#its entirely my fault but. i do it anyways. i do enjoy horror stuff even though it makes me hallucinate/irrationally fear something | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

curlynerd · 3 years

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You're Bacon Me Crazy Word Count: 2K Rating: T Summary: "I can like more than one kind of burger, you know!" Or, Dean comes out through complicated burger metaphors. Notes: humor, canon-adjacent, coming out, established Destiel, #pray4Sam

Also read on AO3!

"You're really having two burgers, Dean?" Sam asks in his most smug, most obnoxious "I’m eating kale for lunch" voice. Dean really hates that voice.

Dean straightens his back and spreads his hands out, like the two wrapped burgers, the extra large fries, and the soda with two straws are a majestic bounty. “I’m a growing boy, Sammy."

“Uh-huh,” Sam deadpans. He lifts the takeout lid of his salad and starts carefully drizzling the vinaigrette cup over his bed of leafy greens and grilled chicken. “And you’re definitely not going to bully Cas into splitting them with you? You know he doesn’t need to eat.”

Something tight and anxious curls in Dean’s chest. “No!” he blurts out, realizing a second too late that it’s normal for him to share his food with Cas. Just because he’s been doing it more now that he and Cas are finally together does not mean that it’s weird now.

In response to Dean’s defensiveness, Sam raises a self-righteous eyebrow in sync with his salad-laden fork. “Can he even really taste them? I thought he didn’t like food in angel mode.”

Dean swallows down a multitude of answers. He likes sharing the experience with Cas anyway. He thinks the way his face scrunches up at the molecules is cute. It makes him feel all warm and fuzzy inside that an angel -- his angel -- is willing to put up with something so silly and mundane and human as taste-testing different burgers.

He really, really needs to tell Sam the truth about him and Cas. Hell, he’s been trying to for months! But every time the perfect opportunity presents itself, he turns into a fuckin’ coward.

And today definitely is another perfect moment. The conversation has naturally turned to Cas. They’re sitting at a picnic table at the park, with nobody around to overhear Dean spill his guts in the most agonizing and uncomfortable way possible. They’re working a case, so immediately after the conversation Dean can bury himself in research and hunting and not have to deal with Sam’s big, obnoxious “let’s make a huge deal out of this!” puppy dog eyes. And Cas isn’t even here right now to make things more awkward. He’s still checking out the victim at the coroner's office across the street.

Dean tries not to think about what a big baby he’s being by ignoring this golden opportunity. “He just tastes stuff different as an angel. He’s learning how to pick out the nuance.”

Sam rolls his eyes. “Because there’s so much nuance to ‘extra cheese’ or ‘hold the tomato.’”

“Oh like you’d know, Mr. Tofu Burger.”

“You’d eat a burger off the floor. Are you really trying to convince me you care about what kind of burger it is?”

Dean huffs and levels an indignant glare at his brother. “I absolutely have a favorite burger.”

“Then why’d you get two different kinds?”

"I can like more than one kind of burger, you know!"

Sam snorts. "That's just an excuse to eat more burgers." He spears a forkful of tomato and spinach with a smug little twinkle in his eye.

"It's so not," Dean insists. He gestures at the two wrapped foil rounds in front of him. “These are two unique burgers that both have their own delicious qualities.”

“Really?” Sam’s expression is so pompous Dean kind of wants to throw a french fry at it. Except that would be a waste of a perfectly good fry.

“Yes ‘really.’ Look--” Dean carefully unwraps his first burger. “This is a pickle burger. And not just any ol’ pickle burger. The best, most amazing, and -- dare I say it? -- sexiest pickle burger in the entire continental US.” He smirks as Sam rolls his eyes. “Now I can tell by that condescending look in your eye, you’re wondering, ‘What the hell is so special about a pickle burger? It’s just pickles!’ But that’s where you’re wrong.” Dean lifts the top bun and points down to the burger, looking almost gleeful at all its toppings. “Fried pickles, pickled red onions, relish…Sour and sweet and crunchy, the perfect compliment to a juicy, meaty burger. And one this big? You’ve gotta have a little something special to handle all this meat.” Sam tilts his head, his mouth twitching like Dean said something embarrassing. Was it waxing poetic about vegetables? Probably. Dean chooses to ignore it.

“Ya know,” he continues, “for the longest time I didn’t think I’d like a pickle burger. For years I’d be at diners and think, ‘...maybe? I dunno. Probably not for me.’” Dean pulls his mouth down into a thoughtful frown and bobs his head to mimic his past thoughts. “And then...I’m not sure, I just figured, why not at least try it? All those burgers I’ve had all over the country; I could at least give it a whirl. And it. Was. Awesome!” Dean gently places the bun back on his burger and gives it a little affectionate pat. “Now I can’t get enough of ‘em.”

Sam's expression does a complicated dance that Dean can't even begin to follow. But it suddenly clears into a look of dawning realization, followed quickly by horrified guilt, before it clamps down entirely.

Weird.

"Well...I can't fault someone for enjoying a good pickle burger," Sam says slowly. He doesn't meet Dean's eye, keeping his gaze down as he delicately stabs at his salad with his fork. He frowns at the cucumber slice he spears and carefully dislodges it from the prongs. "Especially if they really like, uh, pickles?" Sam cringes a little down at his greens. Dean can't blame him. It's a sad looking salad.

"Exactly!" Dean gestures down at the burger. "I'm a meat man and a pickle guy." Sam looks up toward the sky and then down toward the ground below with a sort of pleading desperation. "This is a great burger for me. And don't even get me started on the sauce--"

"Okay!" Sam's voice pitches up several octaves. Dean frowns at him, but before he can ask, Sam takes a deep breath and plasters a warm, understanding smile across his face. "You know what? You're right, Dean. After all this time. All those, uh...burgers. I'm glad you've figured out which one you like best."

"Well, not quite. I mean, this one…" Dean carefully unwraps the second burger. "Is there anything sexier than a breakfast burger?" He practically beams down at the golden-brown bun, the fringes of fried egg drooping over the side, crisp bacon peeking out from under the patty.

"I...I don't know?" Sam has the same terrified expression as when Dean drags him onto ramshackle roller coasters at crappy county fairs. God, he's such a baby about cholesterol.

“Yeah. C’mon, you know they’re great!” Dean says cavalierly, because he’s not going to miss a chance to gloat about the awesome food Sam misses out on with all his salads. “Bacon is, you know, bacon! It’s the best tasting thing in the world! Salty, greasy, crunchy…”

Sam’s brow furrows so deeply it’s like it’s mining for coal, his unfocused eyes searching the empty space between them like he’s trying to figure out the deep, dark mystery of bacon.

Dean rolls his eyes. Of course he wouldn’t understand. The dude eats low sodium turkey bacon. "I know you haven't had good, real bacon in ages--" Sam looks offended. Then confused. Then offended again. "--but trust me, man. It's awesome. When ya got bacon in your burger, it automatically makes the burger a hundred times better. Can’t get enough of it!” Sam groans like he's in pain.

Dean grins and keeps going. “And you’ve gotta admit, a fried egg is a thing of beauty. Give me a good silky, drippy egg all over my burger and I’m a happy guy.” Sam’s nose scrunches up into abject horror. “You get that gorgeous, soft yolk oozing everywhere...It’s creamy and delicious and unctuous and--”

“Dean!” Sam shrieks. He lets his fork fall into his bowl and covers his face with both his hands. His voice is muffled, but it’s definitely a tormented whine. “I know this is a tough topic for you, but can you please just say you’re bi and never use words like ‘unctuous’ again? I’m begging you!”

Dean freezes. “Wh-What?” Did Sam really--? He--? How does he know?!

Sam pops up from his elbows, dragging both hands through his hair as he frees his face from hiding. “I get it, dude. Okay? I get it. I mean...I don’t get it.” He glances down at the two burgers with a perturbed look and holds up his hands in surrender. “But I get it.”

Dean stares at him. “Get what?” he demands. His heart is pounding fast. Bi. Sam knows he’s bi. When did he figure it out?! Why’s he bringing it up now?!

Sam fixes him with a flat look. “The burgers? The...God...bacon sex metaphor? The pickle guy thing? I get it. Please. Please stop talking about eggs like that. I’ll never eat an omelette again!”

Sex metaphors? Pickle guy?! Dean takes a moment to think and...yeah. Yup. He really did say “I’m a pickle guy,” out loud. Wow.

Maybe he should just...roll with it?

Because otherwise Sam is definitely going to mock him for that for the rest of his life, and honestly, coming out is the much better option.

“You got me,” Dean says with a small laugh. He spreads his arms out with a bit of a flourish, and it’s a relief to say it. It feels good. “What can I say? I like all kinds of burgers. And hotdogs. Tacos. Kielbasa...”

“Please stop,” Sam groans, rubbing at his eyes with his hand.

Oh yeah, this is definitely the better option. Dean fell ass-backwards into a conversation he’s been dreading for months, and the only person feeling awkward and miserable here is Sam!

Really it’s a win-win.

Dean grins from ear to ear as he relishes Sam’s mortification. “Hey now, I thought you were supportive! What happened to ‘I’m happy for you and your burgers?’”

“I am happy for you, I just wish this wasn’t happening over lunch…” Sam whines as he drops his hands on the table.

“What’s Sam happy about?” Cas asks, startling the both of them by approaching their picnic table. His eyes are earnest and sincerely curious, which only causes Sam to send a miserable, pleading look his way while shaking his head.

“Sam thinks pickles are gay,” Dean says to Cas with the same sort of smug glee of the teacher’s pet tattling about note passing in class.

Cas scrunches his face in confusion as he sits down beside Dean. “Sam, that’s...nonsensical.”

“That’s what I said!” Dean lies, because the way Sam’s eyebrow is twitching right now is too damn funny. “Wait til you hear what he thinks about bacon.”

Sam drops his face into his hands again. “This is the worst day of my life,” he groans as he massages his temples with his fingers.

Cas furrows his brow at him. “You’ve been to Hell.”

“And I’m still there, apparently!” Sam flings his hand up in exasperation. Cas quietly takes a sip of Dean’s drink, which for some reason just pisses Sam off more.

“You know, you could have just been normal about this. No weird, gross food metaphors. Just--” Sam drops his voice several octaves and bobs his head in a deliberately annoying parody of Dean. “--‘Hey Sam, by the way, I’m bi and totally in love with Cas, no big deal,’ or whatever.”

Dean goes still while Cas tilts his head at the two of them.. “Who says I’m in love with Cas?” Wait. Is that obvious too? Shit, well, looks like he gets to rip two bandaids off today. Thank God for the hilarious panic on Sam's face, because otherwise Dean would be the one freaking out here.

Sam’s eyes go huge, all color draining out of his face. “Oh shit. I didn’t-- I’m sorry, I--”

Dean can only manage to maintain the ruse for a few seconds before he bursts out laughing. “Nah, I’m just messing with you. Where have you been, man? Cas and I have been together for ages. I thought you were the smart one!”

Sam looks like he wants to leap across the picnic table and strangle Dean.

With a glare so sour it could peel paint, Sam snatches Dean’s extra large order of french fries and storms off toward the car to sulk. About three paces away, he stops, turns around, and levels a stern finger at Dean alongside his scowl. “For the record. I’m proud of you. And I’m honored you chose to trust me with this information,” he hisses in a frustrated huff before he spins on his heel and marches away.

Dean wipes a tear from his eye, still chuckling under his breath. Cas stares after Sam in concern.

“Why is he so mad?”

Dean shrugs off the question as he slides the pickle burger in front of Cas and nudges him with his elbow to try it. “Hell if I know. If you ask me, dude needs to have a burger every once in awhile.”

#destiel #deancas #destiel fanfiction #deancas fanfiction #supernatural #spn #destiel fanfic #deancas fanfic #katie writes things #this is either the best thing I've written or the worst thing I've ever written. possibly both #I'm very sorry for making you read the bit about the fried egg

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audreycritter · 3 years

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IDK if you take asks from the woodwork so feel free to disregard, but this is prompted by your recent Arkham post. You mention video games and it made me think of the Arkham Asylum game. I really like your point about how games are organized towards the player’s interests—hitting stuff— but you also talk about how Arkham is a place of incredible nuance that (imo) can be both horror and ideally healing at the same time, and I guess I was just curious about your thoughts on the Arkham game(s) and their place in Bat-mythos, especially given they did try to thread some needle of “how do we bring Batman into a real(ish) world and all that may mean.” It was an exploration of the Asylum as a place with an intrinsic character, which I personally hadn’t really seen before save for maybe Serious House Serious Earth, but I was curious if you had thoughts/opinions you wanted to share. Love your blog, and have a great day!

I don't mind asks!

I haven't played MUCH of the Arkham games, and I'm not opposed to them. I like the horror concept of Arkham having its own kind of identity, or Arkham as a character.

But I am gonna stop you right there (kindly, gently). The Arkham games have their own stories-- some of them engaging, I'm sure-- but it's still fundamentally a video game. Video games aren't inherently violent, but the Arkham series is by design about being able to do lots of cool fighting. That's totally fine! Its fun! But we have to be really careful in engaging with media to not make the mistaken correlation between grimdark and realistic.

Good character models and emotional stories don't even make something realistic. It's a thing that comics, games, and movies have struggled with for a long time, and not just in Batman canon, but Batman canon does suffer pretty significantly. The Arkham games are in no way about a meaningful engagement with reality or what Batman would look like in the real world. We might be able to draw on some interactions and further explore those as fans in a way that connects closer to reality, but it's not at all the real world.

My guess is that a nuanced, realistic exploration of Arkham would be difficult to pull off because the actual daily grind of mental health care in institutions holding highly violent offenders is ... a grind. It's a lot of doing the same thing over and over for small returns, because it's hard for people to change. It's a lot of small victories other people don't understand the scope of, because just walking down a hallway and being civil can be a huge accomplishment for someone who actually tends toward the kind of social disconnect rogues are often written to have. It's a lot of disappointing setbacks, and if you hype up the drama of any of those things, it's going to feel exploitative. Personally, I'd like to read it? I'm sure lots of other people would enjoy it, too. But it wouldn't be the kind of high energy drama that people are drawn to in comics, and treating it with too much realism makes the world fall apart in other ways.

Within the constraints of the universe, the rogues aren't real. We've had good and bad media that's tackled the idea of criminality and mental illness, and I don't think that's a bad thing to try to deal with sometimes? But overall part of the conceit of comic-media (and its derived forms like film and game) is that we actually understand that the rogues aren't mentally ill, not in any realistic application of clinical terms. They aren't real. They're themey symbols of different kinds of evil or corruption or selfishness, designed to be cycled through struggles with The Hero, because readers find comfort in the familiar. And to do that, we need a holding tank for them so comics aren't accidentally implying they just rule Gotham when Batman isn't chasing them.

In a story that engaged with Arkham realistically, he'd put most of them in once and they'd never get out again. The few that did get out would maybe get out once or twice, tops-- years and years apart. There might be an outlier, but most of them aren't escape artists. The problem is, nobody really wants a realistic Arkham unless it's in a closed short story form, because a functional Arkham would break the narrative cycle. Fandom just ends up making the mistake of holding Batman as a character responsible for the narrative function of his own world-- they want to treat him as a failed hero for not correcting the things about his world that make the stories keep happening. Like, yeah, he could kill the Joker-- then what? Nobody writes the Joker ever again? That didn't work the last time he died.

He could "fix" Arkham somehow. Then what? The entire rogue gallery is permanently retired and a few of them "recover?" That maybe makes a great epilogue but it doesn't support ongoing stories, and then the second someone is used in a story again, it's somehow Bruce's fault for the narrative requirements of the fiction he's a character in?

Part of being a comics fan-- specifically a comic fan of an intellectual property that's been around for decades-- is understanding that we don't get final resolution. When LOTR ends, the story is over. We don't watch canon make Frodo & Co destroy the ring over and over in hundreds of different ways. Fanfic might explore alternatives, but canon has given us resolution to the plot. Batman doesn't get that in most media because Batman isn't ever over. And I think sometimes fans (and writers, ngl) make the mistake of trying to hold Batman as a character responsible for the cyclical nature of his own media, and the things we see as "problems" because we instinctively want resolution in a landscape that doesn't have it.

Anyway, I think I went off on a tangent. I don't mind the Arkham games, but they're just a another entry in a long line of media that likes playing with Arkham as a horror concept.

#batman #meta #asks

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bearstarseraphffxi · 3 years

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Subtext and Connotations

“Stupid kid…” Piccolo said to himself. He looked at the small human — no not human, not completely anyway — who had fallen asleep and casually collapsed onto him without a care in the world.

A world that had just gotten immeasurably bigger ten months ago.

Piccolo did not know how to react at first. This kid was a first for many things. He stayed still hoping he’d fall off.

But no… The son of his greatest enemy had just leaned forward and was now draped over one of his legs.

Piccolo sighed. He looked up at the moonless night sky. He absentmindedly wondered which pinprick of light was the fault of what he was about to do. What he had been stewing over for four months now, making him seriously analyze his birth and what could have gone wrong with the transfer. He was Demon King Piccolo, damn it…

Piccolo looked over to the west and sneered. He could practically hear Kami snickering in his head.

Piccolo closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He put his large hand on the boy’s head. “Sebnek yemtaw himefinnew.”

Gohan moaned and twitched.

Piccolo jerked his hand away, but Gohan simply moved his arm and somehow ended up even more over his leg before he went still again.

Piccolo sighed in relief.

~~***~~

“Hey, Mr. Piccolo?” Gohan asked, adjusting his pants from the morning bush and small ki-blasted hole visit.

“What?” he said annoyed.

Piccolo stood as he always did, his back to him, but Gohan did not mind. That was just Mr. Piccolo.

When his mother was mad at his father, she would turn her back and talk in that tone when he would win the argument, then reword what he had said to make it look like she got exactly what she wanted all along. He did not know what he was “winning”, but Mr. Piccolo was being a lot nicer to him recently when he wasn’t beating him into a pulp.

“What does Seb nek yem taw—”

Piccolo partially spun around. “What?! You were awake?!”

Gohan stuttered, “I… you always randomly attack me. But you were gentle, so I went back to sleep.”

Piccolo regained his composure, crossed his arms, and towered over the boy. Any other child would be terrified, but this one just smiled back at him.

Piccolo sighed in annoyed defeat. There was no scaring this one. “I called you a silly boy last night in my language, that was all.”

“What part of it means silly?”

“Himefinnew. It is a single word that means a silly child.”

“You can call me Himefinnew any time you want, Mr. Piccolo,” Gohan said grinning, with what few teeth were left.”

Piccolo reached his hand out and grabbed Gohan’s head, then gently spun him around. “Let’s just keep it Finnew for short, got it?”

“Yes, sir! Mr. Piccolo,” Gohan said happily.

Piccolo suddenly punted the screaming boy high into the air. “Never turn your back on the enemy!” Piccolo shouted, jumping after him to start the day’s training.

~~***~~

Three months later…

“Hey guys!” Bulma shouted, holding her phone in one hand and waving with the other, “Dad says he’ll be here in about twenty minutes with the two cargo planes to take us to my place!”

“Does it really take this long to traverse your own planet?!” Vegeta snapped. “This planet is puny judging by its gravity!”

Bulma put her hands on her hips. “Oh, stop complaining, homeboy. It hasn’t even been an hour yet.”

“An hour?!”

Everyone glanced at the arguing couple before returning to their own conversations.

Piccolo glared ominously as Gohan was speaking with Dende and three young adults. They were laughing at each other’s bad accents while speaking each other’s languages. “He” knew that the three couldn’t speak properly and that the laughter was not genuine. “He” knew ‘teenagers’ when he saw them, the old word suddenly sounding like he heard it for the first time, even though it was spoken with “his” own mind’s singular voice.

It had only been a few hours and these sensations were getting old fast.

“(Hey there),” a Namekian came up to him awkwardly in their native tongue. “(How are you doing, after… everything)?”

Piccolo sighed. “(I)”, he stressed, “(am fine… Lumache. Really. Go comfort the others who are taking Guru’s death badly.)”

Lumache smiled relieved, but his face quickly changed to confusion. “(Are you sure? You’re speaking with a bit of a lisp.)”

Piccolo smirked. (It’s the accent here on Earth. I doubt ‘Kami’ will be coming down from his ‘high horse’ to meet any of you. But this is how we speak here.)”

Lumache tilted his head concerned. “(Is this ‘Kami’ another aboriginal like the pet?)”

“(Gohan is no pet)”, Piccolo said, barely containing his rage. “(And ‘Kami’ is…)” he paused. “(… the name of my egglayer’s hatchmate.)”

Lumanche raise his finger, “(But… ‘Kami’ is not a Namekian name.)”

“(I know, but his name is Kami. So get used to it.)”

Lumache bent his raised finger. “(And he was also called a… ah…)” he hesitated looking for the right words.

Piccolo smirked. “No, his name was Namekian and I will be using it going forward. That was the deal.”

Lumache sighed relieved with a thankful grin across his face, “(Oh, that goodness. I was worried, dear brother.)”

Piccolo was feeling both a little bad but also waiting in great anticipation to laugh at his reaction when the conversation with the teenagers got loud. He turned his full attention back to Gohan and Dende.

Piccolo uncrossed his arms, then bent his elbow as he balled his fist.

~~***~~

Moments earlier…

The teenager in the middle of the trio was making funny noises to the laughing of his two companions and the giggling of Dende.

Gohan, however, was being encouraging. “You’re getting close. Just find a soft spot near the top of your throat to click the area just behind the tip of your tongue against it.”

The teenager threw his hands up, and spouted what Gohan knew to be curses. “(This is bleep-ing ridiculous!)” he continued.

“(Don’t feel bad,)” Gohan said. “(I still can’t get *guttural sound with a secondary high pitch right afterwards* right. ‘Mr. Piccolo’ said he knows of a few ‘human’ languages with the sounds happening at the same time and that after the fighting we could look into ‘throat singing’ together.)”

The one on the teenager’s right chuckled. “(Yeah, and I’m sure this ‘Piccolo’ has been a big help since you speak with such a bad lisp.)”

“(He doesn’t have a lisp,)” Dende corrected. “(It’s just the accent of the people here. I’m told everyone speaks that way.)”

“(Dende,)” the one to the left shook his head. “(And the elders always say you were the smart one. Here you are believing everything a piccolo says.)”

“Dende,” Gohan whispered in English, “is there a word that’s also said as piccolo and not just a person’s name?”

Dended had a look of shock on his face. “You don’t—”

“(Dende, don’t bother,)” the teenager in the middle said. “(There’s no point learning this stuff.)”

“After everything that just happened, how can you say that?!” Dende said loudly, and in English.

The entire congregation went silent and turned to look at them.

As Dende started to whimper and Gohan wrapped his arms around him, the three knew they all looked bad.

“(Since you can’t say my name right,)” Gohan offered an olive branch, “(My teacher, ‘Mr. Piccolo’, calls me something when I’m being stupid. ‘Nickname’ doesn’t have a better translation than that.)”

Unknown to the youths, everyone’s sight was turned to the sudden fighting stance of the person all the Namekians but Dende knew only as Nail’s new Keeper.

“(Ok, ‘Hohan’, What’s this ‘Nickname’?)”

“(Himefinnew. He shortened it Finnew.)”

You could hear a pin drop.

~~***~~

Vegeta knew something was wrong instantly as his eyes scanned the clearing. This type of shock, disbelief, and the building rage so pungent it was tasteable on his tongue, this only came with something unforgivable. Vegeta enjoyed getting his prey to react like this. The resulting stupidity was entertainment on boring missions. Killing and eating children usually did the trick. Nappa didn’t even bother with the killing part first.

Vegeta smirked.

This wait just got a lot less boring.

~~***~~

“Gohan! Gohan, don’t say something like that!” Dende grabbed his armor and shook him. “Apologize!”

“What? Is… Is it actually a curse word?” Gohan said horrified as the possibility dawned on him. “Mr. Piccolo said it meant ‘silly child’.”

“Silly child?!” Dende looked over at Piccolo. “Has the meaning changed here?! Don’t you know what it means?!”

Suddenly, an adult came over and grabbed Gohan’s arm. He tried to bite his nails into his flesh, but they bent backwards instead.

Gohan barely had time to plant his feet when the man went suddenly flying through several trees.

Piccolo retracted his arm from the long punch and stormed over. “(Next person who touches that child joins Schnecke pulling splinters out of his tonsils!)”

“(How…)” “(Can we even do that?)” “(Did he just… extend his arm?)” were among the murmurs Gohan could make out. He also spotted several Namekians put their hands over their mouths and looked away, or even bending over at the waist.

Dende tugged on Piccolo’s pants leg. “How did you do that?” he whispered in English.

“(Don’t you dare teach something that barbaric and obscene to the hatchlings! You shame your role as a holy keeper to Na, eh?)” the Namekian paused. “(What even is your name, brother?!)”

“(He’s no brother! Brothers do not harm brothers! He attacked Schnecke!)”

“Why do they keep calling Mr. Piccolo ‘brother’?” Gohan whispered to Dende. “He’s from Earth? So was his father and Kami? They don’t have siblings.”

“Sib-lin?” Dende said confused. “I don’t know that word.”

Piccolo stood proudly, “(My name is Piccolo! Piccolo ‘Daimao’ the Second!” He slowly turned his head glaring into as many eyes as possible, “Heir to my dead egg layer, King Piccolo ‘Daimao’!)”

A pin drop could be heard again as Gohan looked around. All the Namekians had looks of horror on their faces. He kicked himself for being surprised.

“Gohan, what does ‘Daimao’ mean?” Dende whispered in English.

Gohan jerked his head. “Wha? You don’t? Then wha?” he stuttered. He began glancing around anxiously.

“Gohan what’s wr—”

Suddenly a Namekian fell to his knees screaming in anguish. “(Who names a child that?!)”

Piccolo stomped over screaming something so fast all Gohan could make out was Piccolo repeating his name over and over again, but judging by the adults scrambling to cover the children’s ears, he wasn’t old enough to learn a good portion of it.

Piccolo grabbed the Namekian by his collar and pulled him up. “(And if any of you touch Hime again…)” Piccolo extended his nails into long daggers, “(I’ll slice you apart so bad you can’t regenerate.)” He then shoved the man back on the ground and retracted his claws. “Hime!” he said walking swiftly over to Gohan. Piccolo put his hand on Gohan's head, gently turning and shoving him. “We’re leaving. Come on, boy,” he said in English.

Gohan stumbled briefly but quickly walked in step with him into the trees.

~~***~~

Vegeta was disappointed that the show seemed to be over after those two had vanished into the woods, but their energy seemed to still be close by. Suddenly Dende broke the awkward silence by running after them. The others began to shout before the old one the dead Namekian had placed hands on shouted something that made the others stop before he walked after Dende.

Vegeta turned to stalk them when he looked at the Earth woman who had turned at the exact same moment.

They looked at each other surprised before the woman gave an oddly devious smile, took two steps ahead then turned and pointed at him before repeatedly bending that finger. Vegeta took the strange gesture as an invitation to follow and the two disappeared unnoticed.

~~***~~

“Mr. Piccolo, what was that about? What happened there? Why was everyone mad at me? What did—”

“Not now, Gohan. They can still hear us.”

Gohan looked behind them.

“My ears are not for show,” Piccolo answered his thoughts.

Suddenly Piccolo looked behind them as well.

Soon Gohan heard it too.

“Wait! … Gohan, wait!” was heard softly in the distance.

Then came the rapid footsteps.

Dende burst through the trees stopping in front of them. He placed his hands on his knees panting. “Wait… Wait for me…”

Piccolo sighed. “Fine… you can come too,” he said annoyed. He began walking briskly again. “Hurry.”

“Yes,” Gohan quickly got in step.

Dende jogged out of breath behind them.

~~***~~

Piccolo eventually stopped and leaned against a tree. “Ok, this is far enough,” he sighed. He sat on the ground.

“Mr. Piccolo, what happened? Why was everyone mad at me?”

Piccolo sighed. “Gohan… from what I taught you about my language, break down Himefinnew into its parts.”

“Um…” he thought, “Finnew is the third person singular to finir, which means to find something funny, so… Hime is the part that means boy. I find the boy funny, or Silly boy like you first said.”

“Dende, quiet,” Piccolo said cutting him off. He looked back at Gohan. “Now Gohan, tell me the difference between the words red and crimson.”

Gohan paused. “They are both two words that mean the same color?”

“Yes, but there is a difference. Do you know why the word red is almost always used while crimson is not?”

Gohan shook his head.

“Crimson specifically means the color of human blood. To call something crimson is to compare it to blood. Now answer that question.”

“Blood is scary?”

Piccolo smiled, “Exactly.”

“So Hime is a scary version of boy?”

“What?! No!”

“Dende quiet,” Piccolo snapped.

Dende looked down.

Piccolo sighed.

“Gohan, what I’m trying to say is that many words have a hidden meaning. Like crimson is scary. Hime is… I… it…” Piccolo’s face and ears tinged purple. He covered his face with one of his hands. “Gah… what I’m trying to say is… Gohan…

“So you named the child but never told him? Were you ever going to tell him?”

“Elder Moori!” Dende said as the old Namekian walked out of the trees.

Piccolo shot up as his color deepened. “This is a private conversation!”

Moori gave a knowing smile to the adult blushing like a child being caught being naughty. He looked at Gohan. “So tell me Himefinnew, did Piccolo place his hands on your head and say ‘Sebnek yemtaw’ when he named you, or…”

Gohan started nodding before he finished.

“I see…” He looked at Piccolo, “I don’t know how significant it is with our kin on Earth, but for Namekians the naming ceremony is an important step in a child’s life. We do not name at hatching but let the child grow until it becomes apparent what his name is, like Dende here,” he looked at him, “Dende literally means ‘He writes in stone’. We named him that because he can memorize and repeat anything he hears perfectly.”

“And Nail means humility,” Dende said looking up at Piccolo.

Moori snickered, “Nail was not happy when he was named that by Guru. You don’t know this Dende, but Nail was actually very arrogant as a youth. He was sent to live Guru not because he was virtuous, but because he was a delinquent.”

Dende’s jaw dropped.

Moori looked at Piccolo, “Nail never lost that fire despite him learning to outwardly behave. I was greatly worried for you, but after everything that just happened…” he walked over and put his hand on piccolo’s shoulder. “I know you two will make a fine man once everything settles down in a few hours. Only a man with the pride in his name like that could embrace him fully and not be ashamed of his lesser instincts,” then he smiled knowingly, “Isn’t that right ‘Daimao’?”

“You know what that means, elder?” Dende asked.

Moori took his hand off Piccolo’s shoulder and looked down at him, “Yes I do. It’s a word that means the unpleasant part of all of us, like arrogance,” he glanced at Piccolo, “Or anger.” He looked back down, “While ‘Kami’ is the nice things about us, like friendship and loyalty.”

“But they are both words like crimson, right?” Dende asked.

He nodded. “Yes, they both have a special connotation that makes them very rare. Even the adults don’t know those words.” Moori looked down at his hands. “Even I… did not know those words until a little while ago.”

Dende nodded understanding.

Moori extended his hand. “Come with me, Dende. Let the ‘titim’ and ‘hime’ talk alone.” Then he turned in a random direction. “That goes for you two as well!”

“What?! How did you know we were here?!”

“You stupid bitch! Don’t you know how to keep your stupid mouth shut!”

“I am not a stupid bitch, you—”

Piccolo grumbled putting his hand over his face again.

Moori smiled, “I’m sure you’ll be able to relearn your awareness. Nail was always too easy to sneak up on.” He took a step then stopped, “It may not be my place to say, Daimao, but maybe losing some of your suspiciousness would be a good thing. It can be lonely as a piccolo no matter where your home is.”

He took Dende’s hand and left.

Piccolo sighed as the volume of the argument coming from the trees rose up several notches.

“So… we’ll be talking later, right?” Gohan asked, looking in the direction of the screaming.

Piccolo chuckled, “Yeah… … Actually, Gohan,” he knelt and whispered in his ear.

~~***~~

10 minutes later at the clearing, a large box-shaped plane touched down.

Dr. Brief hopped out.

“Daddy!” Bulma ran over.

“There’s my baby girl!” They hugged. “Phew. Oh boy, I’ll call your mother and make sure you have a nice bubble bath waiting with lavender candles.”

“Thanks Dad.”

“Hey! I thought you said two transports! That’s only one!” Vegeta shouted pointing.

Dr. Brief pulled out what looked like a grenade from his pocket and threw it a good distance away. Suddenly an identical craft appeared in a puff of smoke.

Vegeta gritted his teeth to keep his jaw from dropping.

Bulma threw open the passenger side door, “Come on, Homeboy! Come ride in the cockpit with me!”

Vegeta stiffened and clinched his fists. “As if I’d spend another second listening to your prattle!”

Then sit in the back with the friends of the people you killed for three hours, you jerk!”

“I’ll ride with the old man!” he looked at Dr. Brief to see him already talking with Dende.

“Sorry, sonny! The kid’s beat you to it!”

Vegeta bristled. “Fine!” he stormed over and shoved her out of the way. He climbed in and slammed the door.

“Jerk,” she said, wiping the grass off her. Bulma turned to the group as her father dropped the cargo ramp on his plane. “Ok everyone! Load up so we can finally get out of the bugs!”

Piccolo helped everyone find a seat, the elders and children bucketed on the benches while the teenagers and adults sat on the floor. Gohan did the same for the other plane.

Gohan came around to Bulma’s window.

She rolled it down.

“Everyone’s in over here. I'm going to ride with Mr. Piccolo in the other plane.”

“Ok, Gohan.” Bulma rolled up the window.

On the other side, Piccolo was talking to Dr. Brief.

“Everyone is ready. I’ll be with Gohan in the other plane.”

“Okey Dokey. See you when we land,” Dr. Brief smiled.

The Briefs watched Gohan and Piccolo walk over and disappear behind the other plane in their side mirrors. After a brief rock that felt like someone climbing in, the two rear doors closed.

As the two planes flew away, Piccolo and Gohan floated in the air watching them, having flown up after rocking the plane to avoid being seen on the ground after takeoff.

Gohan had his hands over his mouth stifling a giggle.

Piccolo grinned. “Deceit is fun, isn’t it Gohan?”

“Yes, don’t tell Mom I said so.”

“Secret’s safe with me.”

The two dropped their arms and sighed at the same time. Then they looked at each other.

Piccolo dropped to the ground first, Gohan landing moments later.

“Ok… We’re were we…” Piccolo said slowly.

“Actually, Mr. Piccolo,” Gohan said looking up.

Piccolo looked down.

“Could you tell me what you were saying when you were screaming your name? Besides the bad words, I mean. You spoke too fast. I… got the part where you threatened to chop him up, though.”

Piccolo sat down, “This… is going to be… just about as hard to explain as Hime is actually…”

Gohan looked down, “Oh…”

“Sit down, Gohan.”

Gohan sat down mimicking Piccolo’s legs position.

He halfheartedly smiled, then sighed. “Gohan… ‘Piccolo’ has a very specific meaning, and in fact wasn’t even a name until Kami called out, ‘I banish all that is abhorrent! Piccolo!” when they cleaved. Did you know how they were born?”

“A person ripped in two and became all good and all bad. But you’re not all bad, Mr. Piccolo.”

“Gohan, the ability to care for a child is a biological function. It has nothing to do with good or bad. My father felt every one of my brother’s die by your father’s hands just as much as Guru felt Frieza rip their lives away one by one.”

Gohan gasped softly.

“You didn’t know about my brother’s, did you?”

Gohan shook his head.

“Gohan. You know how babies are made, right?”

“A mommy and daddy each take half a small piece of themselves that can’t live alone, stick them together to make a new person then the mommy either grows them in their tummy or lays an egg and they grow in there until they hatch, right?”

“That is how things work on Earth,” he nodded. “But that does not work for Namekian’s like me.” He adjusted his position. “We don’t have both mommies and daddies. There is only one kind. We take a whole piece of ourselves, already alive, and place in an egg to grow again. That is why we feel the deaths of our children, because literally a piece of us has died.”

“What does this have to do with your name?”

“Because ‘piccolo’ means anything that is not part of us. Born from us. Is. Us. But like red and crimson, Piccolo is saved for special things, like an alien planet and the people who lived there. You are a piccolo, even if people won’t say it to your face.”

Gohan looked down, “And anything piccolo is abhorrent, right?”

Piccolo put his hand on Gohan’s head. “Not everything.”

“What…�� Gohan started sniffling, “What did you say?”

“I was born on an alien world. I was raised as an alien. I am an alien. There are many other words I could have used to convey that, but using my name was just me beating it into their thick skulls without using my actual fists.”

“Being able to defeat your opponent without ever needing to touch them is just as big a part of war as actually fighting hand to hand combat.”

“Correct. If you weren’t such a goofball, there would probably be two Dende’s right now.”

Gohan gave a quick few laughs, then when quiet.

Piccolo waited silently for him to speak.

He waited a very long time.

“Mr. Piccolo…” Gohan finally started, but never finished his thought.

“Say what you are thinking Gohan,” Piccolo ordered, “Nothing you can say will ever make me mad. I have a thick skin.”

“Do… Do I… Do I have two grandfathers now…” he glanced up at his face, “that are kings?”

Piccolo smiled, showing his teeth.

Gohan gasped. Piccolo swore his eyes were sparkling.

Piccolo sighed and closed his eyes. He raised his finger. “One time. This one ti— ACK!”

Gohan flung his arms around Piccolo’s neck and knocked him flat on his back.

“Oofff,” he said, having the wind knocked out of him.

“Titim. Titim.” Gohan kept repeating, now crying in his ear.

Piccolo sighed and looked up at the clouds. He then suddenly raised his arms and gave two middle fingers to the sky.

Even thirty miles below, he could hear the laughing.

#dragon ball z #dragon ball z kai #namek saga #saiyan saga #piccolo #Gohan #son gohan #fanfiction #fanfic

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2manyfandoms2count · 3 years

Text

I love you (not) - Chapter 3

@marichatmay's prompt for today was "dirt", which legally requires Chat to eat dirt, right? Anyway, that happens. His brain is a little distracted, you see. Hope you enjoy!

First | Previous | AO3 | Next

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Chapter 3: In which the universe might not be working against Chat breaking up with Marinette, but the author sure is

This has gone too far , Chat thought as he marched determinedly towards Marinette’s skylight. However fun lunch at her parents, and then their little movie hangout had been, he couldn’t let this… “relationship” go any further. His speech had been stalled enough, by a whole week and a half, and not entirely because of him; sure, he’d procrastinated it a little, but Nathalie and her zeal for filling his schedule were the main culprits, as well as a couple of ill-timed Akumas and last-minute Kitty section band practises. It was like the universe didn’t want their budding romance to end.

He pushed the thought aside. There was no romance between him and Marinette, or at least, not on his side. Which is why he needed to talk to her: he needed to prevent her from getting too invested in their relationship. She’d only end up getting hurt, and he would never forgive himself for it.

But what if she gets upset now ? A little voice piped up in his head. He came to a halt, and traced back his steps. Then you’ll be there to protect her from the butterflies , the reasonable part of his brain chimed in . He turned around and started walking again.

But what if that doesn’t work? Will you be able to fight with the knowledge that it was all your fault? The first voice nagged again. Yes, since I’ll be able to fix it. Ladybug and I will do what we usually do and save her.

He paced the balcony as the figurative angel and demon bickered on his shoulder, both making fairly good points as to why he should or should not break up with her.

It’s not a real relationship, just ghost her, she knows you have other stuff to do.

That wouldn’t be right and you know it.

What if this is a bad time, though?

But what if this is a good time?

His dilemma was so loud that he didn’t think about what it might have sounded like for Marinette, if she was in her room. His indecision was getting so infuriating that he stopped looking where he walked. Why was this so difficult?

What if you stopped being stupid and realised that you actually like her? The thought blindsided him, and not just because he could have sworn that it had been formulated in Plagg's voice. It caused him to miscalculate his next step, and before he knew it he was tripping on a potted plant.

Both him and it came crashing down with a loud thunk and a yelp, and he realised with horror, as he scrambled to his feet, that the plant it had contained not only had its roots out, but that it had landed right under him, and didn’t look too healthy.

“Crap…” He shot up and tried to repair his mistake, but soon realised the pot had broken in its fall.

He looked around him to see if there was a spare pot lying around, but failing to spot one, changed his strategy. He started pushing the earth into a neat pile to cover the roots and also to make sure the balcony didn’t look too messy. He wondered if there was a flower shop, or any shop where he could buy a replacement container nearby, and if maybe he could just pop out before anybody noticed, what on earth could he even do with all this-

“Chat Noir? What are you doing here?” Marinette had cautiously peeked out of her skylight when she’d heard the commotion, anticipating an Akuma and trying to figure out what to do if there was indeed one, and had pushed it all the way open when she’d realised who it was who’d been lurking on her roof.

Chat Noir panicked as he heard her voice, and did the only logical thing that came to his mind to get rid of the mess: he took the handful of earth he was holding, and shoved it in his mouth.

“No, Chat!!” Marinette voiced the thought that his brain deigned to formulate just as he tasted the dirt. His eyes widened and he spat it out, barely registering Marinette hopping out of her room and coming to pat him on the back to help him. “What on Earth were you thinking?”

“I don’t know,” he wheezed.

“Hang on, I’ll get you some water.” She disappeared through the trapdoor and was back before he could put his escape plan to action. It was just too embarrassing to stay.

He gargled the contents of the glass and spat it out, wincing at the... green taste that remained. There was no better adjective for it. He supposed it was well deserved.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, looking at his feet sheepishly.

“For what?” Marinette asked, before her eyes landed on the plant. The lack of pot and her frantic attempts to help him had destabilised it, and it lied horizontally again. The colour drained from her cheeks. “Oh. Uncle Wang’s Magnolia.”

Chat winced at her worried expression. “Can I do anything to help?”

“I think I might have a pot downstairs that I can replace it with. I just need to be discreet, if Maman finds out that it survived its journey from Shanghai, but that it couldn’t survive a day on my balcony…” Marinette nervously chewed on her bottom lip.

“She’d be rightfully annoyed.” Chat nodded. He felt his guilt pink his cheeks.

“Okay, here’s what we’re going to do…”

Chat Noir wasn’t sure involving him in a plan was a great idea after the mess he’d made, but he followed Marinette’s instructions nonetheless, anxious to repair his mistake.

“There.” Marinette rubbed the dirt off of her hands when they were done with a satisfied smile. There was still tension in her shoulders, though. “I think I might have to hide it a little for the next week or so, just so she doesn’t notice the wilted leaves, but it should be okay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, don’t worry.” She relaxed a little as she saw his pleading eyes. “Anyway, you literally preferred to eat dirt rather than answer my questions, what brings you here?”

“Oh, erm, I needed to talk to you about, well, erm… us.” Chat twiddled his thumbs awkwardly.

Marinette froze. She’d looked out for Chat Noir during the days after their “date”, and had been relieved not to see him around. She’d prodded the topic slightly as Ladybug, and given his lack of response, she’d concluded that Chat had given up on their relationship, and had filed the whole ordeal in a “we’ll laugh about it someday” part of her brain. She’d thought that the next time she’d see him as a civilian, they’d be back to normal. She realised that she might have been a little too prompt in moving on.

Chat noticed his friend tense up again, and decided he couldn’t go through with his plan. Hey, I came to tell you that I don’t love you and that I’m breaking up with you - and by the way, I almost killed a plant that came from half a world away. Bye! Really didn’t sound so great.

“Us?” Marinette prompted.

“Yeah, us.” Chat shook away his thoughts. “I, er… Realised that I haven’t been in touch much recently, and I wanted to apologise.”

“Don’t worry, I’ve been really busy too, so, I understand.” Marinette smiled sweetly. It did sound like her kitty to not ghost a girl, and maybe this was the moment he would give her a little speech about how packed his superhero life was, and that he preferred not to keep her waiting and-

“Maybe we could get coffee sometime soon?” Chat blurted.

“Coffee?” She tilted her head, her smile tensing a little. What are you up to? The exit was right there!

“If you like coffee? Tea’s perfectly fine, too, or hot chocolate. Or a coke, or anything. My treat.” He patted her shoulder. Why do I sound so awkward? he cringed inside.

“I guess that would be nice.” Marinette blinked a couple of times. “Shall we set a date now, or…”

“Yes! A date! That’s it! The day after tomorrow? 5pm?” I need to calm down, Chat smiled tightly.

“That works for me.” Marinette eyed her partner cautiously. He seemed overly excited. Had there been something in the earth? Should she call some kind of medical service? “Did you have a place in mind?...”

Chat Noir paused. He didn’t go out enough to be able to recommend a café off the top of his head.

Marinette saw his hesitation, decided he was probably more flustered than poisoned, and decided she should probably help him out with his invitation. “I heard le café des chats was quite cute, it’s not too far away… If you’re not allergic to cats.” She added with a twinkle in her eye.

“That sounds purr-fect!” Chat grinned. “Right, so now that we’ve got that settled, I guess I should go.”

“I guess so.” Marinette smiled. “See you soon, then?”

“Yep, later, Princess! And sorry again about the Magnolia.”

She waved his concern away and then leaned on her balcony railing to watch him vault away. Her smile fell when he’d disappeared from her sight, and she realised what she’d just agreed to.

A real date. In a café. With Chat Noir.

This is going too far, she thought as she hid her face in her hands.

#how embarrassing it appears i've written the title wrong on these posts #marichat may 2021 #marichat may #miraculous ladybug #the miraculous tales of ladybug and cat noir #ml #miraculous fanfiction #miraculous fanfic #marichat #marinette dupain-cheng #chat noir #day 3: dirt #elle writes #love you (not)

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roll-da-credits · 3 years

Text

Lycoris Radiata Pt. 2 -Deku x Reader-

Inspired by the piano piece, "Lycoris Radiata," Written by Spikes, played by MusicalBasics.

Highly recommend listening to it whilst reading.

[1] [2] [3]

Word Count: 1.7k

When a childhood love shows up after being lost to time, it's unnerving to be presented by something so familiar yet different. Deku lost to his own love and presented with the stresses of life and unrequited love, it isn't easy to see the world with an unbiased gaze.

!WARNING!

(This is for the entire series and not just this part)

BIG TW for death, suicide, abuse,

Minor TW for death imagery, toxic relationship, toxic friendship, toxic shit all around

A/n: I hope all of my little details are noticed by you guys because it did take a long time to take into consideration all of the details, I hope you enjoy this.

After reuniting with you in that park, Deku found himself longing to hang out with you even more. Longing to hear your stories and longing to tell you his adventure as a pro. So, that’s exactly what he did.

Every time he had an off-day or a patrol near where you worked or resided. He would always stop by, say hello, catch up, talk about your day.

On not so rare occasions he’d also meet your boyfriend at the same place. When questioned about it he realized your boyfriend worked at the same place you did. It wasn’t very odd to him so he simply laughed it off and considered how lucky you were to be in the same place as your loved one very often.

“There was also this one time where they tripped and spilled the coffee on another barista! It was hilarious!!!” Your boyfriend laughed out loud behind the display of pastries, chatting with Deku.

You looked away rather quickly after he talked about that moment, “Are you ok Y/n?” Deku queried. “Ah they’re fine, they’re just embarrassed. I mean who wouldn’t be, it was their first day.”

Deku grinned and shook his head slightly, reminiscing about all the times he’s embarrassed himself with you in front of people or embarrassed himself in front of you. He smiled at it, without realizing his gaze slowly becoming pinker. Pinker with adoration and love for you.

After all these years, you still held the same grace in his eyes. Of course, you changed a little bit, people change over time. But to him, the best parts of you still remained. You were still the perfect person he would’ve loved to spend his entire life with.

He quickly darted his eyes away from your form making another cup of coffee for a customer, realizing the fact that your boyfriend had gone quiet. Most likely because of the fact Deku was staring at his lover.

“I’m sorry I blanked out,” Deku tried his best to apologize, “What were you saying again?”

For a split second Deku could feel rage beneath your boyfriend’s eyes, it was expected of course. No one would want their significant other to be stared at.

But just as quickly as that rage rose, your boyfriend switched the topics and went back to his chipper move. Though from his already pink-tinted eyes, Deku missed the way his hand gripped the metal prongs used to get the pastries, a little bit tighter.

The next day he came over to the café you worked at, and unlike usual you didn’t greet him from behind the counter. You stayed focus on your work.

Deku couldn’t help but stare once again at your adorable focusing form. Every time he looked at you, though he has yet to come to terms with it, everything else in the room disappears. His eyes, mind, soul, body, and heart all focus on you.

“You must really like our stuff huh?” Your boyfriend interrupted his train of thought and Deku had to mentally scold himself for staring once again.

You also seemed to snap out of your trance and locked eyes with him, you offered him a small smile before rushing back to take the orders of other customers.

Deku, like he would always every other day, ordered his usual. Talked a little bit with your boyfriend, liking him more and more by the day. Then leaving after he had finished his favorite red velvet cupcake you made and morning coffee, oddly enough without talking to you the entire day.

It wasn’t until the next week would he be able to come to your café again, exhausted, tired, and drained.

The week on his last trip to your café swamped him with terribly mentally draining missions and failures. He had failed to rescue the final person from being trapped underneath rubble, after saving her entire family, before he could run in the rubble fell. Instantly killing the person.

A sprout of red blood spilled from her body as her family surrounded it and cried. Deku knelt down and faced the family, his hands stained red from the blood on the floor. He cried and apologized over and over again.

The family stopped his apologies and reassured him it was not his fault.

After clearing out the rubble, the family went over to Deku and invited him to a burial ceremony that exact night. Since their Islamic tradition pushed them to bury the body as soon as possible.

Deku obviously accepted, realizing this could be a way to get through with his own feelings. As if reminding him that people die and that he couldn’t save everyone.

The ceremony was held in a gravesite extremely close to your café, a graveyard he didn’t even notice when visiting your café. To him, the entire thing ended in a flash and after once again apologizing to the entire large family gathered there. He decided to stay and apologize to the girl he couldn’t save.

He felt a foreboding sense of fear of this ever happening again. She was in the wrong situation and no one could’ve saved her if they wanted to save the entire family as well. From the corner of his eye, he saw a beautiful red flower blooming and immediately thought of you.

To him, it was extremely odd to find a flower blooming in a graveyard but he thought it was fitting. The flower had long red petals that curved downwards, red strings of stigma protruding out holding pollen on its tips. He didn’t know what the plant was, nor did he care honestly, he thought it was an incredibly beautiful gem to grow wildly in a graveyard.

Deku stood and plucked a few of them, putting some on the girl’s grave and leaving with a few to bring to you.

Though he found himself unable to go to your café since once more he was swamped with work. He placed the flowers in water, but they seemed to die rather quickly. So, he threw it out before he got the chance to give it to you.

At long last, he was able to visit you. He was rather ecstatic when he saw that your boyfriend was absent from his work. Meaning during your break, he got to have you for himself.

Obviously, he was exhausted and drained, though that would never stop him from babbling nonsense to you. Which he noticed you were enjoying yourself, but you seemed a bit more fidgety than usual. He asked you what was wrong, only to have you brush it off.

He found it slightly frustrating that despite how close you were together, you didn’t trust him enough yet to tell him how you felt. Then the topic of what he did the last week came up.

Deku told you all about the girl he couldn’t save and the flower he found. He asked if you knew the flower and if you could make it bloom right in front of both of you with your quirk. You laughed at his rather childish request but obliged.

“Of course I can silly.” You concentrated your mind to the middle of the table and slowly the same red flower erupted from the middle of the table.

Deku grinned ear to ear and complimented you on your quirk. “You’re incredible as always. I’ve always wanted to ask you so many questions about your quirk but I don’t really think I have the time right now since I have to patrol very soon. But OH do you know what flower this is by the way? I know you love red flowers and I just like the way it looks and how it’s so pretty growing in a place where dead things are you know like in a gra-”

Your sweet laughed cut his rambling short. “Izuku, breathe, I see you still ramble a lot. No, I don’t really know what flower it is, I've just seen it from animes.”

Before Deku could prod you further about the anatomy of the plant or if you could find the flower’s name for him. You quickly turned the subject to a different thing. Letting the spider-like flower in the middle of the table die out rather slowly.

“Hey Izuku, I’ve been wanting to ask.” Deku hummed in reply, “What do you think of my boy-”

But a shriek of pain suddenly filled the café. Deku’s hero instincts caused him to stand up and run immediately to the source. Everything in his eyes went in slow motion.

A woman froze in her spot as a truck rammed against her, just mere inches from Deku’s grasps. The woman immediately got run over just as the driver pressed the breaks.

Deku knelt down on her bleeding body, warm pools of red staining his clothes. Yet another life he couldn’t save. He looked around half expecting to see the looks of disappointment in people’s eyes, and yet all he saw was a pity.

After all, he was a hero, he had to be ready to be able to deal with these situations. Even if it meant forcing himself to get used to the red tint on him from all the blood.

“Y/n look!” A middle-school Deku urged you to look at his hand, a tiny little spider crawled on it. He found the little critter rather adorable.

Yet you found it a little bit more terrifying than him. “How could you hold it so calmly Izuku!!!” You almost shrieked in horror as he tried to pass the spider over to you.

He laughed and continued observing the spider. “Where did you find it anyways??? There are barely any spiders here.” You questioned him further.

Deku merely shrugged, “I found it on that tree, it had pretty red flowers I want to give you…” Realizing what he just said his face turned red and quickly backtracked, “Because you got that perfect score in that final test!!! I just wanted to give you a gift and I know how much you liked red flowers and I’m going to go to a separate school very soon. I don’t know where you’re going, but you know I’m going to UA and going to be the number one hero after I graduate. But I wanted to give you a gift and red flowers seem really cute and if I picked them myself it would be even cuter and I know it's weird and I hope you don’t think I’m we-”

His rambling stopped when he felt something warm on his cheek. “It isn’t weird at all Izuku. I think it’s really cute. Also don’t think so much about that kiss. You seemed too lost in thought so I wanted to snap you back to reality.”

Your funny and mischievous ways of toying with him made his heart ache a tiny bit more. He knew you didn’t realize what you were doing to him was making him fall deeper and deeper to the depths of love.

“Anyways put that spider back on the tree, I want to tell you about this guy that I met the other day.”

He closely listened to your rambles about a boy you seemed head over heels for. He just smiled and agreed to everything. He tuned out every time you gushed about him, the ache in his chest growing heavier and heavier.

He had to be selfless.

After all, if he was going to be a hero, he had to be able to control his emotions. Even if that meant pushing down the urge to tell you to be with him instead, deep inside.

#deku angst #izuku midoriya #deku x reader #izuku x reader #midoriya angst #deku fluff #my hero academia #mha #bnha #boku no hero academia #mha x reader #deku x you #izuku midoriya x you #bnha x reader #izuku fanfic #deku fanfiction

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perfeggso · 3 years

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every fortress falls (AKIRA x NCT)

Please enjoy this anime-kpop crossover for the Lights, Camera, Fanfiction event hosted by @supermwritersnet! I chose to write for Shotaro and one of my favorite fictional universes ever, Akira’s Neo-Tokyo. If you know Akira, my story will run parallel to the canon plot. If not, I hope you give this a try and enjoy anyway and I highly recommend the source material! <3

If you’re interested, here is my AKIRA playlist.

Setting of Akira: It has been thirty years since the end of WWIII, begun due to the detonation of an unidentified superweapon known only as “Akira” over Tokyo. The incident and subsequent war decimated the city which was rebuilt into Neo-Tokyo, a corrupt and crime-ridden megalopolis centered on an artificial island in Tokyo Bay.

Characters: Shotaro, Sungchan, Yuta, Akira main characters, other NCT members upcoming.

Genres: cyberpunk, sci-fi, action/adventure

Warnings: drug use/abuse, gangs, some swearing, eventual graphic violence

Rating: mature but not explicit

Chapter length: 1.3k

Chapter 1:

The capsule cradled in Shotaro’s palm is red and white and shiny, like the earrings that Noriko would wear and which, when Shotaro asked, he found out were supposed to look like “blood and come,” respectively. The drone of Tanaka-Sensei’s voice from the front of the classroom barely penetrates the cloak of sullen disruption shielding Shotaro’s wooden amphitheater seat in classroom 12 of the Eighth District Vocational Training School. Even though realistically no one is paying attention, Shotaro tries to hold the pill so that his hand is obscured by his row’s shared desk. He doesn’t know why he’s so nervous; Tanaka-Sensei is barely commanding control of the room as he attempts to explain how a carburetor works, the closest kid to Shotaro is reading a girly magazine, and everyone at the school is well aware that you can buy as many of these pills as any broke student could afford from the nurse’s office.

It’s just, Shotaro reasons as the patent-leather-like curves of the capsule glint in the jaundiced combination of natural and fluorescent light, he’s always been a good kid. He doesn’t do things like this – at least that’s what Yuta constantly tells him. He doesn’t buy drugs – no matter how cheap they are – from Kaneda’s girlfriend of all people, and he certainly doesn’t take them. Kaneda, Shotaro has always felt, is inextricably linked to him. For one, Shotaro Kaneda’s family name is the same as Shotaro’s given name (though they use slightly different kanji if anyone ever cared to notice). For another thing, the two boys have known of each other since early childhood, having come up in the same orphanage and school system for boys deemed by the state to be “lacking in future prospects.” (Shotaro doesn’t think this label really applies to him; it’s not his fault he doesn’t really like academics and the one activity he really enjoys – dancing – is far too expensive for him to pursue). For a final, crucial thing, Kaneda is the leader of the Capsules, the rival gang to Yuta’s Clowns. The fact that Kaneda could very literally kill Shotaro’s adoptive brother of sorts any day now understandably precludes him from feeling much of an affinity towards his classmate.

Shotaro has been taunted more times than he can remember for being the “boring” Shotaro. But if skating by under the radar to receive his vocational high school diploma, getting out, and not being sent to Jaws for discipline twice a week is boring to his classmates, Shotaro doesn’t really care.

Well, he didn’t care, until he had gotten to thinking one day last week. It started when he’d found Yuta’s stash of drugs. Yuta tries very hard to keep any evidence of his dependency from his little brother, but he’s not always great at it. Over the years, Shotaro couldn’t help but notice the blissful calm which comes over Yuta when Shotaro has caught him thinking he was taking the stuff in private. Nor could Shotaro help but register the ensuing boost in energy and motivation. It had always made him wonder even if Yuta categorically forbid it and he was good at smothering his curiosity. When Shotaro came to school the next day and mentioned finding Yuta’s pills offhand to Sungchan, the younger boy proved less adept at quashing his hunger for new experiences, and Shotaro had begun to truly let his imagination get the best of him.

“Hey!” The harsh whisper startles Shotaro out of his preoccupation with the look and feel of his capsule, to the extent that he almost blunders and drops it down the five graduated rows of seats below him. But fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, he holds on.

The voice is as familiar as the backseat of Yuta’s motorcycle and coming from the level of seats behind Shotaro, so he turns around. Class has devolved to the point that having a full conversation stage-whisper style is about the least disruptive thing occurring.

Sungchan’s oversized frame and comforting smile loom over Shotaro from above, like a benevolent version of the mechanical surveillance vultures Sungchan had once gushed in horror that the American government was trying to build.

“Did I scare you?” Sungchan asks.

Shotaro fakes a glare at his best friend, but only ends up chuckling.

“How could I be scared by a 185cm walking teddy-bear?”

Sungchan tries to look hurt but giggles right back.

“Did you get the stuff?”

Shotaro nods, angling his hand so Sungchan can see the pill.

“Why were you so late to class?” Shotaro asks, feeling irrational panic nipping at the edges of his mind for the first time all day to suggest that maybe Sungchan was held up because someone caught him with drugs. Shotaro wonders why this thought hadn’t occurred to him earlier, hoping that’s an indication of its ridiculousness.

“I got caught up talking to Sawako in the nurse’s office,” Sungchan explains, and Shotaro relaxes a little. “She was very chatty for some reason and I felt bad. I think she’s lonely. Did you know Kaneda got her pregnant?”

“No, what?” Shotaro makes a face as disapproving as he feels. “That asshole. Of course he wouldn’t use protection. Ugh, anyway. Did you get what you wanted? Everything go smoothly?”

Sungchan pulls a button-size plastic bag from his pocket and displays, not quite covertly enough for Shotaro’s liking but he’ll live, the identical red and white capsule within.

“Perfect.”

“I was thinking,” Sungchan continues, “Sawako said she thinks there’ll be a battle between the Capsules and the Clowns tonight. Should we try to catch some of it?”

Shotaro leans his elbows onto the desk in front of his friend and smiles, indulgent.

“While we’re high for the first time? Sounds like a shitty idea.” Sungchan pouts like Shotaro knew he would, so he adds a “we can feel it out in the moment, though,” because he is a weak man when it comes to Sungchan’s wants and needs. They are both that way towards each other, even when it gets them into trouble. But as Yuta always says, “memorable trouble is worth it”; i.e., if it makes a good story in the future, might as well go for it.

“Yuta would kill me if he found out though,” Shotaro wagers, “and I mean that literally.”

The last class of the day ends as he’s speaking and he and Sungchan make plans for meeting in the evening as they filter out of the musty, chipping paint, brutalist structure which is supposed to pass for a place of learning.

Shotaro finds Yuta where he always does after school: unsheathing his motorcycle in the back parking lot.

Yuta’s bike is a souped-up Honda painted to look like a 1940s bomber. Yuta wears a black leather biking suit he probably slipped on in the men’s room before heading out and pulls a helmet decorated with clown makeup over his black mullet as he greets his little brother, following the exchange by offering a similar helmet to Shotaro.

They hop on and head out onto the streets of Neo-Tokyo. Skyscrapers tower grey in the daytime light what feels like miles above the litter-strewn street and block out the sun. They’re so massive they could probably each hold an entire city’s worth of people, Shotaro reckons, and they move sluggishly in opposition to the trajectory of the bike, like cargo ships trudging against water.

“Good day?” Yuta asks when they stop at an intersection next to Flower Alley Mall.

“Yeah,” Shotaro assures. “Sungchan heard something about a battle tonight? What’s up with that?”

“I don’t want to get into it, but he’s right,” Yuta admits. “But don’t try to tag along or I’ll murder you.”

With that, the light turns and Shotaro grabs hold of Yuta, mumbling “I know” fondly into his shoulder. They zip away like that the rest of the way to their apartment, the capsule burning nuclear in Shotaro’s pocket as he’s left to ponder his next move.

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hottestthingalive · 4 years

Note

Ok, fake tic tittle, cause I love your writing, do with it what you please: “The five times (side) faked their death on purpose, and the one time it wasn't their fault”

Ah, y e s!

(Cinder from the future here: Sorry this one took so long, anon, I’ve been using these as a sort of reward system for completing school work and I was procrastinating... Hope you enjoy anyways!)

-It’s Roman. It is 110% Roman.

-DLAMP because he deserves so many boyfriends and so much love, with bonus platonic creativitwins.

-My ideas for Roman fake-dying are as follows, not necessarily in this order:

-During a performance he’s putting on with the other sides (a musical, maybe?) Roman’s character dies. They all cry. He’s an excellent actor and they’d gotten very attached to both his character and also, yknow, their boyfriend. Patton gives him roses after and tells him how brilliant he was and Roman cries too then.

-Pretending to die dramatically on the couch when bantering with Jan. “Your words have greviously wounded me, agh, bleh” the whole thing. Janus thinks its adorable, even though he’s simultaneously having this whole conversation with the other sides about “just kicking the body under couch, its fine, we’re imaginary” and roman “resurrects” all offended.

-Splattering blood all over himself on April Fools and lying down in front of Remus’ room like he was dead (after warning the others so they wouldn’t freak out.) He did it to Remus because he thought his brother wouldn’t care: then Remus is crying over his ‘dead’ body and Roman sits up like “wtf” and then they talk about their feelings and hug it out.

-Playing dead when sword fighting someone (maybe Virgil? I feel like he’d be great at fighting and stuff, what with fight or flight, and his natural talent would probably be a good match for Roman’s training and skill), falls over and goes very still, Virgil’s like “Roman? Roman?” and leans over to check on him and that’s when Roman ATTACKS and Virgil’s all like “you scared me bad” and Roman’s just gloating that he won.

-one time for logan’s birthday he sets up this whole murder mystery plot and he’s the mr. body and it’s just very very very silly sherlock holmes-clue shenanigans. The body disappears halfway through and Logan’s having loads of fun figuring it out and Roman appears at the end in the kitchen like “Haha! I faked my death! What do you think of that, Detective?” and then they kiss and have birthday cake and there’s still a picture of them in their little detective/victim outfits over the mantle.

-and then the + 1.

-angst angst angst~

-So Roman goes off to fight the Dragon Witch in the Imagination. Not an unusual thing. He leaves that morning, sword on his hip, blows kisses to his partners in goodbye, promises to be back by dinner, if not lunch. Remus tells him not to get his butt kicked by the dragon witch, cackling from the couch. Roman flips him off, and then he is gone.

-He’s not back by lunch, but they think he’s just gotten sidetracked, again.

-It is only when Roman is still gone by dinner that they get worried. Virgil insists they go looking for him, but if he hadn’t, one of the others would have. They are all worried.

-(“What if he’s dead?” Remus whispers to Janus, biting his nails frantically. “What if he’s dead, and my last words to him were making fun of him? What if he’s lying alone somewhere, bleeding out in a ditch, being torn apart-”

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Janus says firmly. He has always been a liar.)

-It is not the Dragon Witch they find him fighting when they arrive. Rather, it is an army of shadows, faint ideas of villains that must have broken through the barriers between the twins’ Imaginations and encountered the prince instead of the duke, become strong in the passing. The Dragon Witch fights beside Roman, however, and between them, they are just managing to hold their own.

-They look exhausted.

-“Roman!” Logan shouts despite himself, so, so relieved to see him alive. Roman turns, distracted for just a moment, but it is enough.

-And so the prince falls, and the dragon roars, and she is downed not long after.

-Remus screams, and lunges forwards with his morningstar in hand. Later, he would joke he’d seen red, although privately he knows he hadn’t, and that was the problem -- his rose-red brother, his twin, his family, disappeared beneath the creatures which had been nothing more than living shadows in Remus’ realm, empowered by Roman’s fantasies into full-fledged villains before he’d known to stop himself from picturing them as such.

-Patton has never been so angry before, not that any of them have seen, and his anger makes him strong, his righteous fury fueling him, fighting to avenge his prince. His need to avenge in this place of creation makes him nearly superpowered, his belief in his own ability for vengeance making it possible.

-Then there is Logan, who has always been able to find the cracks in dreams, who uses the logic of the Imagination against the beings within it. He manipulates the rules so whichever creatures he focuses on are once again shadows, or harmless shapes that float away in the end, or black beetles he crushes underfoot with vicious glee.

-As for Janus, well, he has long defended Thomas against the horrors of the world with sweet lies, with his own creations that are not quite imaginary but close enough. He too can manipulate the Imagination, but does not find it necessary, instead whirling among his opponents, shifting between forms so quickly it is impossible to pin him down, his shepherd’s crook the only unchanging element of him.

-And Virgil, Virgil who had vowed to protect all of them with his life a long, long time ago, Virgil who is fast as wind and strikes like lightning, who rages with all the fury of a storm, who knows shadowy villains well, especially the imagined kind, and has always founds them easier to defeat with his family by his side... Well, the army of shadows finds itself battling a hurricane, and they fall at his hand.

-And when they least expect it (when they are on the verge of defeat, despite all their power, when Remus has lost his morningstar, and Patton has fallen, and Logan is surrounded and cannot unreason them all, Janus halfway between snake and side and entirely exhausted, and the darkness that has long clung to the underside of Virgil’s eyes spread to stain all of his skin and forming a pool around his feet) a sword slashes through the being standing above Patton.

-“Sorry, hon,” Roman says. He is an absolute mess, bloody and bruised and sporting a black eye, and their prince smiles tiredly, and Patton thinks he has never been more beautiful, for he is alive. It is all over quickly after that.

“You’re not allowed to do that ever again,” Virgil tells him when they reunite, pulling Roman in a hug and refusing to let him go, and Roman agrees easily.

-After that, there is no more faking of deaths, purposeful or accidental, in the Mindscape. The walls are eventually brought down between the halves of the Imagination, the Thomassphere permanently changed, and though there are other battles, other wars, Roman always has his family to fight beside him.

-He wins them all, of course, for he is their prince, their hero, their Roman, and the hero must always live to see the end of their story, and the end of his story is still far, far away.

Ohhhh, that was fun!!! Thank you, anon!

Send me a fake fic title and I’ll tell you what I’d write for it!

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1kook · 5 years

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baecation

Jeon Jeongguk x (F) Reader

summary⥗“Lose the top, or lose the right to present yourself in any low back gown for the next three months.” He truly knew the way to your heart. tags⥗richboy!jk, -3 knowledge of how vacations work, domestic love!!!, outdoor sex, unprotected sex, fingering, jk’s white ass cheeks mention wc⥗5.9k u ever randomly get inspired for the first time in 2 months and write a whole fic in one night anyway enjoy

There were many perks to dating the heir of your city’s top conglomerate, the endless showering of gifts being one of them, but your favorite thing about your boyfriend wasn’t his overflowing pockets or his secure future, but the lovesick look in his eyes when you told him how much you loved him.

Jeongguk was an enigma.

He was born to be the stereotypical rich boy that authors of teen fiction could only dream of, his looks suitable for magazine covers and his brains destined for top-notch universities. His bloodline was carefully crafted by generations before him, every marriage carefully planned and executed with the ultimate goal to preserve their place in society as apex predators. In fact, Jeongguk’s entire life had been one big script his family had carefully pushed him along, from the fencing classes he took to the hiring of the nation’s best nannies to care for him, all subtle enough for him to not complain but demanding enough that he knew what was going on.

The only thing they hadn’t planned in Jeongguk’s life was him meeting you.

They had never planned for him to meet some middle-class girl, who was definitely not an heiress to any particular company or celebrity of any level, just some random girl he had accidentally bumped into leaving a charity event at the local community park. They hadn’t planned for his long, gangly arms to knock your phone out of your hand, or send it tumbling into the lake as you both watched on in horror. It was only after the quiet plop of water registered in both your ears that you had whirled on him, half of you in shock and the other in fury.

Jeongguk was, as previously stated, handed everything on a silver platter. His parents hardly bothered with teaching him how to do things. He barely understood how to work a washing machine, because all of that was done for him by other people. At the moment, he didn’t have to bother with taking an entrance exam to the best university this side of the country because he knew his parents would pay for the entire thing out of pocket. He especially didn’t ever have to worry about what to do when random girls scolded him in public sight, because frankly, it would never happen.

Yet here he was, completely startled as you told him to watch where he was going, and to learn how to apologize to people when you’ve done something wrong. He’d never had someone of a lower status than him treat him so aggressively before, and when you pause to catch your breath all he can stumble out is that he’ll replace your phone, he’ll even buy you the best model, what was your number so his people could reach out to you again?

The last sentence has you groaning in frustration, as you pointed furiously towards the lake, because how on earth was he supposed to contact you when your phone was 20 feet below surface level?!

After another fifteen minutes of you continuing your verbal rampage against him, the entirety of it which he’d spent fending off his security guard and his assistant (both who’d been appalled that he’d willingly let this peasant swear and curse at him) as he stared at you in awe.

When you finally calmed down and he’d offered to take you to the Starbucks across the street to figure out the details of your phone replacement, he’s surprised to find out your normal disposition is nothing like the one you’d first shown him. In fact, you’re rather sheepish and embarrassed at the coffee shop, albeit still a little upset with him for trashing your phone.

After you’ve finished nailing out the little details of your phone replacement, which included you hesitantly giving him your address, he leaves right away. He’s sad to leave so soon, having become completely enthralled with your entire being in the thirty minutes he’s come to know you, that he finds himself hopelessly staring out of the backseat of the Benz as he travels back to his upscale apartment in the heart of the city. He hopes you don’t forget him so soon.

To say you’re surprised to see a package on your doorstep the next morning is an understatement. You remember every online purchase you make, and if memory serves you right, you hadn’t made one in the past month to warrant its arrival today. After glancing down both ends of your hall, you tug the mystery package inside.

In hindsight you probably should have been more cautious of the entire situation, but part of you was extremely curious to see what brought this surprise on. After tugging the tape off and shuffling through the packing peanuts you’re met with a sleek box for the hottest and most expensive phone right now, a pink bow carefully tied around to secure a note.

One of our guard’s fished around the lake for the phone I misplaced and managed to retrieve the memory card. I hope you won’t mind the new contact I added.

Best,

Jeon Jeongguk

And thus was the start of your love story.

You’re wondering if Jeongguk’s sudden idea was truly a spur of the moment epiphany or another ploy for him to get out of going to the ball his father had planned at the end of this month. You’ve come to learn in the last two years that despite his perfect boy aura, he was quite the impulsive shithead. Eitherway, you know he would have invited you to wherever he was going, and if he hadn’t, his mother would have shipped you a gown from her favorite designer and asked you to drag him there.

As it stands, it’s not a fancy ball you’re preparing for this time around, but a luxurious spring break in the Bahamas, away from school and family and anything to ruin your mood for the next week. You’d just finished your midterms when he bursts into your dorm room, demanding you pack your bags, baby, we’re going to the beach! Evidently, it was not the local beach you were going to. No, the ‘beach’ Jeongguk had referred to was one he conveniently forgot to mention was an entire plane ride away. It wasn’t until he returned later that same day to usher you off to the airport that he realizes how sorely under packed you are.

So now here you were, frantically cramming a week’s worth of cute, summer-y clothes into the only suitcase you own, running back and forth from your closet to the suitcase to the desk where you kept all your beauty products and shower essentials, while your boyfriend ate one of your granola bars on your bed.

“You better not get any crumbs on the bed, you know I hate finding them later,” you scold, not even bothering to look at him as you stuff all your makeup into a small bag.

Jeongguk snorts. “You won’t even be sleeping here for a week, babe,” he says, voice calm and relaxed in the way only someone who’s already done packing can be. The only consolation to your current state was that Jeongguk had booked his family’s private jet, so you really couldn’t be late to a flight only the two of you would be on.

You turn around with a hand on your hip, giving him the same unimpressed look you always do when he’s being unreasonable. “I’m sure the mice you’re attracting will keep it warm for me.” He rolls his eyes, finishing off his snack and then making a big show of patting down your creaky mattress to rid it of any granola crumbs.

He’s settled back into the bed when he speaks again. “Take the orange crop top you bought from Forever 21 last month, it makes your boobs looks amazing.”

You tuck your socks and undergarments against the suitcase’s inner pocket. “Oh right, ‘cause that’s a priority right now.” You don’t wanna tell him it’s already folded against your other clothes because you, too, think it makes your boobs look amazing.

You hear the rustling of the bed sheets once more, before you see his long legs come to a rest around you, arms wrapping around your waist to watch you ruffle through the clothing you already have. “Not my fault my girl’s got a nice set on her.”

“Oh my god, shut up,” you beg, reaching over to your pile of haphazardly thrown shorts and skirts to fold some more into your luggage. You’re careful of not moving far enough away that his arms would dislodge from their embrace. “We could have been halfway to the Bahamas right now if someone bothered to plan things ahead of time and not last minute as a means to get out of a charity ball.”

Jeongguk groans, letting his head fall forward to rest against your back, his soft breath leaving your back warm through your t-shirt. “Can’t a guy just steal his girlfriend away to the Bahamas for a week to avoid the overwhelming stress of life, and maybe choke on some exotic shrimp while she chokes on his di—”

“Get off of me, you pervert!”

The second you step foot on the archipelago that is the gem of the resort world, it’s about seven thousand degrees hotter than it was back home, and the sweat on the back of your neck can attest to that. The jet ride here had been pretty fun, it being your first experience flying private, but also flying in general. Jeongguk had kept you entertained both on the take off and landing, lips kissing down every inch of your neck with a promise for more later.

Well, it was later now, and the need to be sated was still present, something you’re not quite sure your boyfriend was aware of. Jeongguk was like that. Forgetful as fuck. The only reason he ever got anything done was because he had that assistant of his practically glued to his hip at every moment of the day, breathing down his neck every task he needed to complete. If it was up to Jeongguk, and Jeongguk alone, things would get done at a very slow pace.

But you were nothing like your boyfriend, and you suppose it’s why you two go together so well. While he put things to the side, you needed everything to be done right away and fast. Which is why you find yourself pulling him away from the scuba diving kiosk in an effort to check into your high-end cottage away from all the tourist hub.

“Babeee,” he whines, almost forgetting his luggage for the nth time, not used to actually having to haul his things by himself. “We could have seen the reef! You know, where all the fish are at? Where Nemo lives.”

“Uh huh, that’s nice,” you say, finding the driver Jeongguk’s assistant (bless his uptight, perfectionist ass) had booked for your arrival. “But we need to check in first and make sure our rental is all good.”

He seems miffed about the fact people actually have to do that, and had it not been his status as a trust-fund baby funding this entire trip, you would have liked to sock him right in the nose. But he’s your boyfriend and you’re used to his somewhat clueless ways by now, so you let it go.

You don’t know what you expected his assistant to rent out for you guys, but it certainly wasn’t the swanky beach house your driver pulls up to. It’s carefully secluded from the other houses around it, a high hedge-turned-fence surrounding the private yard. It hides a decent sized pool, a few lawn-chairs, and a hot tub from the public beach down below. The house itself is marvelous, complete with multiple bedrooms, two baths, and the most luxurious kitchen you’ve ever seen in a beach house.

“Oh,” you say upon stepping out of the car, mouth agape as you take in the sight of your accommodation for the next few days.

A pair of hands snake around your waist before carefully coming to rest above your navel. Jeongguk presses a gentle kiss to your temple, murmuring, “all for you, princess.” The waves crashing against the beach below are miniscule compared to the sudden blossoming of warmth in your chest.

“Shut up,” you shyly whine, turning around to envelope him in your arms. Your need for him and his body fades at the breathtaking sight behind you, and you find yourself forgetting about it completely as you venture around the house.

It’s the same day when you decide to go out into the yard and tan for a bit. Jeongguk had went in for a nap, a little tired from keeping you entertained on the long flight, because he’d stayed awake even when you fell asleep just in case you woke up scared. You don’t try to discourage him, watching him snuggle into the king mattress as you shuffle around for your bikini.

You’re absentmindedly applying another layer of sunscreen to your face, sunglasses pushed onto the top of your head. You’re completely enveloped by thoughts of your boyfriend, of how he could have easily ran off to the Bahamas alone (he went to Moscow last November on a trip to ‘find himself’), but he’d elected to whisk you off with him.

You tuck your AirPods—another gift from him—into your ears before finally settling into the comfort of a lounge chair, the sun’s rays beating down on you full force. It feels wonderful being away from everything you know with the comfort of returning. You’d always dreamt of visiting such places as a teenager, the presence of a lover or not, but now you truly got to live out those fantasies with Jeongguk.

He was a dream.

It’s about thirty minutes into your session when you register the sound of the sliding door, and you crack one eye open to see your refreshed boyfriend wandering into the backyard in a pair of swimming trunks and a goofy look on his face. “Oh, pardon me, I didn’t know such women came to the public pool,” he smirks.

You roll your eyes, not that he sees through the shades protecting you. “Don’t you dare try to roleplay with me, weirdo.”

He cackles, before somersaulting into the pool, and you find yourself squealing at the splash he makes. He disappears for a second under the water, but then pops back up at the ledge closest to you. “Come on, don’t be a pussy. Play along and maybe we’ll go to the spa tomorrow morning,” he offers.

“Fine.” You decide to join him, but not because the spa.

Jeongguk laughs at your petulant tone of voice, before sprawling out to float across the surface of the pool. “Great, so here’s what I was thinking. Me, the rich middle-aged husband coming here strictly for business. And you, the shy darling relaxing by the pool with her girlfriends who are all pushing her to go talk to me.”

“Sounds perfect, except for the part where I’m actually the sly minx coming here to scam a rich college boy out of his money, luring him into the most pleasurable sex he’s ever had, before ghosting him for all eternity and leaving him forever waiting for someone like me to come into his life again,” you propose.

Jeongguk blinks. “Wow, that sounded so realistic. You’re either really good at this, or… I should be worried,” he playfully accuses, before throwing over a gesture that says im watching you. You laugh.

“Just keep swimming, rich boy.”

He does as you tell him, playing in the water as you tune back into the music drifting into your ears. You’re about done tanning the front side of your body, and flip over to make sure your backside catches the rays as well. You set your sunglasses off to the side, and when you look back for them they’re adorning Jeongguk’s silly face as he doggy paddles around the donut floaty he found.

“Untie your top, dumby. Unless you want those ugly tan lines,” Jeongguk calls out in that brash tone of his. You flip him the bird, before sitting up in a very Ariel-esque pose to glance around your private yard.

As if sensing your hesitation, Jeongguk paddles over to your side, leveling you with an unimpressed look. “These bushes are as tall as a door, and there’s no one around for the next half mile, babe. Lose the top, or lose the right to present yourself in any low back gown for the next three months.”

He truly knew the way to your heart.

You untie the knots at your back and your neck, carefully laying back down to get that perfect tan Jeongguk was talking about. Admittedly, you do feel a bit better knowing you won’t return home with noticeable tan lines, and that much is enough to have your topless self blissfully relaxing.

Your soundtrack is the playlist you had collected on the plane ride, occasionally joined by the splashing Jeongguk makes as he moves around the pool, and before you know it, your timer is ringing to let you know it’s time to flip over again. This time, you’re less hesitant about shedding your top, breasts bare to the sky as you throw the top over your eyes (guess where your sunglasses still where).

You hear a wolf whistle from the other side of the yard, and catch sight of Jeongguk sitting at the edge of the pool. His skin is glistening from the water, the sun enveloping him in its warmth. He’d been outside for a shorter time than you but somehow he’d accumulated a darker color faster. The sun loved him like no other. He’s pushing himself to his feet when he catches your gaze, mischievous smirk twisting his features as he rounds the pool.

“Didn’t know this was a nude beach,” he says, and you curse your body for the way it reacts to the sight of his messy hair and tone abdomen. Your nipples harden embarrassingly and you can’t even hide them.

“Tired already?” You muse instead, hoping he doesn’t comment on the state of your breasts. “Tired after a plane ride, tired after swimming. Didn’t know I was dating an old man.”

“Har har,” he says in a monotone voice, and you can’t help the curl of a smile at beating him at his own playful ways. He stops in front of you, and your expression is knocked clean off when the water droplets clinging to his body fall onto your warm skin.

“Jeongguk!” You whine, pushing him away with your foot in a valiant effort to save yourself from the cold water. If anything, your actions end up bringing your demise as he catches your ankle in his hand.

“Ah ah, princess,” he tuts, bending your leg upward only to place his knee where it once was. He ducks down to tower over you, your continuous squealing only bringing an evil smile to his face. “What did we say about tan lines?”

You push him away, groaning in defeat as his hair drips even more water onto your skin. “I took the top off, what now?”

He glances down, and for a moment, you’re confused as to what he sees that you don’t. You're only met with the sight of your yellow bikini bottom preserving the last of your dignity.

You scoff. “You’re kidding.”

Much to your chagrin, he’s not.

“You’re on one of the nicest islands in the world, staying in a private home with fences tall enough to stop Bigfoot from looking in, and you’re gonna tan with your bikini bottoms on? You’re ridiculous.”

You shove his shoulder, before resigning yourself to getting soaked by him as he shuffles around to squish you under his weight. “You’re ridiculous for thinking I’d be outside without any clothes on!”

He snorts against your shoulder, long arms moving around until he has one somewhat curled beneath you. “Nah. You are.”

“Don’t start with me, Jeon.”

He shifts again to look you in the eye. “Come on, ___. You’re really gonna get tan lines when you could avoid them?”

You roll yours eyes. “You couldn’t get me to go outside completely naked for a million bucks, baby.” The beginning of a grin curls around his lips. “Don’t even think about it.”

This brings a laugh out of him, before he’s laying back down to kiss your neck. “You’re silly.” All you can really hope for now is that him laying on top of you won’t give you an even worse tan line.

Just when you think he’s given up on his quest to have you completely naked outside, you feel the slightest tug on the tie holding your bikini in place, slapping your hand down on his as if he were a pesky fly. “Fine!” He huffs, rolling off you to jump back into the water. “I hope everyone sees your uneven tan.”

“No one would see a tan line on my coochie, Jeon,” you remind him, flinching when he decides to cannonball into the water right beside you, sprinkling you in another round of water pellets.

He emerges from the clear water a moment later, paddling to the ledge beside you to flick more water your way. “I will,” he retorts. “When I got you bent over tomorrow morning.”

You don’t hesitate to fling your bikini top his way, the yellow fabric smacking him across the face. “In that case, you should take those shorts off, because I certainly don’t wanna have to look at your pasty thighs.”

“You love my milky thighs,” he hums, traversing the length of the pool for his donut floaty again.

“Milky?”

Your tiny quarrel ends there, Jeongguk soon becoming too immersed in competing against himself in a breath-holding contest to bother you any longer. He’s adorable like this, cheeks puffed out like Mrs. Puff every time his head pops out of the water, that you almost forget to flip over when your timer rings again.

It’s in the midst of your repositioning that you dare take a peak beneath your bottoms. Much to your disdain, there is a growing disparity between the skin beneath your swimsuit and the skin around it. Nothing too bad, but if you were to lay out as long as you planned, it’d become embarrassingly noticeable. Your breasts had been saved from any differences thanks to Jeongguk’s early warning, and you begin wondering if shedding your bottoms would inflate his already huge ego.

No matter, you discreetly unknot the ties securing your bottoms, hoping he won’t notice from across the yard as you carefully slip them off.

You make quick work of laying on your stomach again, your ass finally catching some rays after being covered for so long. You won’t lie, there’s an unexpected wave of comfort that comes with being bare outside, your entire body wonderfully enveloped by the sun’s beaming rays. You snuggle into the lounge chair’s cushions as you nearly reach nirvana.

Your blissful state is ruined not even ten minutes later when the sound of Jeongguk’s heavy splashing comes closer and closer. It’s not until you hear the splat of his wet feet against the pavement that you realize you’re in trouble.

There’s a playful smack against your ass, and you yelp in surprise. “Jeon!” You whine, instantly sitting up on your forearms to narrow your eyes at him. He’s flashing you that playful grin of his as he plops down beside you, not even having to ask you to move over because you do so subconsciously

“Knew you’d give in eventually,” he sighs, leaning back on his palms as he tries to catch his breath. You decide to give up on your dreams of having a peaceful tanning session, turning around to face your glistening boyfriend.

“What do you want for lunch?” You ask instead, running a hand through the hair at the nape of your neck, rolling your shoulders around to get some movement back into them. He shrugs, slithering his way up the cushions to squish himself beside you. It’s a tight fit, but he makes it easier by throwing your leg over his middle.

“Probably some good food in the little village a mile from here. Could probably walk there too.” You hum in agreement, snuggling into his side. You’ve long since gotten over the coldness of his skin, cheek pressed against his chest. He’s got a hand on your lower back, partially to hold you close but also to stop you from rolling off the chair.

Right as your snoozing off, so wonderfully warm beneath the sun and comfortable in your birthday suit, you feel a pair of fingers brush against the backside of your thigh, and then ghost over your exposed pussy.

“You’re despicable,” you murmur, tweaking his nipple between your fingers. Jeongguk snickers, shifting you around so you’re mostly on top of him now, your awakened core pressed against his thigh.

“C’mon, princess,” he goads, running a pair of moist fingers along your thigh again, trying to carefully coax you into doing what he wants. Most things, you now realize, tend to go Jeongguk’s way regardless of other factors. “No one’ll hear us out here.”

“But what if someone does,” you point out, always the voice of reason when it comes to Jeongguk’s ideas. “We could get in trouble, Guk. I don’t know…”

“In trouble for what?” Is his smart rebuttal, shuffling beneath you so you can finally feel the swollen cock hiding beneath his swimming trunks. “Enjoying ourselves in our own home? Oh, the terror.” Upon seeing the uncertainty that still clings to your features, he drops the somewhat cocky attitude to press a kiss to your nose. “It’s all good, princess,” he soothes, ducking down to caress the side of your face with his cherried lips. “If anything, I’ll just bribe our way out of any trouble.”

“Ugh,” you groan, melting into him as you finally give in. “I hate when you say that.”

Jeongguk snuffles a laugh against your jaw, maneuvering the two of you around until you’re laid flat against the cushion with him hovering over you. “When I say what?” He teases. “That my wallet is as fat as my cock?”

You roll your eyes, untying the knot he’d done at the front of his shorts. “Get that fat cock of yours out before I change my mind.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he complies, setting one foot on the floor to push his shorts down, until you’re met with the sight of his stark thighs. You cackle, and his arrogant smirk is wiped off as he glances down at his two-toned legs.

“What happened to getting the perfect tan?” You sneer, tapping a finger against his muscled thighs. “Don’t tell me your ass is this white, too.”

He huffs in annoyance, before reclaiming his spot between your legs again, tugging you down until your cores are pressed together. “Shut up.” You do as he says, words catching in your throat at the feeling of his engorged cock brushing against your wet folds.

His slips a hand down to languidly toy with your folds, his fingers slightly pruny from all the time he spent in the water. It feels a little weird, but any complaints you may have had are wiped away when he nudges your bud with the tip of his pointer finger. You gasp, fingers digging into his shoulders at the sudden stimulation against your core. “Ohh,” you sigh, eyes rolling backwards.

“Feel good?” He checks, eyes trained on your expressions, lips unconsciously puckering to kiss you, even with your writhing beneath him. You let out a high-pitched mewl, much to your embarrassment, cheeks flushed warm from the sun and his ministrations. You nod belatedly.

He lets his wandering hands carry on, carefully travelling across the entirety of your folds. He knows your body like no other, so familiar with the dips and curves, that it’s impossible for him to not immediately locate your g-spot upon plunging his fingers inside you. “G-Guk!” you cry out, hands falling to grip at his biceps.

He presses a kiss to your throat. “That’s it, baby, lemme hear you,” he murmurs, and subtly presses his cock to the inside of your thigh. “Looked so delicious out here,” he sighs, and it’s as if he’s talking to himself. “Wanted to fuck your pretty little pussy from the second I stepped outside.”

Your back arches beneath him at a particular scissor of his fingers, another whine caught in your throat. “Want you so bad,” you whimper, reaching a hand up to tangle in his dark locks. You use the leverage to pull his lips towards yours, meeting in a frantic crash that has you whining against him even more.

His tongue slips past your lips, subduing yours when you try the same on him, and you almost choke on the excess saliva pooling in your mouth. Right before you can, he pulls back in favor of trapping your lower lip between his teeth. Your eyes flutter open, and you meet his own dark gaze.

“Ready?” He huffs, pulling his fingers out from within you. They’re shiny with your slick, almost as wet as they’d been when he was swimming earlier. You nod, dazed from all the pleasure he was giving you, that you can’t do more but spread your legs for him. He leans back on his knees, lining himself up with your hole.

You’d long since eliminated condoms from your relationship with Jeongguk, your trust in each other overwhelmingly so. Besides, you were still on the pill, and Plan B existed, so you never really worried about slipping up and accidentally getting yourself pregnant. Although there were times when he’d go overboard, stuffing you with his cum until you feel bloated, you’d never gotten pregnant before, so you wouldn’t begin to worry now.

Just the idea of feeling him in his entirety has you salivating, needy hands reaching out to grasp any part of him you can reach. Jeongguk snickers at your desperate ways, knotting his fingers with yours before pressing them to the cushion beneath you, the other gripping onto your thigh to keep your legs spread.

The second his tip pushes through the initial tightness, your mouth drops open, indecipherable noises escaping you. “J-Jeon,” you cry, chest heaving at the sudden intrusion.

“Relax for me, princess,” he huffs, just as out of it as you. Your body feels like it’s ascended, Jeongguk’s cock slowly pushing in further with each breath you take. It doesn’t take much longer for him to completely bottom out, the warm skin of his thighs pressing against you.

You’re like a fish out of water, mouth opening and closing as your body slowly assimilates to the feeling of being so absolutely full. It’s not until Jeongguk subtly shifts his weight onto his other leg that you give him the green light to start fucking you.

You moan, the first few thrusts hitting against every sweet spot inside you. “God, you’re so fucking big,” you heave, clenching around him just to feel the drag of his cock against your walls.

Jeongguk chuckles through his own pants, the fingers entwined with yours becoming impossibly tighter. “You’re too good for me,” he sighs, hauling your thigh further up his forearm until its resting in the crease of his elbow. The positioning allows his strokes to go deeper. You cry out, squirming beneath him with each thrust he gives.

“Oh fuck,” you cry wantonly when he plunges deeper into you, the water that decorated his skin long having been replaced by the sweat clinging to him. Your eyes flutter shut and you’re left only listening to the sounds of you, Jeongguk, and the ocean waves beneath you. “I love you,” you whimper.

Jeongguk grunts, ducking down to kiss you again, his hips not once slowing down. “Love you too, princess,” he murmurs. “Fuck, I don’t deserve you,” he groans, puncuating his statement with a brutal thrust of his cock into you. “Gonna buy you that pretty Valentino bag when we get back, I promise,” he adds, picking up his pace.

You whine, “You don’t have to, Jeon, I—”

He cuts you off, “and that silver Audi you liked at the car show last winter,” he rambles on, seemingly clueless to your protest. “A-And maybe that Louis Vuttion coat that brings out the color in your eyes—”

“I saw the same one at H&M,” you interrupt, swiveling your hips upwards to meet his thrusts. He chokes out a laugh.

“Shut up and just let me spoil you,” he groans, and then seemingly forgets what else he was planning on buying you as he focuses his complete attention on helping you reach your orgasm.

With his focus solely on that, you find the burning feeling in your lower abdomen grow tenfold, voice becoming more annoying with each moan and whine you give. “That’s it, baby,” he encourages, his thrusts sending tingles up and down your spine. He peppers kisses down your chest, each touch leaving your skin scorching.

Time seems to slow when the coil in your stomach finally snaps, an embarrassingly loud moan leaving your lips as your body spasms beneath him. “Oh, Jeongguk,” you sigh, falling limp on the lounge chair as he continues chasing his high.

He pulls out soon enough, giving his cock a few tugs before he’s spurting his come across your lower abdomen, leaning back to admire his masterpiece. He’s panting afterwards, and the backyard feels eerily quiet as you both just gaze at each other with goofy smiles on your faces.

The romantic aura is ruined when he feels the need to say, “hey, maybe now my ass won’t be so white.”

“Fuck, you look sexy,” he murmurs when the instructor finally turns around, leaving Jeongguk to gawk at your body in the tight wetsuit provided. “Gonna fuck you so good tonight.”

“Shut up,” you blush, trying to stop your eyes from violating your boyfriend’s disgustingly gorgeous body in the matching wetsuit he wears. “We’ll get kicked out of the group, Guk.”

He rolls his eyes. “I could have rented the whole place out for us, but someone thought scuba diving with the other corny tourists would be fun.”

You flick his forehead. “You don’t have to buy out every building we go to,” you remind him, memories of this morning’s completely empty breakfast bar flickering to attention. “Besides, I wouldn’t have let you fuck me tonight anyway.”

He scoffs at your claim. “Please, you would have begged me, ___.”

You hit him with the wide end of your swimming fin, then have to apologize to the instructor for your horseplay, much to Jeongguk’s amusement. You narrow your eyes at him, following the rest of the group out onto the boardwalk leading to the boat. “Find me a Nemo, and we’ll do it in the beach cabana.”

Jeongguk’s lips twists into the most devious smirk you’ve ever seen, and he smacks your ass as he runs ahead of you. You yelp, just as he turns to face you just as he nears the group. “Has anyone seen my son?”

#the last line is a nemo reference #kpopwonderlandtag #thekpopnetwork #jeon jeongguk #jungkook smut #jjk smut #mine

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carewyncromwell · 3 years

Photo

*hums the Up is Down theme* All right, let’s get the usual stuff for the POTC AU out of the way super quick so we can just jump right in --

Previous part is here -- full tag is here -- alternate version of picture two with a lame attempt at blood is here -- and characters that aren’t mine are Jules Farrier-Weasley @cursebreakerfarrier; Finn McGarry/Davy Jones @theguythatdraws; Samantha O’Connell @samshogwarts; Arjun Singh and Aishwarya Mehra @hogwarts9; and Ellie Hopper @that-ravenpuff-witch! Hope you enjoy! xoxo

x~x~x~x

The crew member Orion sent delivered his Piece of Eight -- his right earring -- to Jules aboard the Revolution. Both Bill and Jules had been concerned about Orion sending it on ahead rather than bringing it back to them himself; they were even more concerned when the fleet of small ships was led by Jae and the Kumiho, rather than by the Artemis. Jacob and Ashe, however, didn’t seem surprised, even though Jacob’s eyes narrowed slightly and he went oddly quiet when he heard the news. If Bill didn’t know any better, he could’ve sworn he might’ve even seen some guilt in the curly-haired pirate’s face.

Meanwhile Charlie pulled up alongside the Revolution to drop Chia Dalma off safely before the Phoenix rejoined the Blackbird, Naga, and Treasure. Before parting ways, Charlie actually pulled Chia aside.

“So,” he said a bit sheepishly, “guess it’s time, then?”

Chia nodded. She tilted her head slightly to the right in response to how uneasy Charlie looked.

“Something troubles you?” she asked.

“Not trouble, exactly,” said Charlie, offering a smile. “I mean, I’m glad you’ll get to be free. What the Brethren Court did, back then...it was a right rotten thing to do...”

His smile faded. “I guess I just wondered why you called yourself ‘Chia Dalma,’ and not Calypso. I mean -- you are Calypso, right? It’s not like when the spell is broken, you’ll just...disappear, right?”

Chia was taken aback by the concern. Then her pale face softened, betraying genuine fondness.

“You have a noble heart, Charles Weasley,” she said. “I’m afraid that Chia Dalma will cease to be, when the spell is broken. She is human -- I am human...and I no longer will be, when the spell is broken. I will no longer feel things the way I do now, or see things the way I do now...and my perspective once again will be that of an immortal, not a mere human.”

She gave Charlie a reassuring smile.

“But Calypso will not forget what Chia Dalma has seen and learned. Nor will she forget the kindness you showed her.”

The corners of Charlie’s lips turned up too. He brought up a hand and clapped Chia on the shoulder, giving it a squeeze.

“And I won’t forget the sea goddess who was once my friend,” he said with a grin.

Meanwhile, on the HMS Lion, Cutler Beckett had assembled his higher-ranked officers on deck to give them their last set of orders. There would be no quarter during the battle, no prisoners taken -- everyone in the pirates’ fleet and in Shipwreck Cove would be wiped out, without exception or mercy. Carewyn could see how hesitant the other officers were, upon hearing this. Percy, in particular, looked very troubled.

“Lord Beckett -- ” he said before he could stop himself, “d-denial of quarter -- surely that isn’t necessary...we have more than enough room to transport prisoners back to Port Royal -- ”

“The pirates themselves wave a flag that represents no quarter,” said Beckett very smoothly without stopping his stride as he walked past the line of officers. “They have not earned the right to it themselves.”

Percy faltered. “W-well...yes, but...they are pirates, sir. Should we not...show a better example, as King’s Men -- ?”

Beckett came to a sharp stop in front of Percy, looking up at the slightly taller man with a rather beady dark eye.

“Do I sense a lack of conviction, Captain Weasley?” he asked, his voice very soft but very dangerous.

Percy stiffened, his freckled face losing quite a bit of its color. The officers surrounding him looked worried too. Rakepick, who was standing a few feet away from the line of soldiers with her arms crossed, didn’t look worried, but her dark blue eyes did narrow grimly upon Percy and Beckett.

“No, sir!” said the red-haired Captain very quickly.

“Ah, then it’s a conflict of interest, perhaps,” said Beckett, his voice becoming a bit harder as his lips spread into a cold smirk.

He leaned in a bit closer, and whispered something else in Percy’s ear that no one else could hear. It made Percy’s entire frame stiffen, his face blanching in horror as his wide brown eyes flickered over to Carewyn.

“Lord Beckett, Captain Weasley’s loyalty to the English Crown is unflappable,” Carewyn said in a very loud, harsh voice. “As is the loyalty of all of our officers. He meant no disrespect, I assure you.”

Beckett looked at her, his eyebrows raised high over his coldly narrowed eyes. As he strode purposefully over to stand in front of Carewyn, all of the officers tensed up even more anxiously, none more so than Percy. Rakepick had uncrossed her arms and was watching the scene unfold like a hawk.

“I certainly hope that is true,” said Beckett very softly. “Treason is -- as we all know -- a death sentence.”

Carewyn met Beckett’s icy gaze head-on, even as he likewise leaned in, his head once again lingering over her shoulder like it had back in his cabin, so that his breath grazed her face.

“I will not punish your brother for his insubordination, as a favor to you. But I expect proper gratitude on your part. After all, I’m already doing quite a favor for you already, allowing you and him to remain among the ranks.”

Carewyn’s almond-shaped blue eyes narrowed, but she refused to look at him or speak. Beckett’s face grew a bit colder still as he tilted his head enough that his lips were mere inches from her ear.

“Don’t forget, Admiral,” he whispered, and there was an odd satisfaction creeping into the corners of his pitiless voice, “your loyalty is, first and foremost, mine.”

He then moved away, turning his focus back to the rest of the officers with his more usual, detached sort of expression.

“Attack when ready -- no prisoners, no mercy. You’re dismissed.”

The officers all saluted and immediately bustled off to head back to their ships. Carewyn glanced over just in time to see Percy, rather than heading immediately back to his ship, rush up to her. His freckled face was ashen and his eyebrows were knitted tensely over his eyes.

“Carey...Lord Beckett -- ”

“I know,” Carewyn cut him off. She already knew what Beckett must have said to Percy, for the rose-colored lenses to fall from his eyes so quickly.

Percy’s brown eyes widened even more. They darted over to Beckett heading up to the helm and then back to Carewyn, welling up with anxiety.

“He suspected it after you expressed interest in him hiring a woman,” said Carewyn softly. “I reckon him knowing Rakepick first made it easier -- she dressed as a man for a while, when she was in the Navy...”

Percy seemed to be losing more and more of his courage every second. His face suddenly looked so much more boyish as his gaze fell away from Carewyn’s face, staring down at the deck of the ship without seeing it.

“It’s my fault,” he mumbled.

“Don’t say that,” Carewyn cut him off firmly.

Percy closed his eyes and shook his head.

“It’s all my fault,” he repeated, shame and pain pulsing through his face. “I never should’ve trusted him, I never should’ve believed -- I just -- he was so against piracy, and I...after you were taken by Orion Amari -- after you got kidnapped by the crew of the Revenge -- ”

“Percy -- ”

Carewyn brought a hand onto his shoulder, but he cut her off, his soft voice more choked and upset than ever.

“I never should’ve let Bill and Charlie go after you alone -- I should’ve followed them myself in my own ship, if I had to -- ”

“Percy.”

Her hand clutched the top of his shoulder, right beside his neck, so as to force him to look up at her.

“You were only trying to do what was right, as an officer,” said Carewyn, her blue eyes blazing with conviction despite their pain and empathy. “The Navy is your dream, far more than it ever was mine, or Charlie’s, or Bill’s. Don’t hate yourself for trying to do things the right way. ...That’s always been who you are.”

Giving Percy’s shoulder a tight squeeze, she steered him forward enough that she could bring her other arm around him and give him a hug.

“I know what Beckett must’ve threatened you with, Perce, but I want you to forget it,” she said, and her voice betrayed a crack of emotion Percy had never heard before. “Don’t try to protect me or my reputation -- those things won’t matter much longer anyway. Do what you need to, to do what’s right...for yourself and them.”

Them... Percy tensed. He knew who that “them” was, but...the way her voice choked -- was she...trying not to cry?

He looked at his surrogate sibling with dismay, but he couldn’t see her expression.

“Carey -- ”

��Admiral.”

Carewyn pulled away from Percy and looked up.

Rakepick had approached them, her dark blue eyes flickering from Carewyn to back over her shoulder at Beckett, who had seemed to have turned his focus back to the two red-haired officers -- almost as if she was...trying to warn them.

Recovering from this surprise quickly, Carewyn turned to Percy with a harder, more serious look and grabbed his shoulder, giving him a light push backward.

“Go, now,” she said, her voice hardening to try to obscure the pain and tears she was trying to force back.

Percy’s brown eyes rippled with anxiety. He clearly wanted to insist on her explaining, wanted to argue her point -- but he too could sense Beckett’s gaze. So, with a pained expression, he reluctantly straightened up and exchanged a salute with Carewyn, before finally leaving the deck and returning to the jollyboat that would return him to the Clearwater.

Rakepick and Carewyn both watched Percy go.

“You didn’t tell him,” said Rakepick lowly. “No doubt because you don’t want him to try to stop you...”

Carewyn looked at Rakepick, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. “Didn’t tell him what?”

Rakepick, however, didn’t respond. Her eyes watched the horizon absently, but seemed to almost look beyond it.

Carewyn's eyes flashed with even more distrust as she turned to face the older woman. “Don’t play games with me, Rakepick -- ”

“The time for games is long since through,” said Rakepick sharply, as she turned to looked Carewyn straight on in the face.

What...was that, in her expression? It was certainly harsh and arrogant as ever, and yet...there was something almost sadder there.

“You truly are a guardian, Admiral Weasley,” murmured Rakepick. “Right now, though...it seems to me that it’s you who most needs guarding.”

Carewyn felt a knife in her chest at the thought of Jones and the fate that awaited her. Her blue eyes drifted off to the side and away from Rakepick’s face, hardening further as she tried to obscure her emotions.

“I’m not so much of a coward as to choose my safety over the lives of others’,” she said very harshly, turning her focus to the helm.

She turned her back on Rakepick, her arms looping behind her straightened back in proper Navy posture.

“You should return to your post...before Beckett gives you the side eye too.”

Rakepick didn’t respond, and Carewyn refused to look back as she strode away.

Almost immediately, the strategy Jacob had devised did not go as planned.

The plan had been for Jules to bluff Beckett before releasing Calypso -- but although the Revolution, as flag ship, had pulled into position at the head of the pirates’ charge, Beckett’s (and therefore the Navy’s) flag ship the HMS Lion did not. Instead it hung back, letting individual Man O’ Wars immediately start the charge without it.

In alarm, Jules ordered her crew to hoist the colors and signal to the rest of the Pirate Lords to attack, as the Flying Dutchman sailed out in front as if to meet the Revolution. Charlie and Merula led the charge in the Phoenix and the Blackbird, firing at will against the Man O’ Wars in an attempt to hit their stores of ammunition, even as the Navy’s ships’ superior firepower quickly overwhelmed them, cutting down the smaller ships in the dozens with their cannons.

“Captain!” said Barnaby from his place at the helm. “We just lost three more ships -- oh. Make that four!”

Charlie’s eyes narrowed as he racked his brain.

The Man O’ Wars were too powerful to face head-on -- they just had far too much firepower, compared to their pirates’ fleet --

A mad idea beginning to take root in Charlie’s head, he whirled around toward Samantha O’Connell, who’d been up in the rigging adjusting sails so that the Phoenix could better avoid the Navy’s cannon fire.

“Signal to the Naga! We need to get closer to that Man O’ War at the front!”

Samantha’s mouth dropped open disbelievingly. “Closer? But that’ll only make it easier for them to shoot us down!”

“Not if we divide their attention!” Charlie shot back forcefully.

He ran up to the deck of the ship and leapt onto the railing so he could dangle off the rigging and better talk over the sound of cannon fire.

“We’re going to do what pirates do best,” said the red-haired pirate captain, shooting a huge, blazing grin up at Samantha, “we’re going to sack and commandeer that Man O’ War ourselves!”

With some help from Arjun and Aishwarya running interference, Charlie was able to steer the Phoenix up alongside one of the Navy’s ships, called the Clearwater. As mad as Charlie’s idea was, however, it seemed he hadn’t been completely off-base -- just as Ben Copper himself had proposed earlier, the Navy had indeed not expected the pirates to try sacking and stealing their ship. Unfortunately to get close enough, the Phoenix ended up directly in the path of the Clearwater’s cannons, and as the pirates started to board, cannonballs blasted through the air, smashing the Phoenix to pieces.

“ABANDON SHIP!” roared Charlie. “ALL HANDS TO THE CLEARWATER!”

The pirates all flocked to the rigging and gangplanks to board the Man O’ War, now their only hope at avoiding the ocean waves. Charlie met up with Barnaby on deck, even as its planks was blasted to pieces.

“Is everyone else off?” demanded Charlie.

“Aye, Captain!” said Barnaby.

As splinters of wood and metal shot through the air, Charlie and Barnaby both leapt up into the rigging, preparing to swing across --

Unfortunately, just as they both swung, a cannonball collided squarely with the ringing. In an instant, both men were flung off of the ropes they’d been holding and into the air, falling toward the water with the weight of stones.

Barnaby, in a purely instinctual move, leaned forward in mid-air and, with all of his strength, shoved Charlie forward just enough that he could clear the hurtle between the two ships.

Charlie ended up colliding harshly with the deck of the Clearwater, his leg collapsing out from under him with an unpleasant CRACK.

“ACK!”

With a bellow of pain, the red-haired pirate captain crumpled in on himself, gritting his teeth as he struggled to control his breathing.

“Charlie!”

Samantha chucked a lit grenade right into the side of one of the Navy soldiers’ heads, using the Navy officers’ alarm and the subsequent small explosion as a distraction so she could run over. Bending down, she quickly grabbed hold of his arm to help Charlie to his feet.

“Augh -- “ choked Charlie. “My leg -- I can’t...ack!”

Samantha secured her arm around his waist, using a considerable amount of strength to try to hold him up at her side. “Hold on -- I’ve got you -- ”

Charlie looked up and around, taking in the scene of his men hot in battle with the Navy’s men.

“Barnaby?”

Charlie looked around. His First Mate wasn’t there.

Limping badly on his injured leg, Charlie threw himself across the deck to look over. In the ocean between the two ships was an unsettling set of ripples -- as if a body had collided with the water.

“BARNABY!”

“LOOK OUT!” yelled Samantha.

Charlie would’ve likely thrown himself overboard to try to retrieve his fallen comrade, but he immediately had to yank out his cutlass and defend himself against a Navy soldier who‘d made to attack him. Samantha pulled out her pistols and began shooting, trying to beat the enemy forces back as they descended on the fallen Phoenix’s captain.

Neither Charlie or Samantha saw the second cluster of ripples and bubbles that burbled up from under the surface, nor the gold mermaid tail that briefly flipped up out of the water before disappearing again under the waves.

Nothing turned out as it should. The battle plan Jacob and the pirates had devised hoping to scare the majority of the Man O’ Wars into surrendering was cut off at the legs. If they released Calypso now, there would be no reason for any of the Navy officers to think that her release was a threat pointed squarely at them. Calypso would certainly have no reason to cooperate, even if Chia Dalma had expressed some favoritism toward Orion and Charlie previously. They were still pirates, and Calypso had no reason to help the kind of people who had trapped her for so long just because they released her, especially since the decision was made out of desperation. The only thing guaranteed by Calypso’s release would be that the battle would be harder and would likely put everyone’s lives in even more jeopardy.

Despite this, however, Jules was firm in her conviction. They’d made a promise to release Calypso, and more importantly, it was a decision that was already well overdue. Regardless of whether Calypso decided to help them or not, she didn’t deserve to stay in bondage.

So despite the hesitance on Jacob’s and the majority of her crew’s faces, Jules fetched the tricorn hat full of the seven Pieces of Eight she’d been given by the other Pirate Lords -- Orion’s gold hoop earring, Jae’s copper mun coin, Ellie’s sunflower-engraved pocketwatch, Arjun’s snake-engraved fob seal, Charlie’s “S”-trimmed anchor button, and Merula’s jade ring. Then Jules plopped in the eighth that Samantha had fetched from the inside of the Pirate Codex (a cheap copper brooch shaped like a mermaid and scarred over with greenish-white rust), to represent her as Pirate King, and handed the full hat to Chia Dalma before setting the pieces on fire.

“Calypso,” Jules murmured as gently as she could, “I release you from your human bonds.”

The transformation was terrifying. It was little wonder that the process of turning Calypso into a human was described as her “being bound in her bones,” for when the goddess was set free of her human form, it was like a foreboding, slow-motion explosion. Chia’s eye sockets erupted blueish-white light, while her hair and clothes dissolved away into terrible gusts of wind and crashing sea spray. The low, rumbling, earthquake-esque sound that erupted from her could not be contained by her lips, instead coming from her every pore, as she levitated up off the ground, her flesh and blood limbs dangling uselessly in the face of her supernatural essence breaking free of them. Her flesh seemed to melt away, becoming more liquid and blue and white and incorporeal -- until at last, Chia Dalma’s frame burst open in a violent crash of seawater that for an instant submerged the entire pirate ship.

Jules, Bill, Jacob, and the rest of the crew were suddenly underwater, scrambling to escape so they could breathe. It was only thanks to Ashe that they survived. The merman quickly swam up to the helm and took control of the ship’s steering wheel, chucking it all the way around to tilt the Revolution sharply enough that it forced the ocean wave that had been Calypso back off the side.

Calypso, however, was not just the wave, as the pirates quickly found out. Overhead, there was a horrible rumble of thunder. Within moments, the ocean began to quake under the Revolution and the Flying Dutchman, darkening forebodingly. Somewhere in the distance, Jules could hear a delighted roar, like a triumphant beast’s -- it was Jones, delighted by the liberation of his lover and by the vengeance she would wreck for him.

Rakepick stared up at the darkening sky, her eyes very wide. “This...this storm -- it can’t be -- !”

“Oh, but it is.”

The cursed captain whirled on Rakepick, a smirk curling up into his octopus-stained features and a malevolent gleam in his eye.

“And now,” he said as he unsheathed his sword, “I fear no consequence o’ this!”

Rakepick cried out in agony as Jones plunged his sword right through the upper-right side of her chest. The privateer-turned-pirate-hunter crumpled up on the base of the stairs, her tricorn hat flying off into the wind. She tried to pull the blade out, but she was pinned down to the deck, unable to move as blood spurted out of her chest like a red flower.

“Augh...augh...”

Satisfied that the woman who’d so haughtily lorded over him was going to suffer properly before dying, Jones whirled on the rest of his crew with a victorious gleam in his eye.

“Let’s finish dismantling this ship afore us!” he indicated the Revolution, which was sailing up alongside the Flying Dutchman. “Then we can turn our sights toward different prey!”

Out of the blackening sky, a bolt of lightning crashed down, colliding with the ocean a mere twenty feet from the HMS Lion. The threat of fiery white death terrified Beckett’s men. Carewyn struggled to keep them calm, ordering them to weigh anchor so the HMS Lion could join its brothers in the charge. Beckett, however, contradicted her.

“If we advance, then we’ll merely be sailing right into the pirates’ hands,” he said coolly, as he sipped a cup of tea from the helm. “Our other ships are already dismantling them well enough.”

Carewyn’s blue eyes flashed. In an oddly harsh move, she brought up a hand and slammed it down on the table, making the china tea set rattle precariously and her fellow Navy men flinch.

“Don’t be a fool!” she hissed. “This isn’t some normal storm! Look at the waves you’ve sent our ships into! Look at this lightning -- it’s touching the sea itself! This is not an act of God -- this can only be Calypso!”

The rest of the Navy’s crew tensed up at the name. Beckett looked up from his tea, his dark eyes flickering with some interest for the first time.

“Calypso?” he repeated.

“The Pirate Lords bound her years ago, and now it seems they’ve released her,” said Carewyn fiercely. "We can’t stay still, if we hope to evade the wrath of a sea goddess -- ”

“But you believe she can, in fact, be evaded,” said Beckett mildly, putting down his cup on its saucer with a soft clink. “Good. From what I understand, Calypso doesn’t particularly like pirates much either...so it seems we can have her do some of our workload for us, if we merely steer clear of her destructive path.”

Carewyn’s eyes widened, her pupils narrowing to slits of rage.

“So you sentence your men to death? You choose to abandon our other ships to the mercy of both the pirates and to a vengeful goddess, in the deluded hope that they’ll destroy each other and leave us be -- ?!”

She didn’t even care if her voice was shriller than it should’ve been, thanks to the emotions that rebelled against her chest.

Beckett got to his feet, stepping right into Carewyn’s personal space with a fierce, cold eye.

“Our men know where their loyalty lies -- may you not forget the placement of yours, Admiral!”

Carewyn, however, got right back up in Beckett’s space in return, yanking her pistol out of her belt and pointing it right between his eyes.

All of the soldiers on deck stiffened or let out small, shocked cries. Even Beckett, whose expression did not flinch, raised his eyebrows.

“Just because my soul is no longer mine doesn’t mean that I won’t protect my men, Beckett,” Carewyn spat.

Beckett’s eyebrows furrowed over his eyes, which gleamed with cold, stony, foreboding rage.

“You dare...?” he whispered.

Carewyn’s eyes flared with hatred. “The only leverage you had over me is currently out there, being sent to his death on your orders.”

‘You have nothing left to take from me, Beckett. I’m already enslaved to Jones, and therefore you. I have no future. I can’t do any more good for the others. ...I’m worthless...’

Carewyn returned her pistol to her belt and turned to her men with a gentler, but still very serious look.

“Prepare to abandon ship, Lieutenant.”

The young Lieutenant who’d nearly caught Ben the previous night straightened up sharply. “Sir?”

“I will not have men who were assigned to this mission lay down their lives fighting a sea goddess,” said Carewyn solemnly. “Just as I don’t intend to let the men out there do so. We can’t signal to them to retreat from this far-off, but I won’t endanger your lives while I call them back. Tell the men to abandon ship and head for the Swallow...and then do so yourself.”

Despite the firmness of her voice, she knew the gravity of what she was asking of him.

The boyish, uptight Lieutenant looked from the silently seething Beckett to the grim, pale face of his commanding officer, visibly conflicted. Then, his lower lip trembling, he saluted.

“...Yes, sir,” he said weakly.

The young officer and his compatriots reluctantly followed orders and left the helm, leaving Beckett and Carewyn alone.

“You will regret this most dearly,” Beckett said in a very soft, pitiless voice.

“I only regret that I wasn’t able to do it sooner,” Carewyn shot back icily.

“There will be no safe place to hide from me,” said Beckett. “The entire world will know who and what you are. I will hunt you down with the might of my Company and the English Crown, until you sit under my heel like a dog.”

Carewyn was reminded of how he spoke to Orion, back on that tiny island -- like he was some pathetic, disgusting cockroach.

“I’m not a coward like you, Beckett -- I have no intention of running and hiding.”

‘You won’t need to hunt me down,’ she thought. ‘I already know I'm trapped.’

She turned her back on Beckett and walked away, shooting coldly back over her shoulder,

“Flee with your life while you still can.”

Once Carewyn was sure that her soldiers had all boarded the jollyboats and were on their way toward the HMS Swallow, she immediately made her way down to the lower deck, to where she knew Ben Copper had set up the explosives from the previous night.

The HMS Lion could not use flags to signal the other ships to fall back, from this distance...but the flagship being in distress would be more than enough for them to come back to try to help.

Carewyn approached the highly flammable barrels of black powder, her jaw set in determination despite the fear and paleness of her face. There was only one way she could make it explode on her own -- and so, with a deep breath and a faintly trembling hand, she slowly slid her loaded pistol from her belt and raised it to point at the barrels.

All of a sudden, Carewyn felt someone grab her from behind. She struggled against the grip as the person’s hands seized her arm, trying to pull it back -- “No, please -- please, no -- please -- ”

The voice made Carewyn freeze where she stood.

It was soft, detached, almost airy, and yet so choked and tense...she’d never heard that voice sound that way. Not that voice, at least...only a voice much younger, much less confident --

Carewyn slouched immediately.

“Orion?” she breathed.

The Pirate Lord’s shaking hands still clutched at her arm even after her pistol was no longer raised.

“Please,” he gasped for air, clearly trying to steady his heavy breathing. “Please -- ”

“Orion!”

Carewyn dropped her pistol to the floor with a clatter. She couldn’t pull out of his grip, but she tried to turn around to face him. Only managing to make it half-way, she looked up at him, taking in his parted lips and hollow dark eyes, and reached up to take hold of his face.

“Orion...it’s all right...”

Shakily Orion released her arms. Then, very abruptly, he just as quickly grabbed the back of her head with one hand, cradling it almost desperately.

“Orion, breathe,” Carewyn said desperately as she trailed a hand through his dreadlocks to try to comfort him. “Breathe...I’m here -- I’m here...”

The pirate closed his eyes. His breathing gradually slowed and quieted as he worked to ground himself.

“...Carewyn...” he murmured against her hair at last, still sounding faintly tense, but much more level again.

Carewyn’s chest was so overfull of emotion that her eyes flooded with tears.

“God, Orion!” she swore.

She placed a short, searing kiss against his lips before pulling away to look at him and tearing into him with anxiety,

“What are you doing here!? You’re going to get yourself killed!”

“I could say the same to you,” said Orion, his much more usual, calmer voice low in his throat with disapproval.

Carewyn’s eyes fell down to his shoulder uncomfortably. “I have to signal the rest of the fleet to retreat -- ”

“You needn’t sacrifice yourself for that.”

“I can’t make this signal any other way!”

“Don’t take all of this onto yourself -- ”

“It’s the only way I can help now!” Carewyn burst out. Her own hands were shaking now. “I know what you and Jacob were trying to warn me about, Orion, but it’s no use -- I can’t just stay off the Dutchman! Jones told me that the contract can’t be undone unless I wanted to condemn someone else in my place, and I...I can’t do that, Orion! Even if it means I can never make that world I promised for you -- even if it means I can never get Bill and Charlie and Jules their lives back, or protect Jacob and Ashe from the Navy, or even see you again...”

She fiercely tried to hold back her tears even as they blurred her vision.

“My life isn’t worth protecting, if it means I lose you! I can’t lose you! Without all of you, there’s no point to anything, anything I do!”

Orion’s dark eyes were swirling like miniature galaxies as he adjusted his hand on the back of Carewyn’s head more securely, tilting it up to try to prompt her to look at him before speaking again.

“Carewyn...will you marry me?”

Carewyn looked up at him like she’d just gotten a splash of cold water right to the face.

“What?”

“Will you marry me?” Orion repeated, undaunted.

Carewyn’s mouth hung open in disbelief. Where in the world did this come from?!

“I don’t think now’s the best time!” she said in a weaker, more high-pitched voice than usual.

“Now may be the only time,” said Orion, sounding oddly serious.

Carewyn scanned his face, struggling to understand his thought process.

“Orion...I’ll be part of Jones’s crew -- there can’t be a future for us, even if we -- ”

“On the contrary,” Orion cut her off gently. “We would only have the freedom to be together, this way.”

Carewyn’s eyebrows furrowed. Then, very, very slowly, her blue eyes widened in understanding.

“You’d be a member of our family,” she whispered.

Orion inclined his head in a nod. “I’d take the Cromwell name, rather than give you mine. That would make it so that Jones’s conditions could apply to either of us -- and so, if we wished to be together...the one Jones does not take could volunteer to remain with the other, as part of his crew...or, if not...one of us would be free to leave, with the debt still paid.”

Carewyn stared, hardly believing what she was hearing. She clutched at Orion’s shirt with both hands.

“You...you can’t!” she said desperately. “Jones is still under Beckett’s command -- if you join Jones’s crew, you...you’ll never be free again! I can’t let you enslave yourself to Beckett, not after what he did to you!”

“What he did to me...” murmured Orion.

He cradled Carewyn’s head as he leaned his forehead against hers so that their noses touched.

“Carewyn...what Beckett did to me was make it so that I’m no longer able to live a normal life. What he did to me was make it so that the only life I can lead is that of a pirate -- a creature of few friends, adrift on an unfriendly sea. However much I’ve been able to find independence and camaraderie on the high seas, that doesn’t mean I’ve ever been truly free. For I was never free to stop being a pirate. I was never free to stop running. I was never free...to return to the island where I first met the girl who would flit in and out of my dreams, like a songbird on the wing...see if she was happy...see if...she even still remembered me...”

Carewyn’s eyes widened.

“When I met you, I was an orphan with no name or home to call my own,” murmured Orion. “Although I’ve since crafted a name for myself...thanks to Beckett, I can never have the second. And even if I somehow ever could...that home would not be complete without you.”

His lips spread into a smile as his dark eyes slowly flooded with tears too.

“The freedom I want more than anything,” he said, “is the freedom to stay. Perhaps this choice wasn’t one we ever wanted to make, and perhaps it will be one we’ll have to live with longer than either of us envisioned, but...please...will you let me stay with you?”

Carewyn choked, trying to hold in the storm of emotions beating at the inside of her chest. She covered her face in both hands in a vain attempt to obscure the pain. She could feel Orion’s hand on the back of her head tense slightly, but he made no move to comfort her -- the pirate wasn’t entirely sure how, and he didn’t know if he should, since he knew he’d unloaded a lot onto her.

At last, Carewyn finally tore her hands away and threw her arms around Orion’s neck, burying her tear-stained face into his chest.

“Yes,” she whispered against his neck. “...Yes...”

She placed a feathery kiss to his collarbone.

“...Orion, I’m...I’m so sorry...”

Orion mirrored her, bringing his lips into the crook of her neck.

“Don’t be,” he said seriously, “for I am not.”

Carewyn looked up at him, prepared to speak -- but she stilled when her ear caught the sound of a pistol being cocked.

“GET DOWN!”

In an instant, she’d thrown herself against Orion, knocking him down to the floor just as the bullet whizzed overhead with a loud BANG, just barely missing the barrels of black gunpowder and instead colliding with one of the columns.

Carewyn and Orion both shot up, to find Cutler Beckett standing at the base of the stairs, his stony eyes set ablaze with a kind of hatred Carewyn had never seen.

At the exact same time, the Revolution and the Flying Dutchman were hotly engaged in battle on the rockier, more tempestuous sea. Jules had been firm in not having anyone swing over to the Dutchman until their ship had the upper hand, since she knew her mortal men would be outmatched by men who were already technically dead -- but Jacob, it seemed, had no intention of following her direction. Jones was still aboard the Flying Dutchman, and he had a score to settle with Jones. And so he swung over to the ship of the damned himself to confront its captain.

“Ah, Captain Roberts,” sneered Jones. “Welcome aboard.”

“Where is she!?” he snarled.

Jones’s dark eyes narrowed coldly. “If you mean the Admiral, I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong place. Her enlistment isn’t set to begin for another month or so.”

With a roar of fury, Jacob lunged at Jones, hacking at him with his cutlass. The shorter man was very talented with a blade -- it was fortunate, considering he was hotly engaged in battle with someone who couldn’t be killed through ordinary means.

“Don’t know what you’re intending to do, Jacob Roberts!” spat Jones. “The contract is not one I can break either! The Admiral will be in my crew, no matter what she or anyone else thinks of the matter -- ”

Jacob slashed at Jones’s beard, slashing off several tentacles. Jones cried out in pain and frustration and when Jacob tried to attack again, Jones seized his arm in his claw, snapping down on it really hard.

“AUGH!”

Jones lifted the smaller man up off the deck by his arm so that he dangled off his feet.

“She only has her brother to blame for her misfortune,” the captain of the damned said lowly. “Yet she somehow has enough grace to not do so.”

Jacob’s face blanched and his slit-like pupils flared with hatred as he fought against Jones’ grip.

“You -- argh!”

Jones’s claw twisted Jacob’s arm painfully, making him drop his sword.

“Were I not a heartless wretch, I would feel remorse, knowing I have to condemn so decent a person,” said Jones.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, Jones cried out in surprise as a sword was plunged through his back.

It was Bill.

The eldest Weasley knew that the wound wouldn’t really hurt Jones (and he was correct), but it was the proper distraction for Jules to jump in from the other side and bring her sword down on Jones’s claw with enough leverage that he dropped Jacob. The curly-haired pirate captain fell onto the deck, clutching his arm, as Bill yanked his sword back out of Jones’s back.

“That is for Carey,” he snarled at Jones.

Jones whirled on Bill with his own cutlass, hacking away at him. Jules rushed to help Bill, while Ashe ran over to Jacob’s side to help him up.

“Jack, you’re bleeding -- ”

“I’ll be fine,” croaked Jacob as he clutched his wounded arm.

Jones fought both Bill and Jules singlehandedly, his cutlass slashing at Bill as his claw snapped at the air sweeping through Jules’s dark hair.

“Tell me, William and Juliette Weasley,” he crowed, “do you fear death?”

“Do you?”

Jones froze. Everybody else on the deck froze. Then, as if as a unit, they slowly turned, to look at Rakepick standing at the foot of the stairs.

The privateer-turned-pirate-hunter had shed her red jacket, leaving her in her blood-stained, high-necked and long-sleeved white undershirt, and her ginger-red hair had come loose of its bun and flapped in the gusting wind like a flag. In her hand was the throbbing, pulsating heart of Davy Jones.

Both Jacob and Bill lunged forward, but Rakepick moved before either of them could. Her dark blue eyes flaring with pure, undiluted hatred upon Jones, she yanked her loaded pistol out of its holster, thrust Jones’s heart down hard onto the deck, and fired at point-blank range.

BANG.

Jones lurched forward as if he'd been shot in the chest. He choked, his dark eyes going very wide as he struggled to breathe -- then he swayed, suddenly finding himself unable to stand, as his claw shakily clutched the railing of his ship.

Rakepick’s eyes held no compassion whatsoever as she bore down upon the crumpled-up Jones.

“The Chest’ll be doing its work soon enough,” she said very softly. “As it’s said...‘the Dutchman must have a captain.’”

Jacob suddenly felt like his hand was on fire. Ripping off the bandages, he stared in disbelief as the Black Spot Jones had given him so long ago seemed to shrink and disappear, leaving his palm completely unscarred.

For the deal Jacob had made was only in effect as long as both he and Jones lived.

Jones gasped for air as Rakepick seized him by the collar.

“I would ask if you wished to serve under me -- but I don’t want scum like you on my crew. So I’ll instead be kind...and send you to meet your dear Calypso.”

In a heartless move Jacob only knew too well, Rakepick shoved Jones overboard, right off of the Dutchman into the rushing waves.

“No!” hissed Jacob.

Rakepick turned to Jacob, a cold smirk spreading onto her face. “You know what this means, then, Black Jack? I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised!”

Out of nowhere, Rakepick lurched forward, clutching at her chest, which pulsated with demented, sickly sea-green light. She shrieked in agonizing, hellish pain as her chest ripped itself apart, her own heart molting out of her skin -- the Dead Man’s Chest appeared out of nowhere in a flare of light at her feet -- and it swallowed up the heart that had ripped itself out of her chest before snapping shut.

“What -- ” gasped Bill, “what is -- ?”

“The one who stabs the Heart,” said Ashe, his face very pale with fury and anxiety, “must replace it with their own.”

“And become the immortal Captain of the Flying Dutchman.”

Rakepick clutched her chest with one hand, her long ginger hair in her face. She breathed heavily as her lips spread little by little into a broad smirk. When she pulled her hand away, the wounds in her chest and in her shoulder had completely sealed up. Even the blood had dissipated.

“Incredible,” she whispered. “I can feel the Dutchman -- the sea -- the creatures of the deep, all responding to my every whim...”

She flung out her arm. In an instant, Jones’s fallen barnacle-encrusted blade soared into her open hand, and she raised her head, her dark blue eyes devoid of human light or mercy upon Bill, Jacob, Jules, and Ashe as her loosely flying ginger hair seemed to smack the air like tentacles.

“Now I finally have the power I need,” she whispered triumphantly, “the power to destroy all of you and Cutler Beckett, in one fell swoop!”

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oranolio16 · 4 years

Text

You knock quickly on Comte’s office door before barging in. Arthur grins at you before pointing at Theo and Vincent in the corner of the office. “I took the liberty of inviting them luv, thought they’d want to see your amazing thing.” He looks at the group you pulled in behind you, “ Ahh you got the rest too.”

You nod quickly, thankful that Comte’s office is actually quite spacious.

“Okay guys, sit down.”

They do, looking at you expectantly.

“This thing here is called a Smartphone. People in the future use it all the time.”

You wave the sleek black rectangle at them. You point to Isaac, whose on the edge of his seat, “Ask me any question, I’ll try to answer it.”

“What’s it for?”

“In the future, there’s this thing called the internet. It’s like a huge, free library. Or an alternate world. There’s everything in it, from Music to Art to Scientific stuff. You literally search it up, I mean type in the name of the thing your looking for and you’ll find it instantly. You can even date on the internet.” You grin at that, catching Arthur’s eyes.

The Men look shocked and interested.

“It’s completely free?” Leo asks curiously.

“Yup, you only need a smartphone. Mines made by a company called Apple. It’s an IPhone.”

Dazai elbows Isaac, “Looks like your descendants made the company. Apple though?”

“ANYWAYS,” you break in when it looks like Arthur will join Dazai, “I wanted to teach you the culture of the future. People in the future find Vampires very sexy. In fact, Vampires have stories dedicated to them. Very popular stories.”

“WHAT?” Jean looks Shocked and horrified. “Do people know we are undead, bloodsucking monsters?”

You nod sagely, “It turns people on in the future. Ladies would pay to get bitten by a vampire.”

Jean makes a strangled sound in the back of his throat. Arthur looks entirely too happy, “The future sounds amazing! Can I go through the door?” He gives Comte a pleading glance.

“No. Never. You, in the future? Unsupervised? It’s a disaster waiting to happen!” Comte looks horrified while Dazai laughs and high fives Arthur. Isaac and Mozart join Jean in looking disturbed.

“So, I’ve decided to read you all one of the greatest works of literary fiction. You’ll enjoy this Jean.” You swear Jean shudders at your grin. Sebastian looks as amused as you do, whipping out a notebook and Pen.

“This story is called Twilight. It is a riveting tale about a teenaged girl who moves back to her home town named Forks. She meets a Vampire who has the ability to read people’s thoughts. They meet at school. They fall in love in the most dramatic way but the vampire, Edward, doesn’t want to bite her. She wants him to bite her. He thinks he’ll hurt her and leaves, she’s heart broken but he comes back. Any questions?”

You glance at Jean who’s muttering prayers under his breath, looking shocked. “Well, that guy has no class. Who woos a lady by leaving her?” Arthur demands, looking disgusted. “He wants to keep her safe, that’s why. Or were you not listening you fool?” Theo snaps back. “I think that’s incredibly romantic!” Vincent offers, “To have the strength to leave your love to keep her safe is chivalrous.” Napoleon nods in agreement with Vincent.

“But the ability to hear thoughts? He’s powerful, is he a pureblood?” Comte asks you. “He’s not alive but no, he was turned by his adoptive Dad called Carlisle. He also has four other Siblings, Alice, Rosalie, Emmet and Jasper.” Comte smiles at that, “How nice.”

“So, let me continue.” You open the file on the screen and clear your throat. “My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down. It was seventy-five degrees in Phoenix, the sky a perfect, cloudless blue. I was wearing my favorite shirt — sleeveless, white eyelet lace; I was wearing it as a farewell gesture. My carry-on item was a parka.

In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks exists under a near-constant cover of clouds. It rains on this inconsequential town more than any other place in the United States of America. It was from this town and its gloomy, omnipresent shade that my mother escaped with me when I was only a few months old. It was in this town that I'd been compelled to spend a month every summer until I was fourteen. That was the year I finally put my foot down; these past three summers, my dad, Charlie, vacationed with me in California for two weeks instead. It was to Forks that I now exiled myself— an action that I took with great horror. I detested Forks.”

“How stupid. Why would she go then?” Mozart criticised.

“Maybe she wants to be with her Father?” Vincent suggested.

“But he comes to her. There’s no point.” It seemed as if Mozart had developed a disliking for Bella before she’d even done the really stupid stuff.

Isaac looks at you and asks, “What’s an Airport?”

“It’s where they store Airplanes and people go to travel on them. Think of Airplanes as flying carriages that can go over everything, sea and mountains. They’re shaped like giant birds and carry people over long distances.”

“Oh.” He looks dissatisfied.

“I’ll show you pictures later.” He perks up at that.

You glance again at Jean, who looks nearly catatonic. “Flying carriages? Mon Dieu, what’s that? Sorcery?” You can’t help the wheezing laugh that escapes.

“It’s engineering Jean, not Sorcery. Promise.” He looks at you dubiously, obviously unconvinced.

“Listen, do you really think the Pope would condone people flying in carriages animated by sorcery?” Jean frowns as he focuses, then asks you, “ Have you flown in them?”

“Yes. Hundreds of times. They’re perfectly safe. Well, not perfectly, but adequately I suppose.”

“They do crash often don’t they, though? Your always at risk, aren’t you?” Arthur comments slyly, watching Jean pale dramatically at the thought of you falling out of the air in a magic-powered carriage. “Plenty of people die in them-“

“Arthur, No. Stop scaring Jean. Jean, I promise I’ve never been in a plane crash and hopefully I never will.” Jean still looks unconvinced, but he nods.

“Right. Any more questions?” No one asks, so you continue. “I loved Phoenix. I loved the sun and the blistering heat. I loved the vigorous, sprawling city.

"Bella," my mom said to me — the last of a thousand times — before I got on the plane. "You don't have to do this."”

Mozart looks highly irritated and turns to Vincent, “See? She doesn’t have to go. Her mother doesn’t want her to do this. Honestly, she’s being unnecessarily dramatic.”

Vincent looks confused, but sympathetic. “Maybe her mother’s only saying it to reassure her? Maybe she actually would appreciate her daughter giving her time on her own?” Mozart gives him a sceptical look.

Theo just gives the book a look of disgust, “She’s Vervelend. Does this get better, or is future literature so... terrible?”

“Guys, it does get better. I think. Just sit through this and I’ll show you anything you want, promise.”

Dazai gives you an approving nod, “Bribery. I like it.”

You roll your eyes at him and look back at the story, “My mom looks like me, except with short hair and laugh lines. I felt a spasm of panic as I stared at her wide, childlike eyes. How could I leave my loving, erratic, harebrained mother to fend for herself? Of course she had Phil now, so the bills would probably get paid, there would be food in the refrigerator, gas in her car, and someone to call when she got lost, but still…”

“That’s an irresponsible mother. Is she raising the child or the child raising her?” Napoleon mutters to Isaac, “I don’t blame the daughter for trying to get away.”

Isaac nods, “But what if it isn’t her fault? I mean, it could be a medical condition.”

“I want to go," I lied. I'd always been a bad liar, but I'd been saying this lie so frequently lately that it sounded almost convincing now.

"Tell Charlie I said hi."

"I will."

"I'll see you soon," she insisted. "You can come home whenever you want — I'll come right back as soon as you need me." But I could see the sacrifice in her eyes behind the promise.”

“See? That’s actually very sweet of her.” Vincent tells Mozart.

“We’ll see.” Mozart replies cryptically.

"Don't worry about me," I urged. "It'll be great. I love you, Mom." She hugged me tightly for a minute, and then I got on the plane, and she was gone. It's a four-hour flight from Phoenix to Seattle, another hour in a small plane up to Port Angeles, and then an hour drive back down to Forks. Flying doesn't bother me; the hour in the car with Charlie, though, I was a little worried about.”

Comte looks uncomfortable at the last sentence, “I do hope her father is decent, and that he isn’t...”

“A scumbag.” Leo finishes the sentence off for Comte. “But he might be. Why would her Mother leave, otherwise?”

#@heavensbabygirl #@heavensbabygirl prompt #@sadshaxk #ikevamp #twilight

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five-wow · 4 years

Note

I have a little crisis going on. My friend saw me checking in on tumblr on my phone a week or so ago and asked me what I was looking at. I told her about H 5-0 and McDanno. She likes gay ships and started watching.When she was finished with season one and had watched the conclusion of the season final she asked me why Danny ditched Rachel in favor of Steve. I told her because he loves him – duh! But I guess she just doesn't feel the vibes for that ship. (1/2)

She told me while she got why maybe Steve would fall for Danny she didn’t understood how Danny could develop feelings for Steve, didn’t even get how they’ve become friends with all the arguing. I know I can’t convince her and I don’t want to.But when I was home again, it got me thinking… and to my sheer horror I nearly came up with nothing (okay, he payed for the dolphin swimming and helped finding Meka’s murderer, was there for the memorial service) but otherwise? (2/2)

Dear god, I don’t know myself why Danny would fall for Steve. I haven’t watched season 1 in a while. Could you please remember me? Sorry for the Long three part ask. (3/3)

OKAY SO. Tragically, I haven’t watched season 1 in a while either, because I still haven’t gotten around to that rewatch I keep saying I should probably do, BUT. HOWEVER. YET.

It might be a bit of a mess, but I’m always ready to ramble about why Danny might fall for Steve. This ended up as nearly 2k words, so I’ll put it under a cut:

I think that a crucial first thing to understand is that when Danny yells, it does not necessarily mean he’s genuinely angry. I definitely get how if you do interpret it that way, the entire show could just kind of look like Danny doesn’t even like Steve very much, let alone loves him. Yelling CAN mean he’s angry, and of course it often DOES mean that, but just as often (or perhaps even more) it overwhelmingly means that he cares. Loudly. Right in your face. (There’s a later episode, 3.15, in which Steve does something heroic but stupid and Danny yells at him afterwards and Steve goes, kind of gleefully, “You were worried about me” and Danny says “Worried? No, no, I was worried about my car” but it’s VERY obvious that he’s lying, like, to the point where that’s the whole joke here. There are probably other instances that prove the yelling-Danny-does-not-mean-a-Danny-who-doesn’t-like-you, but this is my favorite because it’s extremely, blindingly obvious, and the narrative actively wants us to see it that way.)

To jump right in with the deep stuff: Steve offered Danny a job and gave him a family and a place in Hawaii and a purpose and the feeling of being useful, and he did it at a time when Danny was living a pretty miserable existence where even after six months he was still being hazed by the other Detectives for being the haole who wears a tie. Danny tells Tani in one of the very early season 8 episodes that Steve has a way of coming into people’s lives at just the right time, and that he did that for everyone on the team, including Danny. Obviously if you’re watching season 1 you can’t know what’s being said in season 8, but it’s just confirmation of stuff that’s definitely there on screen in season 1, too.

Steve is good at his job. Really, really good, and even if his methods are crazy, he ends up helping people. Danny can be shocked at the means and still appreciate the end at he same time.

Steve’s surprisingly smart, too. A bit of a dork sometimes - Steve with that teacup in 1.10? “I like tea.” NERD. (He’s also absolutely saying that to rile Danny up, and essentially that just means he enjoys arguing with Danny which is SO PERFECT for Danny, who can’t stop it even if he tries. More about that later.)

Steve makes Danny laugh. It may sometimes be a laugh borne out of shock, perhaps even anger, but there’s definitely laughter. (Steve also goes along with Danny’s silly banter and smiles about it - Danny’s “you miss me, don’t you?” when Steve is being a super secret spy on the museum ship in 1.07 and Steve’s “yeah, yeah” and “but you don’t swim” are a wonderful example.)

But then, on top of all of that, Steve is also kind. Of course there’s the hotel room with dolphin swimming he gives Danny as an apology after Danny makes it clear that he thinks he deserves one (which, by the way, still make me scream a little, because everything after that one moment ALWAYS portrays Steve as extremely unwilling to spend a lot of money on anything, even gifts, AND because yes, it’s a way to apologize, but it’s also something that immediately shows Steve gets Danny, because it’s not just for Danny, it’s for Grace! it’s for Danny to have fun with Grace), but he also makes a call to the Governor when Danny has issues with Rachel over visitation rights for Grace, and he does it behind Danny’s back. He comes to Meka’s funeral, not because he needs to grieve, but because Danny is grieving. When Grace and Rachel get car-jacked and Danny has to leave suddenly in the middle of a case, Steve’s immediate response is to tell him to call if he needs anything and then look completely thrown for a moment after Danny leaves. tl;dr: Steve CARES, and Danny, a man who is definitely not stupid, knows this. I mean, it’s not like he has to look far to see it anyway - he experiences it, over and over and over again. (And Steve’s there like this for the whole team, not just Danny, but in season 1 it’s definitely mostly Danny, because after Steve he just has the most problems, poor guy.)

(Side note, that episode I mentioned in which Grace and Rachel get car-jacked and Danny rushes to them? 1.16? Later on, Steve is going full camouflage ninja in the forest on his own and then his phone starts buzzing and he sees it’s Danny and the first thing he does after picking up is ask “are Grace and Rachel okay?” and when Danny then asks about the case he goes “don’t worry about that” to calm Danny down, and they end up having a lengthy conversation about Danny’s problem while Steve is panting trying to hold a log in the air for some very important SEAL reason, but he doesn’t complain a single time or even mention that he’s kind of busy. Danny needs him, so he’s available.)

And I mean, obviously, there’s these: “Maybe you’re not as alone around here as you think, Danno.” “I know you.” “I picked you, didn’t I?”

If I can just circle back around to something we’ve sort of covered: Danny yells a lot. He has a temper. He gets angry. He doesn’t get along super well with most people, and then along comes Steve, who initially INFURIATES Danny to the point where Danny ends up hitting him after they meet, but instead of getting angry back or holding a grudge, Steve is impressed and takes it in stride and still wants Danny to work with him because he sees Danny’s talents, and he doesn’t let himself be intimidated by the attitude. He lets Danny rant and get angry and he argues back but also calms Danny down when needed, and everything we’re shown indicates that he enjoys that dynamic. Essentially, Steve is the ideal partner for Danny, and Steve is also lonely and he’s loyal to a fault and they have a similar sense of humor and their banter flows ridiculously smoothly right from day one and their personalities just click and Steve keeps inviting Danny over for beer and letting him walk into his kitchen unannounced and dragging him into Steve’s classic car for its first test drive, so what do you know? Steve’s also a really great best friend.

Danny says Steve is terrible with kids and then Steve is actually GREAT with Grace. Like, when Danny gets hit with the sarin gas and Steve picks Grace up from school because he knows she’ll be getting out soon and there will be nobody waiting for her? That’s something that you can bet means the world to Danny, because Grace is his world. ALSO, Steve goes to get Grace and deliver her to the hospital personally, even though it’s a ridiculously busy day with two cases to work at once, one of which might lead them to Wo Fat, the killer of Steve’s father, which is Steve’s Huge Tragic Backstory and the thing he’ll usually drop anything else for. Except Grace! (Obviously, if he knew when Grace would need to be picked up and hadn’t done anything about it, that would have been a huge dick move, so you could say he had no choice, but that still means that 1) he knows when and where to pick Grace up in the first place, which shows he cares enough to pay attention to something that he couldn’t have known would ever be relevant until that moment, and 2) he could have sent Chin or Kono or Jenna or Duke or Kamekona or random HPD officers, and he did not do that. He went there in person. He went to get Grace.)

Which leads us neatly here: Steve, a guy with virtually no family left except for one very estranged sister (and an aunt we don’t know about yet and a mother who’s actually still alive, but those can’t really be counted at the end of season 1), is a HUGE FAMILY MAN. What’s Danny’s whole reason for uprooting his life and being miserable five days a week but still feeling it’s totally worth it for those other two days? LOVE OF FAMILY. Danny definitely, 100% can appreciate that quality in other people, and Steve has it, he just had nowhere to direct it for the longest time.

In the same vein, Danny is a True Dad. He sees Steve, this lonely guy who just lost his dad, and in the fandom it’s generally acknowledged that Steve saw Danny and went “yes, this one, I’m keeping this one”, but for all of Danny’s complaining, he also adopted Steve on the spot.Steve needs a Danny so he doesn’t get himself killed (the very first episode immediately hammers this point home really hard), and there’s no way Danny isn’t aware of that on some level.

Also just. Yes, Steve does a lot of things Danny tells him he shouldn’t do. Yes, Steve is an idiot sometimes. But he also listens to the things Danny yells at him, and when it really matters to Danny, he changes his behavior. There’s that apology hotel room, for one, but there’s also that bit in the episode about Meka, Danny’s former partner, where Steve is not entirely convinced that Meka wasn’t a dirty cop even though Danny keeps insisting he can’t have been because he was a good guy, and Danny gets so mad Steve doesn’t believe him that he walks off (“If my word is not good enough for you, then I don’t know what I’m doing here,” he says), so a while later Steve goes after him and he keeps asking questions until he understands what Danny means - you know your partner, you trust your partner, the way Danny trusts Meka is the way Steve trusts Danny and that’s why Danny’s behavior makes sense - and from that point on, he fully has Danny’s back in this crusade to clear Meka’s name, even though there it’s not like there’s suddenly more hard evidence to support it.

So why would Danny ditch Rachel to go chase after Steve? Well, because he knows at that point, no one else might do it, and at least not the unrelenting way Danny will. Because Steve doesn’t have many people and deserves to have someone stick up for him. Because there is zero doubt Steve would do the same thing for him.Because Danny knows that in that moment, Steve needs him more than Rachel does. Because he has to make a choice and he’s inevitably going to regret not being there for one of these people, but apparently, to Danny, getting to Steve is more urgent. Because he’s putting Steve’s needs before his own. Because they’re partners and they’re family and they’re friends and that really, really means something. Because it’s Steve, and he means something.

#mcdanno #*#awesomejesakuthings #ask #talking #season 1

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corpse--diem · 4 years

Text

Organ’s Out Of The Bag | Morgan & Erin

Summary: Morgan interrupts Erin at work, eats her organs, and learns about the family trade. When: Week of 5/4 Featuring: @mor-beck-more-problems

There wasn’t a “How To Operate An Illegal Organ Trafficking Business For Dummies” book to help Erin work out the best system for organizing and storing frozen organs. Shocker. Buying a second industrial cooler would have been as expensive as it was suspicious, which made trial and error the only real option. It was tedious, and there was probably still a better way, but she’d found her groove. Hollowed, block-like shelving units had been attached to the far end of the wall. Other items were stored on top but she could lift the face of each one, almost like a locker, to fill and empty as needed. Only she knew where the latches were and only she could open it. A small feat, sure, but you had to take your wins where you could get them. Maybe she was finally getting the hang of this? That was a thought that should have sat more uncomfortably on her mind or deterred the smirk on her lips. If she had a spare moment at all, it wasn’t for that kind of introspection.

With her music loud and her focus set, she made quick work of it. Saran Wrap, label, and onto the next. Just another Tuesday. One more load to go and she could break for dinner. A figure filled the doorway when she turned, startling her backwards while some instinctive part of her reached for the knife in her back pocket. “Jesus Christ, Morgan…” she huffed out, freezing before she pulled out the blade. “You scared the shit out of me. What—“ she narrowed her eyes, her panic doubling in that moment. “You’re not allowed down here.”

After the video incident, Morgan hadn’t expected Erin to be someone who was okay with hanging out with her newly dead and only semi-feeling self. But aside from the body horror, Erin thought she was ‘cool’. Maybe Erin lived with death in a way that kept her from feeling it. Maybe it wasn’t a tar pit for her. Maybe it didn’t even pull, but could just...sit its ass down and let her be. Erin had her life pretty together, right?

Morgan traipsed up the entrance of the Nichols’ house since Erin had said she could just come in, but there was no sign of her, or any life going on in the house. So she turned instead to the lower levels where they had passed through for the ritual. She found her bent over a table with...organs. Bags and bags of organs. Morgan stayed put, hand over her stomach, her mouth watering. At least one of those was a heart, and those were thick enough to remind her of meat sometimes. But there was the whole other question of what they were doing here. Morgan didn’t know a lot about mortuary work, but there were too many different kinds laying around near each other for it to have anything to do with her ‘clients’. And if it wasn’t that, than maybe--

Erin turned just as Morgan reached for a bag of brains and a pair of eyeballs. She smiled, bright and sheepish. “Hi…” She drew out the greeting as long as possible. “We had plans. You said I could come and show you more weird zombie things?” Her gaze slid sideways to the table. Stars, it all looked so good. “I knocked, you didn’t answer,” she went onto explain, popping one of the eyeballs in her mouth and chewing thoughtfully. “And since I already knew my way around…” She shrugged and swallowed the eyeball, popped the other one into her mouth, doing her damnedest to savor it before she stuffed the whole table into her mouth. “So, anyway, what’s with all the random dead organs on your table?”

Fuck. Erin had completely forgotten about their plans. Not that she wasn’t excited for some extreme body horror and manipulation. Between the lack of sleep, the mimes lurking around every corner, and maintaining her day and night jobs, things were slipping through the cracks. “Sorry,” she shook her head, moving to turn the music off. “I got caught up in--” she started to explain, until she was watching Morgan pop an eyeball into her mouth like she was sampling an appetizer. It wasn’t bad enough that Morgan saw the goods, she had to snack on them too. Five minutes in and she was already out a couple hundred bucks. This was off to a hell of a start. “Stop that!” She ran for the table, collecting the rest of the saran-wrapped organs in her arms. Fuck. Fuck. “I was about to put them away,” she answered, aware that it was more of a nonanswer. “They’re not hors d'oeuvres so can you just--try to refrain?” She huffed, moving to the freezer. Glanced back, unable to feel just a little uncomfortable at the thought of being alone with an apparently snacky zombie. “I thought you just were into brains, anyway?”

Morgan backed away from the table, frowning as she cradled her snacks to her chest. “This is me trying!” She whined, mouth still half full. This wasn’t a good time to wonder if whatever species this had come from actually tasted better than the rabbit eyes she normally had, but the pull in her, the wanting, was so much she closed her eyes to enjoy the last gummy chunks sliding down her throat as she finished it off. “Um, so, funny story? Brains make my world go round, but dead bodies and viscera are like...well I never did even soft drugs when I was alive, but I can’t help myself. I’ve stuck my face straight into a dead baby deer. It’s like true love...in uh, you know, gross...foodie sort of way.” She swallowed the last of the eyeball, feeling embarrassed. Then she remembered that Erin was the one with the zombie buffet on her table. “You never answered my question. What are you doing with the zombie buffet on your table? This doesn’t look all that much like Funeral Director of the Year stuff.” She opened the brain bag and started to munch on that next.

Erin couldn’t help but stare with vague fascination as she watched Morgan explain herself, chewing on a half eaten eyeball. “I’ll try to remember that next time, then,” she winced a little, watching her money go right down Morgan’s throat. Nothing that could be done about it now, anyway. Flustered a little at the question, realizing Morgan wasn’t about to let up. “Well--I was saving that one for you anyway so, please. Enjoy,” she nodded towards the human brain she was already feasting on. A little sarcastic considering she was helping herself again but more genuine than not. Fuck. This wasn’t at all how she’d anticipated this little visit to go. With a long sigh, she pulled her rubber gloves off. “It’s--complicated,” she said hurriedly, clearing her throat. Had she ever actually straight up told anyone about this? Nic, Marley--hell, even Nell just knew. No explanations had been necessary. “And I’m a damn good funeral director. This doesn’t change that.” Her fingers tapped on the silver table and she eyed her carefully. “If I tell you, this stays between us, right?” Morgan was smart enough to probably figure it out at this point, but the assurance didn’t hurt.

Morgan continued to frown, miffed that she was on the pointy end of the sarcasm stick when she had been asked to come. What was she supposed to do, stay at the door all night and go home sad? But Erin seemed frazzled beyond being interrupted. Morgan’s dig at her above-board job proved that too. Morgan was even beginning to feel bad. She tilted her head, trying to get a better read on Erin. “I’m a zombie, Erin. I know all about awkward secrets to keep.” She started to edge closer, plucking a chunk of brain matter off to chew on. And, holy shit, she had to know how long this one had been left sitting and at what temperature, because it made her taste buds melt like burgers used to--but there were more important things to deal with. Erin had some kind of organ stockpiling problem, and maybe a ‘oops my friend knows I’m into some weird, sketchy looking shit’ problem. “If it helps, it looks like you’re running some kind of under the table organ pantry. So either I’m right, and I just made your job easier for you, or I’m wrong, and you have even more reason to correct me. But...you just saw me eat eyeballs and I used to sell people shiny rocks I transmuted out of garbage. I’m really not gonna judge.”

Erin chewed on the inside of her lip as Morgan spoke. Yep. Of course she figured it out. What the fuck else was a mortician doing with a bunch of unlabeled organs saran wrapped in the embalming room? All signs pointed to shady. This was entirely her fault, which bothered her the most about this whole thing. She fucked up. Forgot their plans. Something had to give, eventually. It was bound to. Juggling businesses, murderous mimes and actively trying to not be a shitty friend was a dangerous game. But she trusted Morgan, as much as that was worth. Had to, considering how calmly she was chewing on Mr. “Mr. Reid’s dearly departed brain, after taking out his eyeballs in less than five minutes flat. “Organ harvesting and trafficking, actually,” she corrected her, taking a deep breath after she said the words out loud. Just rip the bandaid off, right? Felt wrong on her tongue for more reasons than she cared to think about. “It’s--” she shook her head, glancing down at the table again for a moment, then forced herself to stare back up at Morgan. Fingers thrumming against the table again, her nerves alight. “My dad got into it before I took the business over and I got stuck with it because he couldn’t handle it. Please believe me when I say this isn’t something I ever wanted.”

Oh. Oh, this was something serious. Was Morgan still a person who knew how to take on serious things with new people? She was feeling okay today. Sort of float-y in a way that made a distant part of her worried, but she wasn’t tired. Not like she was on other days. But this whole—thing Erin was tearsely explaining wasn’t something looked suddenly less like a dirty secret and more like a two ton brick she’d been hauling for too long. Morgan could at least understand that feeling, even if the rest of the situation confused her. “Shit,” she said. “That explains some of the vague trauma you mentioned. I can’t even imagine…” She stepped closer, more confident now that she wasn’t in trouble, “Can ask if—I mean, is it going well? Are you...going to be okay?”

Relief came with the confession like an exhale. A momentary reprieve to that tension knotting in her chest for months now. The inhale felt just as horrible as it always had. The knot settled back where it knew it belonged in Erin’s chest. Morgan wouldn’t judge. She wouldn’t rat her out. But there was something unsafe about having it out in the open like this. A little bit of control was gone and that almost felt worse than the deed itself. “Good as it can be, I guess? It was a little rocky at first but--I’m getting there.” She tossed on a smile, raising a brow at Morgan. “Don’t worry about it. Just try not to eat my merchandise? Those eyeballs you demolished set me back a couple hundred dollars,” she teased, a chuckle in her voice to hide the very real pain there. Dale was a good scapegoat for that kind of thing anyway--the big oaf was as heavy handed as they came. She leaned against the table, glancing between the brain in her hands and Morgan’s gaze. “Is… that your first human brain?”

“Oh. Oh, shit!” Morgan cried, face dropping with dismay. “I really couldn’t help it. That’s not just like, me being weird. I can probably get Deirdre to reimburse you? I don’t have to mention the eyeballs, or the brain, if you don’t want, but I uh...don’t think she’d mind it either.” It was a little too late with the brain, so Morgan took a sheepish dip back into the bag to pull off another chunk. It was halfway up to her mouth when Erin said the word human. Morgan looked down at the brain again. “Oh,” she said, voice squeaking. “So that’s why it tastes so good.” She continued to stare at the brain. From the size of it, she probably should’ve known it wasn’t just some deer. But holy shit. You’d think there’d be fanfare or at least a good shock of agony over baby’s first lite cannibalism. But it had just been a really yummy brain, no more interesting than another until she’d tasted it. “Uh...yeah. If that’s what this is...yeah.” Was it bad, that it didn’t mean anything to her? That the only thought she’d had was how yummy? Sure, deer and raccoon and cow brain were nice. But this was steak. Or cheesecake. For all that it looked the same, the taste was enough to have let her feel good about something while she’d chewed. Then another question came to her. “Not to be gross, but are these...was this…” she jiggled the bag in her hand. “...One of your clients?”

“No, no, it’s okay,” Erin finally gave a genuine laugh, shaking her head. Was that one of those zombie quirks? Like how amputated body parts turned to goo? “I actually really was saving that brain for you.” She had to admit, she was a little surprised at Morgan’s hesitation. This was a funeral home. No way she could’ve thought animal brains were more readily available than an actual human’s. Didn’t deter her, she noted, when her fingers dipped back into the bag. “Well,” she said, starting to pull off her blue scrubs, raising a brow. “My clients have some organs to spare. Waste not, want not?” She offered with a shrug. It was more difficult than she anticipated to keep her eyes off of Morgan. She looked the same, and if it wasn’t for the brain food she was gobbling down, it would’ve been impossible to see anything different about her. But she was eating a human brain. She knew what happened to some of the parts that left her basement, but this was the first time she’d witnessed it first hand. “Doesn’t bother you, does it?” Another pause as she tried not to overtly stare anymore. “You know, I swear I didn’t invite you over for this but--if that’s something you think you’d want on a regular basis, I can definitely help you out.”

Morgan looked down at the brain. She was still waiting for the horror to set in, but mostly she was worried what Remmy would say, or Deirdre. She’d only given her animal brains so far, not even an offer or a suggestion of anything else. They wouldn’t blame her for an accident, but liking it, enjoying it---Morgan saw herself split and cracked between two lenses. One monstrous, one that simply was. ‘Don’t eat the humans’ was the number one thing she heard from hunter types. It was even a question she remembered asking herself. Do they eat people? Do they hurt people? As if it made them inherently better, safer, if the answer was “right.” But here she was, some poor guy’s insides already in her stomach. And as much as she was troubled, it took effort to maintain. “B-bother?” She asked. Shrugged. “Does it bother you? You seem pretty chill with me eating in front of you, all things considered. I mean, would you really….supply that sort of thing? For me?”

There was some kind of internal struggle going on behind Morgan’s eyes. Was this weird for her too? She’d been snacking on them like Erin was going out of business. “I don’t know, maybe I should be more bothered,” she shrugged, running a hand through her hair. “But I fished them out of the guy, you know?” Maybe it was like how a butcher didn’t have any trouble selling even the most obscure parts of the cow. In this case, she was simply more familiar with the human body. “Doesn’t bother me,” she confirmed, giving her a smile to cement that. “Brains are a little more expensive, just so you know. But yeah. This is what I do. It wouldn’t be a problem at all.”

“You...did all this yourself? And the guy still looked like himself at the end? With the--” Morgan motioned to her skull. “I’m usually in a weird...zombie haze whenever I’m eating out in the wild, so things like being careful don’t really make it into the thought process. But...bones are hard. If you get it really wrong, you get a bunch of gross pointy bits in the food. Worse than eggshells in your fried rice. What do you do to get to the stuff and humpty-dumpty them back together?” But something else snagged her mind more than her curiosity, pulling her back. “You really mean it? About the not weird and the...supply? Just, you know, for sometimes? Really?” She wondered how expensive Erin was talking here.

“The brain’s usually always taken out during an autopsy, along with the rest of the organs.” Erin explained. “They all get tossed into the visceral bag, which then gets tucked into the stomach cavity. Makes my job easier because then all I have to do is take them out and pack them up.” This would make the whole process way slower and harder if she had to go in every time and dissect them herself, she knew that much. Her brows furrowed at the thought of Morgan out there in the woods, running around and crushing animal skulls. “Yeah, I mean it. Can’t have you out there chasing after squirrels or whatever all the time, right?” Wasn’t exactly inconspicuous. She shrugged. “My boss usually likes to charge a higher fee but I don’t mind cutting costs. For friends,” she smiled.

“Oh, wow. That’s...one way to do it.” Morgan realized with unsettling clarity that she had never thought of the mechanics of death before. When she had lost her parents and her friends, she had been too wrapped up in the loss and unfairness of it to remember there was something practical, even mechanical to death. Even in humans, with the rituals and the preservation that kept the flies and maggots at bay, there was something. A process detached from all that they had meant before the last breath went out. It wasn’t bad, or hurtful, it was simply...after. Morgan came out of her thought to look at Erin, steeped her whole life in this strange, thankless care. It was essential, even as it rattled and stung the rest of the world, her clients. She didn’t even have much of a chip on her shoulder about it, she just continued, and found a way to make “after” work for other people too. Well, maybe not “found,” but she was still at it. And now that the shock of discovery had worn off, she didn’t seem that ashamed about it. A rush of endearment filled her and she ran to Erin, brain still jiggling in the bag and pulled her into a crushing hug. “Thank you, Erin,” she said. “You’re a really good friend, you know that?” She lingered there a moment, trying to fix words to how...fine all of this seemed. Not normal, they wouldn’t be hiding in a basement if it was normal, but fine. She pulled away, backing up to hop on the table, taking another handful of brain. “You wouldn’t have heard from somewhere about how human brains taste, would you? I feel weirdly like...playing board games. And listening to the radio. Like there’s a hockey game on? I don’t like hockey, but if you know where to put one on--” She gave a thumbs up and took another bite of brain. “But, also, I’ve lost my foot like twice this week. If you wanted to check out weird things my bones can do still.”

Erin looked up just in time to brace herself for the shorter woman hurling herself at her. “Oh, you’re--,” she huffed out a laugh, genuinely struggling to catch her breath. For a moment it felt like she had just ran into a wall with arms. “You’re welcome,” she finished, briefly wrapping her arms around her. Morgan was a lot of things Erin was still trying to properly grasp, but she was a good one. Chaotic, but good. That much she did know. She held her hand to her chest when Morgan pulled away, laughing despite herself. “I’ve never thought to ask,” she answered honestly, leaning against the same table Morgan was perched on. “How does it taste?” When she started to prattle on more questions, things so specific to the man in the ziploc bag in her hands, she couldn’t help but stop in her tracks. “Don’t tell me you’re suddenly craving a tall, crisp IPA now too?” She asked, glancing back and forth between Morgan and the bag. His widower had carried on about the man’s favorite things to her just that morning before crying into her shoulder. “You don’t mean you’ve literally lost your foot, right?” As soon as she asked the question, she couldn’t help but realize how very wrong she probably was.

Morgan shrugged. “Rich. Like, a good medium-rare burger. Or like, cheesecake? It’s good. Rich. My mouth is literally watering eating it.” She took another bite. “Ew, IPA? No, I mean, I can’t taste anything anymore, but I came from Houston, and our beer culture is way to evolved for an IPA. Are you saying--” She eyed the brain pointedly. “I actually kinda know Mr. What’s-his-name? When I eat him?” She shrugged, a little uncomfortable. Having real, meaningful parts of people in her head wasn’t something she was sure she liked. But stars, whats-his-name tasted good. “Ooh, but actually, I did mean literally.” She kicked off her flats and wiggled her bare toes. “I don’t have anything to break them with, but if you got anything fancy in here, you can knock yourself out. Like--” She pressed them against a chair leg, more and more until they crumbled and bent over in a way toes normally shouldn’t. It was a satisfying sting of pain. She flexed them again and they righted themselves before both their eyes, only a little dislocated, really. She smiled up at Erin, kicking her legs with a little satisfaction. “I mean, when I ran into this scary eye-hands critter, I just lost the whole thing. And with the killer clams. But we’re good as new now!” She looked around the room for wherever Erin kept her music. “I do kinda mean it about hockey though.”

“Mr. Reid drank IPA’s,” Erin corrected, a slow smirk on her lips as she watched her. She didn’t have any particular thoughts about beer. Beer was beer. Some of it was good, some of it was bad, but it all got the job done in the end. She couldn’t help but stare as Morgan seemed to crush her toes, then flexed them back into shape again. “Whoa,” she said in genuine amazement. An idea sparked and she turned, digging into one of the cabinets. “Yeah, over there,” she said, pointing towards a radio across the room. She pulled out one of her biggest, thickest trocars. This wouldn’t hurt her right? Erin smiled, raising a brow. “Hey--can I try something?”

#wickedswriting #chatzy #chatzy: morgan #organ's out of the bag

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annakie · 5 years

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Thoughts on a DW Rewatch & Mass Effect replay.

So I’m in the Eleven / Clara half-season now.

Also I’m now replaying Andromeda. I have thoughts, about both. I’ll start with Doctor Who then label it when I get to Mass Effect stuff.

Oh my God this gets long and rambly. Apparently, I have a lot of thoughts.

So, season 702... I’m ready for it to be over. I miss the Ponds. I felt like most of the first half of this season was pretty great, honestly. I’d forgotten how fun some of those episodes were, I think at the time we were anticipating a new companion so heavily that it was harder to appreciate those episodes? I feel like there was a lot of criticism levied towards them that now I felt like was a bit too much. The western episode was kinda meh but still not bad.

I’m not sure what exactly it is about these Clara / Eleven episodes that I’m still not connecting with but I’m in the middle of the Crimson Horror episode (which is a Vastra/Jenny/Strax heavy episode and enjoying it more than anything else so far this half-season.

*edit later* NOPE NOPE NOPE I’D FORGOTTEN HOW THE DOCTOR FORCES A KISS ON JENNY. GROSS. SUPER GROSS. SHE’S A MARRIED WOMAN, A LESBIAN AND DID NOT CONSENT TO ANY OF THIS. BAD DOCTOR, BAD.

Honestly even with some excellent guest start acting, the Russian Submarine episode was STILL a slog and the ghosts in the 1950′s episode no better. Like they still weren’t ridiculous and unwatchable but... just didn’t feel fun or interesting at all? The Journey to the Center of the TARDIS episode was decent, and I felt like that wasn’t nearly as cool as it should have been..

I remember reading a criticism of these episodes early on where they said that the biggest fault is that they failed to give Clara any real characterization or solid personality other than “girl the Doctor is obsessed with”. She’s SUPER IMPORTANT but not only do we not know why at this point but it really doesn’t feel... earned? I don’t recall it ever feeling earned that Clara was supposedly always so important? “The most importantest companion EVAR!”

And as someone who stanned the hell out of a character who was hated in the fandom for “replacing” a previous companion I’m checking myself to make sure it’s still not because I Miss the Ponds. Like, I don’t HATE Clara, I just, at least at this point in the rewatch, can’t find any reason to really LOVE her? She’s there, she’s fine, Jenna-Louise Coleman is doing a great job with what they’re giving to her but... I don’t know. It all feels... off.

I had forgotten all about the “the Doctor rides a motorcycle up the side of a skyscraper” moment and something hit me in that moment that made me remember that wow people hated that moment. It felt really... shark-jumpy somehow.

I love Eleven, but this half-season isn’t connecting with me, AT ALL. It feels like the writers just went and dug through a bunch of rejected script ideas, polished them up and were likle “let’s just do this until Matt Smith is gone.” I’m anxious to get to Twelve.

Mass Effect Stuff

OK TECHNICALLY I haven’t finished ME3. I still need to do the party and the goodbye scene, (Citadel Epiloge Mod installed) but I’ve gotten all the Stuff and done all the missions in the arena. I just wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye yet, so I started Andromeda a bit early.

-----------------

OK look I had a point I wanted to make and never quite got where I wanted to go with it right here. I’m too tired of trying to fix it, so this stands as written.

This playthrough had me ruminating a lot on Kaidan and Garrus. I really love both of those characters, though in my heart I’ll always primarily love Kaidan, I’ve done the Garrus romance and wouldn’t mind playing that character again to see the romance one more time. In ME1, I bring Kaidan everywhere all the time, and pick which other companion I bring to the story-based missions based on what I know is gonna happen like I’m sure most people do. Wrex for Therum, Tali for Feros (though I REALLY wish you could switch before going to see the Thorian), Liara for Noveria, Ashley on Virmire, Garrus for Ilos/Endgame. I rotate through all five for sidemissions.

In ME2, Garrus is my always-bring companion, with Garrus + Miranda being my favorite team. Except after the Omega relay, where characters with Throw really shine with all those husks running at us, Jack holds the bubble, and Miranda and Thane, who both have Warp to help take down the Reaper Baby, are the preferred team. Also so Miranda can tell TIM to fuck off.

Then in ME3, once the game opens up, Garrus is back on the perma-team, with a preference towards bringing Liara along... until we get Kaidan back. And then I realized I didn’t bring him to a single thing except a side mission or two until Earth. Mostly, this is because I’m following the Kaidan Banter guide and it turns out Garrus is a real banter hog for most of the missions. At leat he’s not James, who I literally never use unless I’m going on an N7 mission and feel bad that I haven’t taken him off the Normandy in awhile. I mean, even Javik gets more play. Also EDI doesnt leave the Normandy til near the end when all of a sudden she gets real important.

But Garrus is always on the team for Priority Earth. And that always felt like the way the main game should end, with your two favorites. (Also what kind of monster wouldn’t bring Wrex to the combat-centric areas of Citadel DLC? I keep thinking I should have runs where I bring other people but... Wrex is my other fave and we don’t get him with us AT ALL since ME1.)

I love Garrus, so much. And I was thinking with this whole parallel DW rewatch / Mass Effect replay think I’m doing right now how both Rose Tyler and Garrus Vakaraian are characters that were ruined for me for awhile due to their respective... overly enthusiastic fanbases who a small percentage of were dicks to people who loved other characters. The Kaidan tag (and from what I understand Thane got some of this too, but not nearly as bad) was a pretty hostile place for awhile (and yeah I used to check the Garrus tag too and there was a small amount of tag-invasion there but uh, like 5% of what the Kaidan tag got) which made loving the character of Garrus a lot harder for awhile. But when actually watching seasons 1 & 2 / the end of 4 of DW, or actually playing the games, those characters are awesome.

Fanbases can be amazing or terrible, and time and time again I think you start to realize that no matter how great a fandom is, there are going to be a few people who can only enjoy themselves by feeding on drama, or on lifting up what they love by stomping on other people/characters/plotlines. Going back through my blog reminded me that even the TAH fandom had some of this, with a small percentage of fans being real dicks to two prominent female characters in favor of their favorite ship, which soured even that just a tiny bit.

It’s not fair to characterize everyone who loves a popular thing as someone who does this. It’s also hard to avoid completely because there will always be jerks, or young/new people who don’t realize what bad form they’re showing. I did learn by trying to fight it for a year or two, that responding might help that one person not do it again, but it’s not going to stop overall. Maybe yelling a lot about Martha Jones did change some people’s minds. It still isn’t that good of a look now, even knowing that in general I was pretty polite and logical about it. I might respond to an odd comment now and again in some favorite character tags, but in general, turns out that kind of fight just isn’t worth it.

And those fights seem so stupid in the light of everything else happening in the world today.

Anyway, don’t be a dick about the things you don’t like.

-----------------------

I also wanted to say, and I know I said it in a few other posts about this ME3 playthrough, but seriously I cannot believe how much ME3 is a changed game because of the modders. I cannot imagine ever playing ME3 again without these mods. There were so many small things that I kept thinking I should take note of to talk about and I’m sure I forgot 90% of them, but there’s things like... adding in mentions of the Andromeda Initiative, closing a few plotholes, mentioning Emily Wong, adding in many more Spectre console options which end up having their own plotlines, adding in an entire plotline about the VI civilization that had previously only been talked about in like, social media or Cerberus News Network posts, having the Normandy be so much more populated, seeing so many more other species on the Citadel with more variety in clothing for those species that have clothing / could have more variety, way more female Turians.... every time I play ME3 the game is more and more like the game we wanted when it came out.

I am kind of itching to go back and replay it even now.

But hey, instead, its time to talk about Andromeda.

-------------------------

So first of all, yes, mods for Andromeda. A few appearance mods, a lot of convenience mods.

After having recently played DA:I and I think Andromeda and DA:I are a lot more similar than Andromeda and the previous trilogy, I had decided it was time to cut down on the stupid stuff Andromeda does, like “Oh, you want minerals? Spend 10 minutes in each mining zone finding the PERFECT place to gather materials or you’re fucked” No, thanks. I’ll mine but give me that “one probe placed anywhere and you’re done” mod.

Make the modifications and crafting materials I use actually matter. 2% damage increase is nothing. Make my squadmates not suck because I remember doing 90% of the work myself before and that got exhausting with the number of spawns.

I tried to not go overboard so things feel like cheating, but there’s enough out there to just get rid of the stupid stuff, and it’s nice. And works together a lot easier than the DA:I mods did.

One thing I did do was install the Multiple Romance Mod. I enjoyed it in DA:I, even though ultimately I only did 2 full romances. I am **NOT** romancing Gil or Cora with the mod, I just wanted to experience all the content available for female Ryders at once, since I’m not going to have the energy to replay this 100+ hour game enough times to see every romance on its own. So I am poly-romancing Liam, Jaal, Vetra, Suvi, Peebee, Keri, and if it lets me, Reyes when it’s time.

I’ve only gotten all the way through Andromeda once (where I romanced Liam) My second playthrough was right after my first and stalled out about halfway through (was romancing Jaal.) It was one of those “I’m totally gonna get back to this! (She didn’t.)” things. I’m gonna be honest, I enjoyed the Liam romance and was enjoying the Jaal romance, I’d done a fling with Reyes but not the full romance my first time through and the fling with PeeBee on my second. Reyes was probably my favorite out of all of them. So this time I decided.. let’s see which I love the most, all at once. I don’t know if I’ll do this in the future, but this game is too long to not see all the content I wanna see, TBH.

And you know, I still really do like Andromeda. It’s a GOOD game. And I’m forever going to be mad that we’re not going to see how this story ends. This story deserved to finish being told. Like, there are a lot of very legit criticisms about Andromeda, but it didn’t deserve the harshness it got. And the worst thing about it, and DA:I both is that... there’s just a little TOO MUCH of it. 100 hours is an amazing amount of game but... it’s also just too much. For now I’m not trying to 100% this playthrough. My plan is on each planet to get the planet to 100%, take out the Kett or whatever major base, the Remnant Architect, and yeah probably clear out the sidequests that show up on the map, but fuck quests that are like “visit random Kett camps until you find the right datapads that don’t show up on the map!” or “scan random blobs in the forest that don’t show up on the map!”

So like, do the content, not the filler.

I still hate the vaults. The first one is cool. The rest are tedious. But they’re mandatory.

I love everyone on this spaceship though. They did the Tempest stuff SO WELL. All the companions I think are... good? There’s no one I don’t like, even the non-squadmate shipmates ship have so much interaction and so much to do/say. It’s not like “a bunch of randos and Joker, with occasional appearances by Chakwas and the Engineers” There’s no randos, it’s just a few people you have real interactions with, and its great.

The lack of enough beds in the bedroom will never not annoy me. There’s 4 beds for... Lexi, Liam, Cora, Suvi, Kallo, Vetra and Gil? Even if Liam slept on his couch, and Vetra put a bed in her supply room... still doesn’t add up. What, do Salarains not sleep or something? Does Lexi sleep in a medical bed?!? Peebee sleeps in the escape pod, Jaal brings a bed with him, and Drack’s like “Eh I’ll just sleep in the kitchen”. WHAT? THE KITCHEN?

I mean sure there weren’t enough beds, even with the sleeper pods, on the Normandy either, but somehow that was less disturbing.

Also, I know you’re supposed to HATE Director Tann but I love Kumail Nanjiani so I find it hard to be a total dick to him, even if he usually deserves it. If he wasn’t an anti-Krogan racist I think it’d be easier to like him. He was thrown into a pretty shitty situation and... did actually hold things together for some time. He’s not doing anything out of malice. He’s a dick, but also doing what he needs to do to keep the Initiatiave going. Oh, except for being a anti-krogan racist. (Honestly, I also think “until he turned Cerberus Udina was just doing his job pretty well” too, so...)

Taking some screenshots as I go. I mostly just take screenshots for me now. I have a few thousands screenshots from a dozen or more games rotating through my desktop background, and I keep adding to it, and love it.

Anyway, I’ve gotten Eos, Voeld and Havral to 100%. Time to go save the Moeshe. I’m having fun.

*edit from later* I’d forgotten that... idk if the dialog they recorded for Jaal was the first thing they recorded for him or they used a different VA or what but on the Save the Moshe mission his voice is VERY DIFFERENT and oh man, that is still bad.

Might take a break for when Onslaught comes out for SWTOR, though. I haven’t really played SWTOR in months. Oops.

#personal post tag thingy #annakie's mass effect stuff #doctor who stuff #hey this gets REAL RAMBLY sorry not sorry

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breg21 · 5 years

Text

Ladynoir Month: Bad Luck Charm

@ladynoirjuly2019

Ao3 FFN

Here's part 2! And boy am I exhausted. I'm calling it a night, guys! I hope ya'll enjoy!

Adrien couldn't help but feel a tad of disappointment.

It was neither his, nor Ladybug's fault, really. He had been an emotional wreck the week before, and after they kissed, she comforted him the rest of the night, and for that, he was grateful, he had this amazing, caring partner, and even though they didn't officially become a couple that night, he knew they had all the tie in the world to figure everything out, and he couldn't wait. It was all going so great.

That was, of course, until the ground began to shake beneath his feet.

The look of horror on his teachers face chilled him to the bone, yet she was easily distracted so he took advantage of that fact crawling under his desk as to have the room to himself for what came next.

He put the phone up to his ear, only to hear his father's voicemail. "Come on. Pick up for once."

He pierced his head above the desk to see if everyone had fully evacuated. The classroom was left entirely empty yet there was a strange golden glow coming from the air vents. He didn't have time to worry about that. He jumped out of his hiding spot as he yelled.

"Plagg, claws out!"

The little creature swirl around him, materializing his suit in seconds.

With a heavy heart, Chat picked up his phone one last time.

--------------------------------------------------------

"Come on Lil' Bug, we've got some time to fix."

Ladybug looked at the future Bunix with all different levels of confusion. "What are you doing here?"

She placed a hand on Ladybug's shoulder, making sure that they kept walking the entire conversation. "Listen, long story short, I picked on a kid who was trying to lose some wieght, it was stupid, I was young, I know. Point is, he's the akuma right now, and because of my actions, his life goes down the drain big time. So, because of my massive regret for my actions, I thought I would come back and fix that mistake."

Ladybug smiled. "That's great, how can I help?"

Bunix grimace. "You already did and it ended terribly."

Ladybug couldn't tell which feeling was strong, her confusion about time travel of her anger for being insulted for something she hasn't done yet. "I'm sorry?"

Bunix crouched down, placing her hands on Ladybug's shoulders. "No need. It was entirely my fault and I'm here to correct my mistake of trying to correct my mistake."

Ladybug blinked a few times before trying to shake her head clear of her jumbled thoughts of the complexed explanation. "Let's just say I don't understand anything that you just said. What do we do from here?"

Bunix let out a slight grin. "Me, I do nothing, I already messed this day up enough, still not as bad as the darkest timeline." She shuddered. "Word of advice, never alter the timeline after 16 shots of Tequila. Man, those ships did not work."

Ladybug stared on, completely lost to the older woman's words. "Okay… What do I do?"

"Just do what you do best, jitter bug. Take names and kick butt. Speaking of which we should get moving, we have to meet up with your kitty in a couple minutes."

Ladybug's face went flat. "Don't call him that, please."

Not saying a word, they bolted out of the locker room and onto a nearby rooftop where they were soon greeted by Chat with a goofy smile on his lips. "What do we have today?"

She gave him a confused look, trying to signal just how weird their world was going to get with their bunny friend around.

"We know quite a bit actually. The victim has super strength and incredibly fast speed, but because they're not used to their new body type, they are super bad at aiming or controlling it."

Chat looked to Alix in a state of confusion. "How bad is this guy if you're here with us."

She gave him a playful smile. "Not too bad, just, you know, time travel stuff. And I'm definitely not your lucky charm, more like bad luck charm. Anyway, have fun you two." She gave them a very forceful pat on the back pushing them off the building entirely. "Sorry!" Bunix shouted from her spot above them. "I'm still not used to super strength."

The akuma turned to her and before any of them had a chance to blink the Akuma had broken through the building they were standing on.

Both Chat and Ladybug jumped to the nearest rooftop.

When they were in reach of the akuma, Chat took a swing at it, but missed. Over and over, he tried to throw punches, kicks, or anything that would work, but he always missed his reach by a few seconds. "Okay, he's fast." Chat let out as he did his best to catch his breath.

Ladybug nodded before she added, "Yeah, and apparently he doesn't like being called Billy either." She considered calling on her lucky charm and seeing if it could give them any insight as what to do next, but thought better of it knowing that her timmer might run out too soon if she did it then.

The two looked around in the rubble to see if anyone was hurt. Luckily, they found a condemned sign amongst the wreckage.

Ladybug continued to search for the future miraculous holder, but came up short in her findings. The fear held an iron grip on her spine, and started to slowly crawl all over her being."No sign of civilians but where's Alix?"

They felt the ground shake beneath them as a blur flashed before them wrapping them both in highly muscular arms.

Chat wiggled around in the akuma's grip, trying to break free, but realized his struggles were pointless. His hold was too strong. "This is not the kind of hug I needed today."

Ladybug reached for her yo-yo, her fingertips barely able to brush the surface of the weapon, before sending Chat a wink from the other arm. "I'll have to keep that in mind for later."

The akuma victim released them as their momentum sent them both crashing into a wall.

Chat spat out a piece of rubble that found its way into his mouth. "That is, if we're still physically able to give hugs."

She readied her yo-yo as she pointed to the extremely muscular man "Hey, there! Strong arm, you want another go or are you just too slow?"

As he planted his feet firmly in the ground, Ladybug tossed the other end of her yoyo to Chat, making sure she had her footing just right. "When he makes his charge, you pull as tight as you can and when I say throw, you throw it forward with all your might."

He gave her a shaky thumbs up.

Within moments the akuma victim took off toward them, right as Bunix jumped directly in front of the cable.

"Bunix, look out!" Chat shouted, but it was too late. The akuma and Bunix were bound tightly together unable to move.

Ladybug let out a small chuckle. "Hey look, Chat. I made a rabbit trap."

The street became dead quiet before Chat burst out laughing, having to hold his stomach at bay. She felt proud of her pun. "That was so good M'lady."

Bunix rolled her eyes before she started to squirm in her confines. "That's real cute and all, but can we please get me out of here?"

Ladybug took the dumbbells from Billy's hand, purifying the butterfly and returning things to normal.

As the Ladybugs scattered about the city, future Bunix went up to the large teen. "Listen, I have a little secret for you. That girl that made fun of you today is going through a really hard time. And that definitely doesn't give her an excuse as to why she said what she said, but she hasn't exactly found herself yet and she didn't mean to hurt you."

He looked up to her with shame on his face. "I didn't mean to react the way I did, I don't like the thought of hurting anybody. It's just...I've been working out for three months and it just doesn't get any easier. I guess when I hear her making fun of me, it just made me feel like I'm never making any progress."

Bunix shook her head. "You don't have any reason to be sorry. She needs to learn that her words hurt, and you didn't deserve any of it." The bunny superhero paused as she thought over a few things. "Hey, here's a tough thought. Go to her. Tell her how you feel. I know for a fact she has an excellent fitness regimen and could really use a friend right about now."

He gave her an odd smile. "How do you know this, are you her mom?"

Bunix's face nearly cracked at that. "Close, but no. I just know someone who's lost when I see them." She looked back to Ladybug and Chat. "And I know when someone has been found."

----------------------------------------------

With the akuma taken care, of Alix went back to her own time, finally leaving the two to their thoughts. The city below glistened in the golden hour of the sunset as the two once again took their place on the Eiffel tower.

Chat looked out onto the city as Ladybug scooched closer to him eventually bumping her knees against his in an effort to gain his attention.

A loose smile formed on his lips. "What's all this about M'lady?"

She placed a hand on his upper knee. "Alix was talking about how difficult it is as a time traveler not fixing the regrets she made in life and she also told me about how in trying to drastically fix a regret she had to redo this entire day. She also said something about 16 shots of Tequila, but I honestly didn't listen to that part."

Chat let out a little chuckle at that, and she couldn't help but join in. "Point is, I don't want us to have regrets with each other and while I'm still terrified, I think that's never really going to go away. Not fully at least and not knowing who I would be dating... I don't necessarily know if I want that feeling to go away."

His air was almost gone, and knew if he lost everything else, that if he still had her, in the end, he'd find ways for everything to be okay.

She booped his nose, drawing his attention back to her. "You've loved me practically since you first laid eyes on me and have fought tooth and claw to get a fair chance. While I know there's Hawkmoth, we can't let him define who we are. If I choose to be with you, then that's my choice, we may have to fight to keep each other safe but at the end of the day, there is nobody I'd rather have my partner."

He felt like he was choking on his own tongue as hope bubbled up in his chest. "Does… are you saying what I think you're saying?"

She laughed, and he swore that sound was gonna be the death of him someday. He really didn't mind that though. She scootched even closer and into his personal space and brushed her nose against his chin. "Yeah. That is, if you want still want to."

He yelped, and flashed to his feet, scooping her in his arms, and began to pepper her face with kisses, getting every inch of unmasked skin that his lips could possibly touch and it pulled beautiful giggles from her lips and he wanted to continue and just never stop.

He loved this girl. He loved her so much, and he got to keep her.

She pulled nack, but remained in his arms. Her face was slightly flushed all around and he thought he had died in that second, because she had to be an angle. "So, um." She started out, and giggled nervously, which made his eyebrow arch in confusion, because why was she nervous now. He didn't have to wait long for an answer. "Are.. are you gonna ask me?"

Oh, his brain lit up as realization came flying in. Oh.

She wanted him to ask her to be his, and he wanted that, truly he did. But the words fumbled in his mouth. He tried once, opening and closing his mouth. Twice, thrice, four times, but no matter how hard he tried, the stupid words would not tumble out.

He had been pining for this girl for so long, and it had been only a dream in his mind, and his nerves were just eating at him. They just didn't want to leave his mouth, and he knew why.

After so long of being rejected, even though he knew her answer already he was scared to be the one to take the step in their relationship. He had given her full rein, letting her have the space she needed and wanted, and letting her set them at the pave that she needed.

Which was great, because he knew he needed to respect her boundaries, and let her do what she needed to do have them a good relationship— friendship or otherwise— But now she was handing over everything to him, she was asking him to take one of the very important milestones between them in his hands.

He was terrified out of his mind.

And she noticed, as she always did. Her face softened as she inched forward. "Kitty," she breathed. Sweets. Sweets were all he could smell, and he wanted to taste. "I've been the one to make the first move in our relationship because you've been respecting my feelings. I've cared about you a long time— even before it was romantic— but you've cared about me for so much longer."

His breathing stopped, and he could feel his adam's apple bobble in his throat as she cupped his face as he contoured her argument. "Because that's what you deserve. You deserve the world, and I'd give it to you if I could."

Her smile was so bright. He wanted to kiss those happy lips. "That's why I want you to ask me. You've waited so long. Please. You should be the one to ask me."

He could tell she meant her words with the utmost sincerity, and who was he to refuse his lady? He didn't think he could if he tried, it'd hurt way too much. "Ladybug." He swallowed the pool of spit that had built up. "Will you please be mine?"

The forever part was silently implied.

She giggled, moving onto her tiptoes to press her lips onto his for a slow, sweet, lingering kiss that broke between smiles. Everything else ceases to exist after that. "Of course, kitty." Another kiss that was interrupted by their face eating grins. "You wanna know a secret though?"

Breathing on his own was becoming impossible, but she was sharing enough. In a daze, he asked, "What's that, bugaboo?"

Against his mouth, she whispered, "I already was."

*Slams fist on table* I demand more fluff. I love fluff. I live for fluff. Take that away from me, and you will not see a happy girl. You should be scared in fact. Anyways. Till tomorrow, guys! Lots of love!

#ladynoirjuly2019 #LadyNoir #ml #mlb #miraculous ladybug #love square

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