything to you. at the moment, at least. “you said you weren’t looking for a relationship.”
“well, that’s not exactly a lie.” she’s mostly joking but it’s clear that you didn’t take it that way. your hand, which was running up and down the length of her spine subconsciously, stops abruptly. her words are spoken lightheartedly but they suffocate you.
“i just mean…i’m kinda with you, y’know? so i’m not actively looking.” she doesn’t know why that’s what she chose to say in that moment and those words would prove to haunt her for long after.
“would it kill you to call me your girlfriend?”
she pauses, tensing like she always does whenever you talk labels. her silence is the worst answer. her silence is indifference. she doesn’t care, of course she doesn’t. why would you even expect her to? it was clear she only wanted a good time from you.
so you decided to make this easy for her. by saying what she never ever wanted you to say to her. you sit up, standing from the bed. “i think it’s best if we don’t keep seeing each other.”
she hates how formal you sound. she hates even more how she can’t say anything. she hates how she can’t speak even when you gather your things to leave her. she let you go, too frozen to stop you.
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okay i'll bit why exactly do we want tommy in more episodes? ....like are we not rooting for buddie, why do we want tommy here when if he sticks around the chances of us getting buddie are going to drop significantly, like we should want him gone by the end of the season. I don't want him sticking around because he's a threat to the story I've wanted the writers to do for the last 6 years. I guess I assumed with your URL that you're also rooting for Buddie but perhaps I was wrong and you're rooting for Bucktommy to be endgame which just absolutely not, sorry. Yeah 3 episodes vs 6 years, does not even match.
okay idk what’s in the air today but as my beloved @canonbibuck so eloquently put, “we want tommy in more episodes so he can stick his tongue into buck’s anus. hope this helps”
on a real, first of all, please remember this is all fiction. like, we’ve lost the plot so severely i think. second of all, i’d love to introduce you to this GROUNDBREAKING concept called ✨multishipping✨!! back in the days when one direction rpf was a bigger thing and even before that, everyone was shipped with EVERYONE. in fact, it was ENCOURAGED!! the more ships under your belt, the better!! now it’s much less endorsed and i honestly have no idea why!! THIRDLY like, in the loveliest kindest way possible, i have stuff going on outside of tumblr and like i genuinely don’t think its that deep?? i get wanting your ship to be endgame (i’m actually rooting for buddie endgame despite what you want to believe), but this website isn’t my entire life?? i’m in the middle of a biomedical science major, i’m spending my full summer doing some really cool research at a really prestigious university, i’m doing stuff i’m really proud of, and i’m so happy that there’s other things in my life apart from this website and this show. i love it, and i love the community on here for the most part, but i think it’d pay for all of us to remember it really isn’t That deep in the slighest. breathe, relax your shoulders, it’s fine. me enjoying bucktommy while it lasts and writing fic about them won’t kill you, i swear.
(and yeah, i want tommy to stick around. i’ve actually got reallt attached. his crinkly eyes and crooked smile have beguiled me. sue me.)
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This is my protocol bingo! (Thank you as always osric.com).
Lena is just doing her evil job - No thoughts, no morals, no alligence. Girlboss.
Nobody ever finds out Jmart's real names - I just think that would be tragic, and fit in with what RQ have been saying about this not being too attached to Archives.
Redemption arc - There was a notable lack of these in Archives even though forgiveness and making a conscious effort to behave morally were important themes in the later seasons. I'm ready for Mr Bonzo to have Kylo Ren's exact redemption arc where he's redeemed mostly through kissing. I don't even care who he kisses.
Froyo trip - It's pretty clear that we're being told that this is Somewhere Else through things like the Archives staff having tea and the OIAR staff having coffee. The s1 Archives gang iconically got icecream, so I'm gunning for a froyo trip, and a Gwen monologue about preservatives.
Colin dies first - He's just so killable. Plus, Celia can't die until they do her reveal and they'll probably want to build up to it, Sam can't die because he's the driving force behind investigation into Magnus, Alice can't die because she kinda makes the whole show, Gwen can't die because she's mid-arc and it is of the type that if left unfinished it would be anticlimactic not tragic, and Lena can't die because the impact would be pretty low.
Nostalgic PC games - I LOVE that RQ appears to be into old tech. I want to see Chester and Norris play Catz 5. Lowfi retro charm.
Dyhard - I go back and forth on this one, it feels too obvious what with the hot drinks imagery workplace annoyances to lovers stuff, but at the same time it does Just Make Sense.
Somebody becomes disabled - In Archives people were injured a lot, but none of that amounted to a long-term physical disability, except for Melanie's blindness. Feels like something to do in Protocol.
Police brutality - Feels like a theme that Jonny still has more to say about, and an incredibly easy one to weave into this kind of story.
Alice is hiding something - I actually think she isn't but y'all are saying it.
Alice naming stuff has consequences - She does it so much and Colin warned her off it, clearly seeming concerned but not explaining why, I think it will have unforeseen and damaging consequences.
Someone has a pet - In Archives, especially in the earlier seasons, everyone was notably unattached. Martin has a mum to take care of, but nobody has partners or children. I think this was partly because it made them easier to manipulate, and partly because it meant that tragedy could be dialled up: Sasha dying was sad, but not as gutwrenching as Daisy dying because Daisy's relationships were more fleshed out because it was later in the series. We're already bucking that trend with Celia's son, so I think we might see a pet too. Also, the pet will probably die.
Alice dies in the last season - Alice is very killable but she's also the heart and soul of the character relationships, so I think they will kill her but they'll wait to do it, and then do it mid-final season as an OOH THEY WENT THERE turning point, like how Tim dying brought in a new, darker era for Archives.
Conclusion that love isn't what makes you human - At London Comicon in October, Alex or Jonny (I forget) said that if Archives was about what makes you a monster, Protocol is about what makes you human. I think it's kinda trite if love is the answer, and I think the conclusion re love will be that monsters can love, because that's cooler. Hell yeah romantic monsterfucking.
Celia evil - I LOVE that we're seeing another Welsh person, but she doesn't sit well with me.
Agnes returns but we don't hear her speak - The tree on the other side of the rift is still alive, and if that universe was this one then that means that Agnes may still be alive. Jonny and Alex have said that they regret not doing more with Agnes, and I don't think they'll miss out on the opportunity to use her again. However, I think the fact that she doesn't speak is central to her tragic character and role as Jon's character foil, and I don't think they'll change that. I actually posted a tiktok about this.
Scene on London public transport - We're already seeing our gang at the pub and on dates, I think we're going to get some tube content.
Jmart fate worse than death - They're going to have us WISHING that they died in mag200.
Fears never treated as separate - I just think we're over that.
Breakup - They're getting the character relationships in early, so I'm predicting an onscreen breakup, because that's one of the few ways that we didn't see relationships between characters going bad in Archives.
Gerry's life gets ruined again - I'm sorry guys but I don't think they're going to let him have peace. He's going to get dragged into the OIAR situation and he's going to suffer.
Alice's brother lives - People are already noting similarities between Alice and Tim, I think that it'll be essentially the same character beat again if her brother dies. Adapt, improvise, overcome, RQ.
Another Michael - Just another character called Michael, unrelated to the four existing Michaels. I wasn't going to put this because Jonny is very aware of the four Michael problem, but this man plagurised his own full legal Christian name, so anything is possible.
Jack is Agnes' Jack - I think it's cool if we all think about how there was actually a massive age gap between Agnes and Jack because she didn't seem to age past her twenties, so he was absolutely a child when she was an adult. Not that I want to have Discourse or anything, that relationship was hecked up and complex in plenty of other ways, just because it's interesting.
Onscreen kiss - They said they wouldn't do it during Archives and then they did and it wasn't that gross, so I'm ready to see it happening again. They might have a relationship between allosexuals this time, I don't think they're going as far as onscreen fucking, but I'm game to be surprised. Insert joke about reusing the whimpering noises from Archives here.
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it honestly frustrates me when i see people reduce the ericsons cast down to "just some teens in the woods" acting like theyre no different than any other group of lone teenagers from other existing properties and treating them like an overused trope
it is sooo important to acknowledge the "troubled youth" aspect of the whole equation. theyre not just some random teens in the woods clem stumbles across. these kids were abandoned by their families for their various "difficulties" and fucked up by The System before the outbreak even began. and then once zombies started roaming the streets their familes never came back for them and the adults that were in charge of taking care of them just left them there to rot in that old boarding school (except for ms martin who was like their lee 🥺 the only person who ever saw them as the scared traumatized kids they were and died protecting them)
the whole aspect of them already being fucked up by the adults that controlled their lives is like.....kind of important when discussing the whole "delta is stealing kids to force them to fight in a war they have no real part in and want nothing to do with" aspect of the season. and its important when comparing them to clem and her journey of also suffering at the hands of the adults around her forcing her to become self reliant. AND its important when discussing the "just trying to build a safe home (and future) worth fighting for in this world that wants them dead" aspect of the season as well
these kids were forced to come together to survive. and a Lot of them didnt... theyre the only family they have left and you can tell that even when they argue with each other theyre still a close knit group who looks out for each other. theyre a Real family before clem even gets there (and its why what really happened with the twins and brody and marlon hits them all so especially hard)
all of this is what REALLY makes ericsons such a perfect home for clem. its a Real community of her True peers. theyre not Just teens. they mightve had a layer of safety clem never had by at least having walls to keep them safe. and having the benefit of the school being hard to find. its the only reason theyre still alive when clem shows up. but theyre also some of the only people who can Truly understand where clem and aj are coming from. and its why it hurts so much when they vote to kick them out. but its also partially why she merges back into the fold so easily when she returns. plus the fact that shes Really the only one who has any idea what shes doing. shes their rock and she makes them feel safe because underneath it all theyre still just those scared traumatized kids ("EVERYONE is scared, clem..." vi was Definitely including herself in that 'everyone'), and on some level, so is clem
they saved clementines life. and she saved theirs. "the school was supposed to help them with their trauma, now they help each other" its about the LOVE the COMMUNITY the SUPPORT!!!! and thats the shit that makes good zombie media honestly 👌
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I've had some time to collect my thoughts after a couple of days so here they are even though nobody asked.
I really loved the finale. It was devestating, no doubt, but I think this is their best one yet and I absolutely loved how they handled it. There was so much grieving in this episode, not just from Carlos, but from Owen and Judd as well. But despite everything they chose happiness and the wedding ending up being beautiful and bittersweet and joyful all at once.
There has been the question of deleted scenes but there's really only one we've seen so far that I would have loved to see in the episode. Other than that, I'm just glad we get to have them all as extras. I don't think the wedding needed them though.
Another thing I'd like to add is that yes, sometimes storylines can feel rushed in shows where you have a lot of characters and especially if there are clear favorites within a fandom. There was a lot going on, but that doesn't necessarily mean any one character's storyline is less valuable than another's. I guess I'm speaking as less of a fandom member and just more as an enjoyer of the show if that makes any sense. I love all of the characters in this show, and while I would be lying if I said I liked every single storyline, that doesn't mean I wish they didn't happen. In this case, however, I loved all of the storylines and I think they all made sense together given the theme of this episode. I personally don't think any of them shouldn't have been there in favor of getting more wedding content.
Honestly, my only regret is not getting off of tumblr as soon as the final bts stuff started coming out. I'm pretty bad when it comes to guessing things so if I hadn't been aware of the theories I literally would have had no idea and it would have hit me so much harder. It still got me pretty good though.
Again these are just my opinions so feel free to ignore everything I say if you didn't feel the same. I'm happy though, and I'm going to continue being incredibly annoying about this show. ♡
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