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thestraggletag · 2 years

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The Changeling, Chapter 2

Rating: M

Summary: Belle and Lacey had always been as different as two twins could possibly be, but always ready to do whatever it took for each other. Which includes Belle putting her life in pause to replace Lacey in hers as she checked herself into rehab to kick a drinking habit that could potentially end her modelling career. All she had to do is attend some fittings, do a couple of photoshoots, avoid if possible the slimey and two-timing Killian Jones and steer clear of Lacey’s boss, Mr Gold, and his suspicious nature.

How difficult could it possibly be?

A/N: Posting today because I will be away from my laptop on Friday. Enjoy!

Though it seemed hectic at first, not to mention incredibly draining, Belle soon seemed to settle into her new routine. She went running in the mornings, something she had at first found grueling but was now strangely pleasant. It was by far the quietest time of her day, and there was something pleasant about the exercise itself.

After showering and having an uninspired but healthy breakfast she took a town car to the House of Gold, where she would practice with Ruby, try outfits for her Granny or model for Jefferson. And though those activities used to take up most of her day after a while she began to have precious moments of downtime, hours on end with little to do other than “be available”. It was then that she began to take her laptop with her every morning, hoping to advance her thesis work in-between all the modelling work. That way she could also keep from interacting with anyone she did not strictly have to, therefore diminishing the chances someone would find her out.

Taking advantage of the fact that she was in New York she contacted the NYC Public Library, creating a special collections account in order to try and get an onsite research appointment. Though it took jumping through a few hoops she got her request through, pending approval. In the meantime she had been hunting around the fashion house for a more permanent place to work, since usually she found herself migrating constantly throughout the day, escaping the hordes of people seemingly in constant flow around the building.

It was a mistake on her part- pressing the wrong number on the elevator- that made her discover the library. A whole floor of books and antiques, almost as if she had stumbled into the abandoned wing of a museum. She vaguely recalled that, before creating the fashion house, Mr Gold was originally an antiques collector and dealer. As far as she knew he still was. His empire stretched far and wide, Lacey had said.

“To him we’re a profitable hobby. The only reason he’s so invested in the House’s financial wellbeing is the fact that he doesn’t like to ever lose.”

Walking around the room it was clear where Gold’s real passion lay. There was little rhyme or reason to the collection of objects, and Belle had a limited knowledge of everything ancient that wasn’t books, but even her unpracticed eye could tell her that everything on display was priceless, from the paintings in the walls to the vases and sculptures propped above pedestals and over antique chests of drawers and cabinets.

She set up her laptop in a corner, taking advantage of a coffee table that looked to be at least from this century, and a set of Chesterfield couches that shielded her somewhat from view, in case anyone appeared, and tried to immerse herself in her research. But soon it became almost impossible to ignore the wall of books behind her and to the sides, always in her peripheral vision as she forced herself to stare at her laptop screen.

“Well, one look couldn’t possibly hurt.”

The collection was as fine and expensive as she had suspected, but it was also more diverse and eclectic. There seemed to be logic to the purchases, it was certainly not a curated collection, but it spoke somewhat of the collector’s personal tastes. As she browsed Belle had the feeling she was getting a rather unique look into Mr Gold’s mind.

“What the devil are you doing with that book, Miss French?”

Belle startled, her grip on the edition of Notre Dame the Paris she had been inspecting tightening, as if afraid the surprise would make her drop it. When she turned around Mr Gold was a few feet away from her, looking ridiculously polished in another one of his expensive suits, this time with a bright blue pocket square. The glacial look of disdain in his face was exactly the same as the last time he had seen her, only now he didn’t even have a reason to suspect her of being drunk or otherwise doing something untoward.

“Well, I can read, Mr Gold. My education has gotten me that far.”

“I didn’t think you’d be interested. It’s not the latest edition of Vogue , after all. Not many pictures in that lovely book you’re holding. A lot more expensive, though.”

Her sister was right. Mr Gold was mean for sport. Mean for the fun of it.

“Careful, Mr Gold. Someone might suggest you don’t pay me enough, if you think I would resort to stealing.”

He smiled at her then, as if amused by her sarcasm.

“I didn't mean to imply that, dearie. But I do fear you have very little notion of the treasure you hold in your hands.”

“I know what this is. It’s a book.” She waited for the contempt to show in his face before she continued. “More specifically a very well-preserved first edition of Notre Dame de Paris , in its contemporary blue half calf binding, decorated with woodcuts and likely worth around…” She made a mental assessment, having seen few flaws in the book. “Fifteen thousand dollars? Give or take a thousand or so.”

Belle had paid for most of her bachelor’s using a mixture of scholarships, but she had received none that would cover a full tuition, so she had worked for the rest. She had been lucky to land a job at a small boutique bookshop, specialising in antique books. It had been what had first sparked her interest in antique books. She had learnt a lot over time, including basic book appraisal. She realised, however, that Lacey would have no reason to know any of it.

“That’s… rather impressive, dearie. I didn’t peg you for an antiquarian, though.”

Gold, fortunately, seemed to be more curious and surprised than suspicious. Belle mumbled something about being a fan of Victor Hugo, which she hoped was convincing. She looked around, trying to find a way to distract him, and found the perfect opening when she noticed again the sheer size of his collection.

“Which one’s your favourite?”

Having spent years on the fringes of the antique book’s community she knew such a question posed to a collector was bound to get them talking. Mr Gold didn’t look like he wanted to answer her first, looking at her speculative, as if trying to figure her out. At last, however, he moved to a corner of the room, pointing towards a row of seven well-preserved books bound in red morocco binding with ornate filigree designs on the back depicting flowers. She leaned close to read the title.

“The Iliad, 1731.” She paused, counting the books again. “Is this a complete set?”

“Yes, took me years to complete. Found a couple together, but most of them were snatched up as singles, in different levels of disrepair. I restored them myself.”

She didn’t dare pick one up and inspect it, but the spines themselves already spoke of precise, detailed work. He seemed to notice her admiration and it seemed to put him at ease somewhat. She asked a few follow-up questions, interested in how he had managed to acquire all seven volumes of a singular collection, and he seemed more than happy to open up about it. Surprisingly, there was little of the sarcasm he usually displayed when it came to talking about antiques. His entire face transformed, enthusiasm turning his expression animated, and he became an inspired conversationalist, learned without being boastful and witty without being mean. It was the most intellectual stimulation Belle had had in weeks, getting to discuss her own passion with someone who shared it, which in turn made her perhaps less reserved than she ought to be.

After that afternoon she did not expect to see him again at the library, feeling like she had gotten some sort of tacit approval to be there and he would not feel the need to check up on her. And though he didn’t, they did meet at the library every now and then, almost by chance. Belle thought she should feel rather insulted that Mr Gold was most likely making sure she didn’t mess up his expensive collection, but she liked their conversations a little too much to take umbrage with his presence. His slightly off-colour sense of humour was very similar to her own and he was a safe person, a person who didn’t know Lacey enough to suspect anything when she behaved in a way that would have exposed her to anyone who really knew her twin. It was a nice break from pretending to be anyone other than herself.

As the weeks progressed and the fashion show loomed ever closer the mood shifted somewhat, becoming far more urgent. Now that Jefferson was inspired everything seemed to accelerate, which meant she was busier than ever. The designer commanded most of her time and attention, not only having her model new half-finished pieces but making never-ending changes to the ones she thought were done. A seam added here, an extra ribbon there… It felt to Belle like she spent half her time on the other side of the folded screens that served as her changing room in a corner of Jefferson’s atelier. She liked most of the changes and the new direction of the line, which seemed more whimsical and diaphanus instead of the more leatherwear-inspired outfits Jefferson had dressed her up in weeks ago. There was an air of romantic, old-fashioned glamour to the dresses now, and they were far easier to walk in, even if the voluminous skirts were sometimes a trial not to step on.

As she did every afternoon Belle stepped into Jefferson’s workspace right after tea, ready for round two of fittings for the day. She found her rack easily, grabbing the first dress- a rather impressive silk organza confection layered to add volume and movement to the skirt- and slipping it on. It was, surprisingly, a little loose around the waist. Perhaps all that running, coupled with how little she had been eating as of late, consumed as she was by the nervous energy around the building, explained it. They had also been compensating for her “new measurements” in recent sketches, which Belle had seen. She took a peak as she waited around for the designer, noticing his frantic scrawling all over the papers, accompanied by another, more measured hand, making adjustments to the silhouettes and adding touches in black ink over Jefferson’s pencilled lines.

“Curiosity killed the cat, you know?”

Belle turned around in a hurry, almost getting tangled up in her skirt as it did not fully rotate with her. She was surprised to see Mr Gold there instead of Jefferson, a length of tape measure around his neck and a small pad and pencil in his left hand.

“Where’s Jeff? He’s usually never late.”

“He got a call from his daughter’s school. Seems Grace has caught some stomach bug and needed to be picked up. He’s probably on his way to the doctor right about now. But taking into account the tight schedule we’re under I offered to replace him. Can’t really spare the manpower and I was a fitter, once upon a time. I have the basics of it down, enough to make the necessary adjustments and notations for the sewers.”

He must have seen the sudden, and unexplained, unease in her face, because he smiled, lifting one hand in an apparent gesture of truce.

“I promise not to prick you.”

“Well, that would be a first.”

His laugh was unexpected but strangely pleasing, deep and raspy, as if he was unused to making the sound. He took the barb in stride, motioning for her to step into the small platform as he tied a pincushion to his wrist and set the notebook and pen nearby. As he promised he obviously knew what he was doing, working faster than she would have expected, pinning the dress around her waist and adjusting a strap on the shoulder with not even the hint of a pinprick. When it was done Belle caught a glimpse of what the final product would be. It was exquisite, from the delicate beading resembling scales to the way the skirt trailed behind her as she moved.

“Your measurements have changed.”

She twirled, feeling how much movement the dress allowed. It was certainly an improvement over Jefferson’s latex bodycons for sure, even if the sheer size of it was tricky to manage.

“Yes, I’m trying to get rid of my vacation fat.” She hated having to say it, to imply she had had some “unnecessary pounds” to get rid of, but it was what Lacey would have said, what was expected in the modelling world. She ducked back behind the folding screens after grabbing the next gown, telling herself that it was best if she were quick about it. Though Mr Gold was supposed to be a safer companion compared to Jefferson, who even in his inspired frenzy was bound to notice if she slipped up heavily as Lacey, he didn’t not feel safer at all.

“Nonsense. Whatever you’re doing, you can stop it. You’re perfect just the way you are.”

She paused, the new gown halfway tied around her neck.

“What, with more fat? Jefferson practically chewed me out the moment he saw me. He’s been hounding me ‘get my waist back’ ever since.”

“The dresses will look better with more of you in it, is all.”

The way he said it, with a softness to his voice, made her shiver. She told herself firmly to pull it together. He thought she was Lacey, she could not lose sight of that. Telling herself firmly to get a grip she stepped out of the folding screen, with the train of the gown- a frothy mess of fabric resembling the forest floor-, trailing behind her. When she stepped onto the platform and turned around to allow Gold to pin the dress around her waist she stumbled, one of her heels accidentally slipping into a loose hemline. Before she could right herself Mr Gold’s arms were around her waist, her own hands landing on his shoulders as she found her balance once more. It was hardly a compromising position, Jefferson had touched her in more intimate ways while adjusting a seam on her torso or a pleat in her lower back. But it somehow felt like more. Like something far too close to be happening in such an open space, where anybody could just walk in there.

As if to prove a point one of Mr Gold’s assistants, a nervous one called Anna, practically barged into the room, looking like she had been running around the building for a while, barely able at first to say a word.

“I’m sorry, sir, but there’s a Mr Aston here and he’s looking for Lacey. He says they have a date?”

The announcement felt to Belle like someone had dumped a bucket of water on her. Blinking, she righted herself up, murmuring something about having “completely forgotten it” before ducking behind the screen again, her fingers deftly untying the dress, eager to get rid of it. She changed in what felt like record time, taking a few minutes to tease her hair up the way Lacey preferred it and reapply her eyeliner and lipstick before stepping out, feeling more like her sister than before.

“So sorry to rush, Mr Gold, but I did promise Gaston we’d go out to eat. It’s past my usual time anyway.”

“Far be it for me to stand in the way of your busy social life, Miss French.”

Mr Gold’s tone was back to its cold, impersonal manner. Belle rolled her eyes, feeling tired of the Scotman’s mercurial nature, his ability to be practically charming when he wanted, only to devolve to his usual frosty self a second later. He practically sneered a goodbye at her, tacked right before a sharp reminder to be on time the next day “no matter the hangover”. Though Belle knew that Lacey would sweep past him giving him the finger she couldn’t quite muster enough enthusiasm for it, her mind still muddled by whatever the assistant had blissfully interrupted.

That confusion gave way to unease as she met Mr Aston- or ‘grabby Greg’ as Lacey liked to call him- and took in the tall, well-dressed man, looking like he did little other than spend time at the gym and be a sort of decorative piece at board meetings of his father’s company.

Greg, however, turned out to be a fairly harmless, if conceited, jerk, apparently satisfied enough with taking a top model out and about and being seen with her to offer much resistance once Belle made it clear she was going back to her apartment alone, by herself, single. She kept the conversation light and impersonal, drank very little and was blissfully back in Lacey’s apartment at a decent hour. She was surprised, however, to find a bouquet of flowers waiting for her in the living-room, placed there by Lacey’s accommodating doorman who had a key for occasions such as that one. It didn’t take more than a cursory glance to identify the flowers, her stomach sinking a bit when she recognised the calla lilies. As the daughter of a florist she had seen, and even created, a good number of calla lily Rowangements, and could not help but associate the flower with death and funerals. She fished out the accompanying card, reading the name out loud:

“Killian Jones.”

Lacey had told her very little about him. Only that he was the owner of a club she used to go to and not a very nice person.

“Avoid him at all costs if you can, Belle. He’s bad business.”

Making a quick decision Belle took out a plastic bag to dump the flowers in and decided to forget all about them and all about Killian Jones. Hopefully he’d get the hint and leave her and Lace alone.

By the time the fashion show was almost upon them Belle had made up her mind: she was going to do the show herself. She felt prepared enough and did not want all the time Lacey had already spent on rehab to go to waste. Ruby promised not to call her as well, acknowledging that the stressful environment characteristic of a fashion house before a show would hardly be conducive to her sister’s ongoing recovery. Belle felt like she was barely coping with it, adding a barely-controlled substance abuse problem would test any person.

The day of the show itself she was barely able to eat, forcing down a couple of granola bars and a yogurt throughout the day, enough to prevent her from passing out from hunger. Ruby, to her credit, stuck to her from the beginning, covertly guiding her through all the steps, commandeering a nook backstage so they could both adjust their make-up and have their racks to quickly change after each run.

When it finally came time to open the show she found herself alone on the runway. It wasn’t like she imagined. Though there were people there she could barely spot them, the lights streaming onto the catwalk blinded her to everything that wasn’t the white strip ahead of her. It was probably for the best. She told herself to breathe, reminded herself of how she looked now, wearing tulle and beaded silk, her hair teased into a mass of curls and decorated with gold and silver branches, as if she was some nymph out of a story. There was power in what she looked like, in how ethereal and inhuman the make-up and the clothes made her, doe-eyed and fragile yet the centre of attention. She was someone else, someone different, so when she walked down the runway she tried to do it the way she would imagine that creature would do it. It was surprisingly easy once she hit a certain strut, as if she was alone, the murmurs of the people around her sounding as if they came from far away.

When she was safely back behind the stage she felt like trembling, and perhaps a little bit like throwing up, but Ruby hugged her, her Granny fussing around her as she finished getting ready for her own moment on the runway, and told her she’d been great. From then on it was all a blur of costume changes, make-up retouches and people attaching and detaching stuff from her hair. Backstage, the nervous energy threatened to choke her but the runway was calm, almost like her own personal space, where she could simply walk and be. It was nice and quiet, even the music that had been picked for the show was pleasant, all whimsical chimes and soothing harps.

As she completed the last turn Belle could finally say she got it. She finally saw why Lacey loved modelling, what the rush she often described was. Feeling all over the place she clung gratefully to Jefferson as he let her escort him down the runway in the closing dress, an amazing iridescent creation that seemed to float around her, and only then did she hear the crowd, the cheers and applause as the designer bowed to his audience before bowing to her, kissing her hands as he smiled wide.

She had no idea how she made it backstage but soon she was whisked to the reception area of the building, where an after show party was in full swing. The room had been transformed into a fairytale forest, and the models, still in their final dresses, added to the ambiance of that. Someone shoved a coupe glass filled to the brim with champagne and she took a sip, the dryness of the beverage sticking to her throat. All of a sudden the weight of it all hit her, as if her body realised she could finally relax. Hunger and exhaustion seemed to settle in out of nowhere. Her shoes pinched, the dress was heavy and her scalp felt like it was on fire after so many hairstyle changes and ornaments put in and out. She looked around, but she could only see small hors d'oeuvres being served, and Belle figured it would not look good if she ate her weight on them right there in the middle of the party.

Just as she stumbled, feeling dizzy and distracted with hunger, a man was by her side, an arm around her waist. She startled, but soon recognised the tell-tale wisps of floofy hair on her peripheral vision. Mr Gold came to rescue one of his exhausted models. Thank God . Grateful, she draped herself on his side, trying to get some pressure off her feet without fidgeting too much. Gold’s grip tightened and she felt rather than saw his frown of disapproval.

“Let’s get you out of her before you end up on the ground, shall we?”

The offer was angrily hissed, but Belle was too tired to do anything but enthusiastically agree. With a social finesse she wouldn’t have thought he possessed he managed to get them across the room and out the door, his town car appearing seemingly out of nowhere. Though it was a chore to get in with the dress she was wearing, the interior was warm and she was off her feet, so it felt like heaven.

She might have dozed off, because it felt like only a minute or so had passed before the car was stopping, the outline of her building easily recognisable in spite of the darkness and her exhaustion. She did not protest when he insisted on seeing her up the stairs, thinking that perhaps he would worry unless he saw her to the front door of her apartment. It was only when he barged into her apartment after her that she startled.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking after my investment, dearie. Couldn’t risk you tumbling on the corridors and ripping the dress in your drunken stupor.”

The indignation she felt was instantaneous. How dare he imply she was drunk? She had taken, at best, a couple of sips of champagne in the five minutes he had allowed her to enjoy the after party.

“I’m not drunk, you asshole, I’m tired! Exhausted . I worked my ass off for this show, which went great, thank you for pointing it out. I’ve barely eaten all day, or had time to go grocery shopping the entire week! I’m dead on my feet!”

Belle quickly removed her shoes, tossing them at Mr Gold’s feet, happy when he flinched and took a step back.

“You can wait here, I’ll change and you can take your precious gown back with you.”

Without another word she retreated to the safety of her bedroom, slamming the door once she was sure the whole train of the dress had made it inside the room. She stripped right there, moving to the ensuite bathroom for a quick, unsatisfying shower. It was the easiest way to remove her makeup, the specks of glitter that had shed from her hair to her body and the glue residue from the double-sided tape that had protected her modesty, her final dress having a rather plunging neckline. Though she felt like she looked a little bit like a drowned rat when she finished it felt amazing, to be clean. For her hair to be free of lacquer and her feet soothed by the warm water. She draped an oversized robe around her before grabbing the dress and opening her bedroom door. Mr Gold was right where she had left him, her glittery shoes in his free hand. He looked more than a bit contrite, glancing towards her barren kitchen with what looked like regret.

Good. She hoped he felt guilty. Wordlessly, she proffered the dress to him, frowning when he did not immediately take it.

“Miss French, I might have… jumped the gun tonight.” Belle could tell that the Scotsman was having a hard time spitting out the words, but did not feel charitable enough to help him. “I’m sorry. I saw you stumbling around and came to the worst possible conclusion. It’s my fault entirely.”

There was something strangely disarming about having the imposing Mr Gold apologise to her while she was barefoot and wearing a robe, and Belle had to admit that the assumption about her being drunk was not without merit. She could imagine similar situations in the past where Mr Gold or someone else had had to remove Lacey from an event because she might have drunk more than was good for her. There was likely at least one precedent of some unsavoury scene at a public event in her twin’s past. Lacey had in a roundabout way admitted to it, telling her it was one of the main reasons why she wanted to get sober.

“I can’t say you didn’t have reason to suspect, though you were wrong.”

Feeling suddenly regretful at the way she had crumpled the dress in her hands she attempted to smooth it out. Mr Gold took it from her then, more gently than he had ever been before that day.

“Let me make it up to you. There’s a small bistro a block away from here. It’s very good. Let me treat you, since you have nothing to eat from what you’ve implied.”

Warning sirens went off on Belle’s head, reminding her that this was dangerous. She was supposed to be Lacey and her twin, she was certain, would never ever go out with Mr Gold. On the other hand, she was starving, and the shower had woken her up completely. There was no way she would be able to go to sleep without eating, and unless she wanted to devour half a packet of stale crackers and call it dinner, she would have to take the offered alternative.

“Alright. Let me get changed.”

Belle didn’t let herself contemplate why she reached for her own clothes instead of raiding Lacey’s wardrobe, choosing a dark burgundy printed dress with long sleeves and a short hemline, tights and a pair of low-heeled boots. She let her hair down, her scalp still feeling too tender to even think about putting her hair up in one of Lacey’s characteristic updos.

“This will have to do.”

Mr Gold’s bistro turned out to be a cute, if small, yakitori restaurant, with very limited seating but, blissfully, mostly unoccupied so late at night. They sat at the bar, ordering an assortment of skewers and, to Belle’s surprise, a small bottle of umeshu.

“Is this some sort of test?”

She was too tired and strung out to deal with it if it was, but Mr Gold shook his head.

“It’s a peace offering. I’ve accused you at least twice in recent times of not being able to handle your alcohol, so I wanted to rectify that. I trust you to drink responsibly.”

Belle felt uncomfortable, knowing she was setting a precedent that would not be good for her twin, yet also recognising the situation itself was already past that point. Lacey would never have accepted to go there, to have dinner with Mr Gold. She also happened to be a vegetarian.

“Well, not a lot of chances to get drunk with the boss sitting right next to me.”

She played it as a joke, accepting the small glass of plum wine he poured for her. When the food arrived they both dove in, relishing in the bits of chicken, beef and deep-fried tofu and the small dishes sent to accompany them. Soon Mr Gold began to glance over at her every now and then, which reminded Belle that she wasn’t raised by wolves, no matter how much it felt at that time like she was, given how hunger had driven all her manners away. But even when she slowed down and attempted a more ladylike demeanour he kept looking at her.

“What? Why do you keep staring?”

She silently prayed she didn’t get a piece of marinated beef in her hair or sauce all over her face. She would never be able to recover from that.

“It’s your hair.” Her stomach sunk, but he smiled. “I’ve never seen it dry and curl naturally past your shoulders. It’s always in some elaborate style or other. I prefer it this way.”

She shrugged, silently agreeing with him. It felt wonderful to have her hair free of product, she could not understand how Lacey was not bothered by all the hairspray and the bother, though she knew why she did it.

“I’m too small for the modelling world. I need every bit of height I can get.”

“I think you’re just the right height.”

She knew she shouldn’t read much into it, it was clearly a joke aimed at his own below-average height, but she couldn’t help but blush. It was a silly, dangerous thing to do and she told herself, for what felt like the umpteenth time, that she was pretending to be Lacey. Whatever this was, it was supposed to be temporary and not upset the status quo.

A bit late for that, perhaps.

#rumbelle fic #rumbelle #The Changeling #thestraggletag fanfiction

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kandadiff · 2 years

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Lux Anderson

The leader of THE CIRCUS before it broke down and became FUNHOUSE. It isn't often that just one girl makes an impression on an entire town, but Lux always had a way of staying on people's minds. She was a mystery, even to those closest to her, and only those who were in the wrong place at the right time ever truly got to see the facade slip. To some, she was an angel walking among the ordinary. One of the nicest people they had ever met, and wholly convinced she would do anything for them. To others, she was their tormentor - even if some didn't quite realize what she was getting away with until she was gone.

Lux was up to something in her last few days. She was distressed and snapping at everyone who asked her about it. After attending the Jenners Halloween Party, testing her friends and getting into a few arguments there. She disappeared inside a mystery persons car and went missing. She's still missing.

Kimberly 'Hoodie' Ahn

Was actually secretly in love with Lux and tried to break her and her boyfriend up. Lux did string her along because she liked the attention but finding out about her plan she brutally rejected her.

Hoodie is hiding the long-term affair that her mother is having afraid that her father will hate her if he finds out she knows.

The night of Lux’s disappearance Hoodie was one of the only ones to defend her test.

Makayla Arrabah

Makaylas first trying something worse then weed was with Lux at some party they went to. Both girls did coke and while Lux could do it once in a while Makayla easily became addicted. Soon pills followed. Lux used this to her advantage, able to keep sweet Makayla on some what of a leash by her secret drug addiction.

On the night of lux’s disappearance, Rue and Makayla were secretly getting high by the lake. Makayla and Rue were getting high away from the party and saw lux with a mystery man out in the woods. When Makayla tried approaching her Lux just told Makayla “go pop your pills, love, I'll be fine.”

She left for the summer after Lux was officially announced to be missing and told everyone she went to Greece with her family but actually went to a rehab.

Kassandra 'Kassie' Jansen

Kassie helped a close friend from her home town who was mentally unstable escape from a psychiatric ward, where they were being held after endangering people’s lives. the unstable friend, while appearing well upon escape, eventually snapped and murdered someone. She told the police but she has felt guilty about the death caused and never owned up to being the one who got their friend out.

Lux brutally bullied Kassie, in fact she wasn’t part of the group until after she disappeared and was actually grateful when she disappeared.

Naomi Jefferson

Only got into the school because her father forged her SAT scores.

Lux found out somehow and have been keeping it over Naomi’s head. Naomi terrified now that her father was removed from the school that she doesn’t have the grades anymore. But Lux promised to have her back.

It was a late night at the Library. She were searching for a particular book when she heard a voice she thought was familiar. she heard Lux arguing with someone on the other end of the line - she heard her begging for mercy, and offering secrets as collateral. she don’t know who was on the other end of the line but Lux caught her and threatened to out her secret if she told anyone so she stayed quiet.

Arianna 'Adi' Johnson

Used to act as a get-away driver when ex, Xavier, used to rob houses. Eventually got convinced into join and the one time she did they got caught. Let Xavier take the full blame.

Had an affair with the married police partner of her father. In the beginning to try and get Xavier’s sentence reduced. Instead started to fall for him. He was even going to leave his wife for her but she rejected him.

Lux knew about the affair and tried to get her to admit it to marks wife. She refused and it strained the relationship between her and Lux, in the last week before her disappearance.

During the night of the party she stood up against Lux during the test and was responsible for Lux’s bloody nose.

Yekarina 'Katya' Leskova

Katya’s family was struggling after the death of her mother and to help her father, she took up being a cam girl as well as robbing a few of the men who tried to meet up with her. She earned a lot from loyal subscribers however, despite being masked, wearing a wig and disgusting her voice Lux caught her one day. Promising to keep her secret and get her into the sorority on a scholarship.

A week before her disappearance Lux forced Katya to help her break into a house by blackmailing her to tell everyone her secret. She took a few things and made Katya promise not to tell anyone and she hasn’t said a word since.

Kade Morrose

The black sheep from his family, he was doing coke with a few ' friends ' including Lux when one overdosed. Kitty went to go find him and found him with the dead kid. She was going to call the cops but Lux threatened her terrible.

He often fantasizes about killing someone lately its been all his sisters, Angelique, Kitty and Parisa. He loved Lux and is determined to find where she went.

Kara-Lina Kitty Morrose

Left someone for dead trying to find Kade, the boy overdosed and instead of going to help him, she listened to Kade and Lux and left him. Lux threatened to out Kade for his part in the accident if she spoke up. She tries her best to forget about him but he pops in her head every so option.

The night Lux disappeared she followed the four girls into the woods and watched it. After they beat up Lux she helped them clean up.

Draven Patterson

Two summers ago, Draven got high on ‘shrooms at an outdoor party. However during the party she got into an argument with a girl in the sorority who she didn't really get along with somewhere away from the group. The girl began insulting and pushing her out of anger. Draven, tripping badly on their ‘shrooms, thinks that the girl was seriously hurting them and so she freaked out and attacked. She end up smashing the person over the head with a large rock and knocking them out. The girl was discovered the next day and taken to hospital. Lux revealing to draven that she saw the whole thing but promised to keep it a secret.

Things came to a head again, when Draven started to see Henry, the girl she attacked ex and a boy Lux had a crush on. They broke up a few days later and draven knew Lux had something to do with it and when she came back asking for Draven's help in breaking into a house draven refused.

It was after the test when Draven, Kay and Adi confronted Lux the night she disappeared in the woods. Lux taunted the girls but got particularly vicious to Draven. . In a fit of rage, the three attacked Lux. Draven beat her bloodied - she had to be pulled off by Kay before it got too bad. After that the girls left lux beaten in the woods.

Kalyn 'Kay' Snow

Was having an affair with Professor Jefferson when she was dating Liam and he was married. It was a very tumulus relationship ending when his daughter Naomi joins the sorority. He wanted to leave his wife and Kay refused to be with him, Lux found this out when he went to the sorority house pretending to visit his daughter. She promised to keep the secret between them and helped Kay get him removed from the school.

Kay helped Lux break into the principals office a few days before her disappearance and the night of her appearance the girls got into a fight. Lux demanding Kay to go with her somewhere then when she refused - accusing her of not appreciating what she did for her and saying she's just there to take her spot as leader.

Kay gave her the black eye that night and pulled draven off of her before the girl killed her. They left her in the woods.

Edward Styles

After a particularly horrible visit from his father, Edward full of rage followed his father to a seedy casino outside of town. He pulled his father into an alley and brutally beat the shit out of him. At the time Lux was at the casino attempting to cash out her chips for extra money when she heard the commotion. She helped Edward pose the body and clean up taking him back to his house. She promised not to tell anyone as long as he always had her back.

Marcel saw them and later on the news there father was declared to be in a serious coma where he has been for the last 2 years. Neither Edward or Lux mentioning it to anyone.

A few days before Lux died, she showed up at his house; terrified. She paid him to keep an eye on the girls of teh sorority to make sure they weren't the ones “scaring her.” He found nothing and the night she died he reported it to her. She was frustrated but thanked him. Offering him money, with an odd business card in it. He never told anyone but kept the card realizing it might be the key to where she disappeared to .

Damien Thorne

While visiting Kingston Mental Asylum, Lux discovered Damiens mothers severe mental illness. She also discovered the medicine Damien uses to prevent it in himself. When she brought it up to him he nearly attacked her until she told him she’s never tell anyone as long as she keeps an eye on things for her.

A few days before Lux died, she showed up at his apartment. The conversation was short, worrisome. She told stories of someone following and threatening her and told him she just needed one thing… A gun, to protect herself. Damien provided the gun and he kept his mouth shut after she told him not to breathe a word of what she said.

Maddy Gomez

Is Adi’s half sister. Adi’s mother fell in lust with Maddy’s father when he visited France. He went to visit Paris and met her and they had a romantic week together. Her mother shipped Adi off to her father permanently and she got pregnant with Maddy. Not wanting another child her mother shipped Maddy off to be with her father who she left shortly after maddys birth - not even wanting to acknowledge the child.

Maddy's father told her when she was younger that her mother left them and gave her a picture. It wasn’t until joining THE CIRCUS that she realized Adi had the same picture. She didn’t tell her and doesn’t want to in fear adi would be like there mother.

When looking through Maddy's stuff Lux found the picture and put two and two together. Though she was keeping that secret up her sleeve.

Jules Montgomery

Sweet and sensitive, Jules was a brand new face to the circus and prefect prey to Lux. Lux often using her sweet nature for her benefit.

Confused with her sexuality she was conflicted with her feelings and often slept with many man before even in the sorority. Including Robert, Tyler, Harry and beck to name a few. She kept these a secret though Lux managed to get out a few names from her. Jules - racked with guilt for some of them often took her guilty feeling with destructive coping mechanisms.

Example, Lux caught her self harming and Jules profusely apologized while Lux snarked at her telling her “if you’re going to cut yourself, get the fuck out of my sorority. I don’t need any depression kittys bleeding out here.” After that Jules nickname was ‘Little Miss Wants Attention.’

Jules defended Lux during the halloween though didn’t stop the others from screaming at her. And now that she's gone - she feels a bit relieved though she won’t ever admit it.

Madeline Mimi Blossom

Mimi has an older brother, Ryan and was and is scared of him. When they were kids, Ryan used to take his temper out on her whenever he could, they’d usually have arguments that ended with him grabbing and yelling at her. Once, when she was 12 and he was fourteen, Ryan actually tried to push her down the stairs of their parents large house. If he’d succeeded in pushing her the whole way, mimi most likely would have broken her neck. She did hit her head and had to stay in hospital overnight but nothing too serious happened and because of that, and due to Ryan being the “perfect son”, her experiences were downplayed and she was gaslighted. Her parents acted like Ryan’s behaviour was just part of sibling squabbles. She was sent away in order to satisfy her brother.

Ryan came to visit her and played the doting brother. However, he did try to beat her. Lux saw and tried to get him off of her. He threw Lux into a wall and Mimi pushed him off of her. Slmming her body into him making him crack into the 5th floor window of the Cullen Building. He plummeted to the ground and ended up in a coma. Lux quickly said Ryan was depressed and Madelien was trying to stop him from jumping. It was good enough for the police but her parents still don’t believe and hate her.

Victoria ‘Tori’ Vega

Since the moment Tori saw Adi she was allured in. There was something intoxicatingly alluring about the girl and as soon as she saw she was apart of THE CIRCUS. Tori knew she needed in. Adi and her got along well enough but each interaction made her feel things she hadn’t felt before and even in a room full of people, Tori often found her attention drawn exclusively to the other girl. One night, with a blood-alcohol level that would have made her father scowl, Tori was in the bathroom attempting to psych herself up to make a move on her.

Of course Lux noticed, when Tori came out of the bathroom she was met with Adi kissing another student, in defeat she drunkenly admitted her feelings to Lux. Since then Lux subtly laughed at Tori’s obsession while baiting Adi to hate the girl. And Adi did start to hate the way Tori copied her, hated it when she would sit and watch her in the school courtyard… Nothing was ever good enough but, to Tori, even the negative attention from Adi was sometimes welcomed. She supposed that if this was all she would get she would have to find a way to make do

Tori knew Lux had her wrapped around her finger to keep her secret and the morning of her disappearance she threatened to tell adi unless Tori gave her ‘emergency’ money. She winded up stealing from a few of the girls in the sorority to fund her.

Amber Lui

Amber has a bit of an anger issue in fact she was arrested for aggravated assault at her last college, and should have faced jail time. But thanks to her fathers money, the problem was hidden in the shadows and she was allowed to quietly transfer...

However, in this town things don’t get past Lux and she used Ambers secret (& budding feelings for hoodie) in order to have her as her personal body guard.

Amber blames herself for Lux getting beat in the woods feeling like she should have protected her. She wants to get revenge on those who did it but doesn’t know where to start looking.

Liam Payne

Liam should have been weary of Lux but when he was already suspicious of Kay, Lux fed on his insecurities. Saying Kay had been spending more time with Josh or even Robin.

One night Liam was drunk and angry and decided to teach both boys (who shared a dorm room) a lesson. He took his bottle of jack Daniels and stuffed his shirt in the bottle before lighting it on fire and throwing it through the open window. The fire exploded in the dorm room instantly killing Josh and injuring about two dozen people who were in the dorm building as teh fire spread. He never told anyone what he did but suspects that Lux knows and is happy she disappeared so his secret would be safe.

Camilla Cabello

Was heavily bullied by Lux. Lux hated her for a variety of reasons but all came to a head when Lux beat her up as a pretend hazing ritual for joining the sorority.

Shawn found her in the park and helped her and thats when she fell in love. She loved Shawn, she loves Shawn and was terrified of him leaving her. So what did she do? She secretly stopped taking her birth control so that she could get pregnant and she did or so she thought. Turns out Camila can't have kids and when she was looking for comfort she found lux trying to hook up Adi and Shawn.

When Lux disappeared she was grateful to get rid of that hateful bitch.

Elizabeth Allen

Elizabeth is prescribed pills for insomnia after she had major trouble falling asleep a few years ago but she stopped taking them as they made her feel like a zombie. She still gets the prescription refilled and has all the pills hidden in a drawer in her room. She’s having horrible sleep troubles again, including night terrors, but she hates the medication and it doesn’t occur to her that she could ask the doctor to try something different.

She writes fan fiction often about the people in school and her dorm room has notebooks full of fan fiction on the people in school. It turned a bit weird and she regretted it after she posted it on wattapad and then she just… couldn’t stop. It got so many likes anyway. She started writing stories that focused on the more popular guys liking her (Max, Edward, Robin, Damien, Shownu, act...) fantasising about them in a relationship or something. Most of it is her crazy imagination and the lack of sleep not mixing well together and she knows she sounds weird and crazed in some of them, some of the things she writes, but she can’t seem to stop. It’s therapeutic and she feels like she knows them.

Seungri Lee

He has a son, whose mother he has been paying off ever since the kid was born. He pays her to say that the kid is the son of some other man, her now husband. The family is quite poor and he knows the money helps a great deal and while he does feel a bit guilty about not getting to know his son, he doesn’t feel ready for that kind of thing. He doesn’t know how to be a dad, he’s scared of the whole idea of it, and he’s really not up to the responsibility. It’s much easier this way and tuning it out is pretty easy too.

he often goes to the next town over and finds a girl in a bar. A girl who’s dressed up a little too much, wearing a bit too much make-up, clearly underage and having used a fake ID or sneaked in. He charms that girl and takes her to a hotel to have sex with her. It’s wrong and he knows that, they’re too young but they’re keen and they like him and it really does help him feel a bit better, feel a thrill. It gives him a bit of a kick, doing something he knows he shouldn’t be doing and sneaking around. There’s something addictive about being bad that he can’t quite seem to shake. And… how bad is it really, anyway? At least he’s not out there attacking or killing people.

However, Lux did know one of the girls was almost Annika, Katya's younger sister. She blackmailed Seungri into getting her airline tickets in order to keep it a secret from Katya.

Ian Payne

Has his eye on both Draven and her current fling Jiwoo Jeon. He knows that Jiwoo is a lesbian (and she looks like she could stand to lose a few pounds in his opinion) but he has always viewed that as a challenge. He doesn’t take that sort of thing seriously and believes that girls say that stuff for attention or because they’re scared of sex or something stupid. He’s made it his mission to get her into bed one way or another and he doesn’t really consider how that would affect either girl, he thinks it’s just all in good fun. he has never been that great at considering other people’s feelings.

He stole Kylie’s emergency credit card on impulse and has been using it to pay his bills while he settles into town, saving his own money. He doesn’t think he’ll get found out and he likes the idea of free money.

Olivia Rodriggo

Has a crush on Kay Snow. Olivia thinks that if Kay got to know her properly they’d hit it off, she thinks they’re quite similar and would match well. She feels a bit silly about it because she’s liked her since she started uni but she can’t seem to shake the girl.

Isn’t a Kelpto but often finds herself going into Kay’s places and things and taking things no one would notice being gone, hair accessories, jewellery, etc. She just wants to get to know her better, even if it has to be in secret. She also gets a thrill wearing the things she's taken and no one noticing who it really belongs too.

Jiyong Kwon

His nightclub back in Seoul is in a little bit of trouble. It was discovered that some dealers were using his club as a hub to sell drugs. The police have been investigating after the dealers lied and said Jiyong is involved in it too. He is angry that his club was used by scum and he is frustrated that the police are looking into him. He’s just laying low for a while until it all sorts itself out.

Is getting too into drinking and actually likes Drunk Driving. He sees it as a challenge to safely get home.

Knows some guys who can get fake ID’s and passports. He got some for Lux a week before she went missing. Lux knew about the hit and run he preformed and threatened him.

Jade Thirlwall

She is stealing money from the Anne’s Bakery (she works there during the week) till every Friday when she has to count up the totals. She’s always been a little bit of a kleptomaniac but it got worse as she got older and doing this gives Jade a rush and makes her feel powerful. She tends to steal more when she’s feeling especially lonely, too. It makes her feel better somehow.

Found out that her mother is having an affair and she is quite furious about it. She wants to confront the woman, or tell her dad because he deserves better, but Jade also doesn’t want to blow up her entire family and threaten her inheritance. The prospect that they could get divorced is just so outrageous, she doesn’t want to give them the push that could cause it. But it’s affecting her and she doesn’t know what to do.

Caleb Irwin

Is becoming a little bit addicted to visiting the local lapdancing/strip club. He likes going to the club, getting the real interaction with women, watching them dance, giving them money. It’s starting to become something he’s eager to do nearly every single weekend and he’s not sure how to stop or if he even wants to.

Had the brilliant idea with the rest of the fetuses to write a book about lux hardcore bullying them and about her disappearance. For ‘research’ they started to follow her clique around. He fell in love with Adi and now can’t stop following her.

Stephan James

He suspects his father killed his mother when he was 13 because he found her dead body at the bottom of a staircase and his father on top. Nothing ever came of the investigation but He still sometimes suffers nightmares brought on by guilt and the trauma of finding his mother’s body. They sometimes cause him to sleepwalk and have violent impulses while still under the influence of sleep. He once strangled a girlfriend who was staying over years ago. Needless to say she left him immediately and his father paid to have it covered up.

Andrew Hood

Two summers ago, Roberts mother married Andrews uncle making the boys cousins by marriage. Which they loved, being best friends and all.

Whenever he and Robert get into a fight over a girl, it gets a little too tense. They both do have a love-hate thing going on, they’re friends, enemies and lovers. They love the fight getting heated and usually end up having sex at the end of it. It’s not like any of them is ready to commit to this side of their sexuality so it’s just between them and they don’t speak about it and this fits Andrew just fine.

Robert Clifford

Two summers ago, Roberts mother married Andrews uncle making the boys cousins by marriage. Which they loved, being best friends and all.

Robert is a furry and his fursona is a red wolf named MoonBlood.

After they fight about the girls they had and try to have they let things escalate. When you talk about close relationship with them they’re not only best friends and cousins, they also sleep with each other whenever they get into an argument. Probably to de-escalate it but they’re also enjoying it but not really admitting to anything, extending their sexuality. Robert wants to talk about it sometimes but he knows Andrew doesn’t.

Vanessa Hudgens

Her stepfather has always been horribly abusive of her ever since he became part of their family. Their mother is aware but turns a blind eye as she doesn’t want to lose her husband.

Ran away a few years ago, to escape her stepdad. She was very young and terrified, after a rather horrible night, and was eager to go, taking only a few items and some money from her mother’s purse. They kept in contact on and off but it was hard not to be able to be with her sister and she didn’t want her father to track her down. She worked her fingers to the bone as a barista every day to pay for her room in a flat she shared with three other people and basically lived off tea and Nutella. She crashes on random old friends couches or in their spare rooms, so she doesn’t have to set foot back in that house. Until she got accepted in the school.

Lux blackmailed her to use her couch surfing connections. Threatening if she told anyone Vanessa would be shipped back to her stepfather.

Victor Malik

He has never dated anybody his whole life. He gives vague mentions of girls he’s liked or kissed through his life, but he’s never had anything serious at all. Never asked a girl out, never kissed someone, never been told someone has a crush on him. He was always too busy working to really focus on relationships and now he feels left behind and pretty embarrassed about it.

Jiwoo Jeon

Her best friend, three years ago while they were staying in a hotel in another town. Jiwoo was sober and she put up a fight, attacking him back and hitting him over the head in self defence. he ended up unconscious and she fled, escaping back to Van Der Wulff and leaving him there. She watched the news religiously until she heard something about him. He ended up in a coma, in a hospital in another town, and nobody could ID him because she’d taken his wallet with her. She stupidly kept it in her school bag and Lux found it one day and threatened to tell the police everything unless she kept an eye on the girls during the day she disappeared. Jiwoo still lives in fear that she’ll be arrested to this day, terrified that Jensen is going to wake up.

Miley Cyrus

Used to sell drugs - the family was so poor and it really helped out. This is a secret that Lux found out about her before she disappeared. She tried to blackmail him but then she vanished - back then she didn’t want to give people a reason to suspect her of anything. she stopped after and kept her stash hidden in her shed under a creaky floorboard. Recently, though, she went out to check it was all still there and she’s noticed that some of the packets have been going missing.

Was a regular who used to provide drugs to Tyler, in exchange for either a discounted price or, more often than not, a bit of a make-out or groping session - even a couple of times as far as full blown sex.

Perrie Edwards

Has been telling everyone since high school that she is dating an older guy from another country that she met online. She has a bunch of photos on her phone and laptop of a random guy whose profile she found and liked, and has been telling everyone he’s her very serious English cop boyfriend, Henry. It’s been going for a year and she can’t seem to find a way to stop it. It would be easy to say they broke up but… she’s grown oddly attached to him.

Atina Davis

Back in high school, Atina had much less control over her anger than she does now. She let it get the best of her. On her way home from before she transferred one winter night, she spotted a girl she had a falling out with some way ahead of her. Something just took over Atina and she rushed at the other girl, shoving her hard from behind. When the girl was down, she didn’t stop, she started to kick her, just completely seeing red. She grabbed her bag and ran off with it when she was finished, to make it look like a robbery. She felt sick with guilt after she calmed down. She still has the bag

Had to go onto medication, to help her with her mood swings and her anger issues. They were so out of control and she would get violent sometimes. She’s much mellower now as long as she sticks to her dosages but she doesn’t want anybody to know because it just makes her feel like a complete freak.

Leroy Payne

To him THE CIRCUS were full of small town stars. Each girl bringing something new to the table. Leroy isn’t exactly sure when he began focusing on them in his little home movies or filming them with his camera, but once he started he couldn't stop. He wasn’t peeping but instead was fasinated by the group. He spent hours filming us at group gatherings, parties, school events or through windows in the sorority. It would go perfect with there documentary after all right?

Jihyo Park

Had developed a bit of an obsessive crush on her current boyfriend, Yoongi, after she heard him playing piano at there school in Japan. She thought he was incredible and she got way too obsessive and would do just about anything. She started showing up places she knew he would be and often texted him for help she didn’t even need. She once even made up someone following her home to gain his sympathy. She figured if he saw her as a friend the possibility of more would open up. It worked and she was accepted to come back to California with him and study at Van Der Wulff.

Jihyo has had these obsessive tendencies over guys in the past and she’s even gone so far as to make up terrible lies and go to extreme lengths to keep them. Though the problem she has now is Kay Snow and her strange relationship with Yoongi.

Became obsessed with a teacher who had a girlfriend back in high school. Kimberley had the biggest crush on him but it got out of control. She would turn up places she knew he was after school and find ways to talk to him, get extra help, and play on his sympathy. She twisted their relationship into something it wasn’t in her head and eventually things ended dramatically when she ran his girlfriend off the road, almost fatally injuring her. Jihyo was convinced they’d end up together but she only ended up put away in a hospital for a year to get treatment. She came out a year later, pretending she’d been away on an internship, and her family figured she was all better.

Daesung Kim

It happened last year, at one of the many parties Daesung attended back in Seoul. He had been wasted, completely incapable of actually thinking out his actions before he did so. And before he knew it he was bringing some girl he didn’t recognize to the bedroom. He could hear her protests but in the time kept thinking “I’m Daesung, of course she wants me.” Since then, the girl has threatened to tell the police, to press charges. But Daesung paid her a lot of money and is willing to do anything to make sure the word doesn’t get out about it. He left to Van Der Wulff as soon as he could but realized the girls sister Momo, is in the school now.

Zayn Malik

Is starting to become a regular at RED HEART casino. He wins a lot but looses a whole lot more and got himself into debt with the owner. He needs money and wants to stop but just can’t.

Jennie Kim

Has been pretending that she has a job at a local cafe but honestly she has been unable to find work anywhere in town. Nowhere wants to hire her or when they do she leaves within a few days. She’s been shoplifting and selling the items online to keep up the appearance of having money, though it’s not the most lucrative option. Recently she's been stealing from people in the school, from there lockers or gym lockers.

In high school Jennie had a vendetta against a teacher at school, Mr. Kang, and made it a mission to seduce them, get a better grade because of it, and then out the teacher for sleeping with a student. He was arrested and she quickly moved onto Van Der Wulff before anyone realized what she was doing.

Justin Beeiber

He was the guy Selena was pushed at by Lux one night at a party he’d been dragged to by a friend. Selena was clearly very drunk and out of it but it didn’t stop him getting a bit too touchy with her. Justin isn’t quite sure what would have happened if she hadn’t pushed him off and staggered away. He likes to think that he wouldn’t have gone too far, that he’s a good guy, but when he gets too much alcohol in him he only ever gets one thing on his mind and a quick grope or kiss never seems to be enough. He’d actually been promised by Lux the night of the party that it would be Adi, not Selena, that would be dropped into his lap - all ready and willing.

Yoona Kim

Is a little addicted to taking risks. All kinds of risks. Whether it’s just something small like walking through the park or the woods after midnight or something bigger like getting blind drunk and going home with a complete stranger. She can sometimes seem like she’s lost her mind but things that give her a complete thrill and that makes her feel good.

she sometimes attends AA meetings·when she’s feeling especially lonely, just so that she has people to talk to, though she sometimes feels like a complete fraud because she isn’t an alcoholic. She goes out of town so that nobody recognises her and she knows it’s not exactly right but she likes feeling connected and like she can talk to the people in the meetings.

Michael B Jordan

Was having an affair with his fathers girlfriend. Of course first he didn’t like her at all, she was younger than him and dating his father which was pretty disturbing to him. And it was just an act of revenge against his father but now the girl is threatening to expose them unless he continues with the affair.

Wonho Shin

He is actually the one who killed his brother’s friend Candace. It was a complete accident that he ran into her while she was leaving this guy’s apartment after most likely sleeping with him. Wonho had been driving home from work (he did nightshift) and he offered her a lift home. When they stopped at a red light, Candace tried to kiss him. He pushed him away and he got angry and the two fought. She stormed out of his car and he followed her. The two had an altercation and he ended up pushing her, causing the girl to fall and hit her head. He panicked and buried her in some nearby woods, Woo helping him. the burned her belongings and promised never to speak about it again.

Lisa Manoban

Has been following Jennie around, taking pictures of her and sending them to her in the mail. She isn’t trying to be threatening, at least not on purpose, but Jennie does confide in her about it and it makes him feel wanted by her. Lisa has always had some weird, creepy crush on Jennie despite her being childhood friends and Jennie being straight, ever since they were kids, and it makes her act in dumb, irrational ways around her. Stalking is the newest in a long line of things that Lisa has done out of her sheer frustration and jealousy and she’s in too deep to stop now. Not that she’s sure she even wants to but maybe that’s because she’s so fucked up.

Penelope Beryl

Was on the verge of being kicked out of her apartment for being consistently late with the rent. Penny took a loan from a pretty dodgy source and, though she managed to keep her flat, she is being visited by some pretty scary guys who want the loan repaid. Penny feels pretty stupid and freaked out… and she’s tempted to go down some pretty illegal lines to get enough money to pay them back for good. She’s even tempted to start begging on the street like a homeless person, though in another town so she wouldn’t be recognised. She knows she wouldn’t even get much from this but it feels so desperate that every little helps or something right now.

Seunghyun TOP Choi

Suffers from schizophrenia. he has been going to therapy and been on medication for the past few years but he struggles with hallucinations, especially when he is incredibly stressed. He travels to another town to get his prescriptions filled so that nobody can catch him and possibly discover his secret. It causes him a great deal of shame, And often self-medicates with drugs.

Maximus Valente

Got really drunk at a party and decided to “borrow” someones car for a joyride, even though he knew he wasn’t allowed to drive yet. He was going too fast and hit someone, but was too afraid to stop and check on them. He took off, ditching the car. It wasn’t until later that he found out the person died. he doesn't drink or do any drugs ever since.

Rachel Michele

Shoplifted a couple of times in high school but one of these times, just as she was about to get caught by security, she planted the items on her friend. The friend got into a lot of trouble and has a record and though she feels guilty, she’s just relieved it wasn’t her.

Stole a few blank prescription pages when she visited her sister at the hospital where she works. She doesn’t have much of a plan for them other than she just saw the opportunity. She decided that maybe she can sell them to some desperate people for enough money.

Emma Roberts

Since she doesn’t have much money anymore, and her father won’t send her any, she began to make her own clothes and put fake labels on them so she could pretend to belong to the crowd. To have the good stuff. She’s ashamed she’s basically living on nothing and she had to take up a job. She started working in a club in across town and has recently been approached there to be recruited for a call girl job. She’s debating whether or not to do it because that job would really bring money.

Abusive. Beat up her last boyfriend ; current boyfriend and constantly shamed him for “not being a man”. She often blackmails her friends and beats them up too if they cross her.

Jisoo Kim

makes her money online by catfishing men. She pretends to be other women and has various profiles with different pictures and different personalities and convinces men to spend money on her and send her gifts. When they start demanding things she can’t send, like videos and such, she moves onto the next or deletes the profile and starts fresh. It’s sometimes tough and they don’t always fall for it as most men want to meet a girl first but she manages to make enough to scrape by in the dorm. It’s not something she feels she can tell anybody but it’s exciting sometimes and she feels a rush scamming guys out of their money. Especially a few of the boys around school.

Kendall Jenner

She was in love with a teacher in high school but he gave all his attention to another student in her class. Sure they were having an affair she outed her for sleeping with their teacher. the teacher lost their job was investigated. Turns out he was just tutoring her friend in private but Kendall doubled down and insitsted it was inappropriate even going so far as to create fake texts between the teacher and student. she mailed them to the teacher in an attempt to blackmail him but instead he killed himself and she's lived with that guilt ever since.

Naeyeon Im

She is a lesbian but her mother was always very, very homophobic. It really affected her and every time she would get any kind of inkling about her daughter (if she thought a girl was pretty, was caught glancing at a girl, or other things she’d rather never think about) then she would take her homophobic anger out on Naeyeon. Thats why Naeyeon left Seoul though she's scared of her mother finding out about hoodie.

When her and Hoodie are off (in there very on and off relationship) she hooks up with Jeongyeon, however the last time they hooked up was when she was on the phone with Hoodie speaking about getting back together.

Taylor Swift

Used to date Harry Styles a while ago. Before she had been crazy about him and was kind of furious when she found out that he had been hooking up with Kendall. She resented that girl anyway, going around and leaving her scent on practically every boy in town. After a while though, Taylor managed to get his attention and finally got to date him. It was great and she was crazy in love. However, because she could feel the end was coming and that he was bored with her… she told him she was pregnant. Trying to guilt him to stay with her and it actually worked and then she was trying to really get pregnant so she wouldn’t be found out, but it didn’t seem to work. She broke up with him after that hoping to never be found out.

stole her best friend’s diary during a sleepover in high school. She found some pretty horrible things written about her in there and, in a rage, she put the girl’s deepest secrets online, spreading them all over social media for their whole school to see. Soon after, the girl committed suicide and Taylor still suffers guilt from it, but she also has moments where she doesn’t regret what she did because the things the girl had written were nasty.

Evan Peters

After him and Emma got together, she got psychologically abusive. She would take advantage of him trying to do everything for her, while she forbid him to go see his friends or she would look through his phone and would accuse him of cheating whenever she could. And whenever they got into a fight and where close to break up, she would cry and tell him she would kill herself and it would all be his fault. Everyday was hell for him and one day, he just couldn’t do it anymore broke up with her. She kept trying to keep him from doing so but he kept strong in that moment.

After he’d moved himself out, she called him up a couple of times, and still writes messages about killing herself and pinning it on him or threatening too black his eyes again. He’d gotten the police involved but they did nothing even when she openly threatened him. He has her blocked now, He’s emotionally scarred though, and really, he doesn’t know if he would ever be capable of having a healthy relationship. He doesn’t want to be manipulated anymore and tries to keep more to himself.

Ever since hes started dating Kitty, hes scared Emma is going to find out not because he doesn't want anyone to know but because he knows if Emma does anything to Kitty he’lll snap and might hurt her.

Hyuna Kim

The real reason that she left home was because her adopted brother, started to come onto her. As they got older and she grew into her looks, he started to make odd comments about her appearance and her body. She brushed it off at first, thinking he was just making fun of her, but it got worse and he would try to spy on her in the shower, look through the crack in her door if she left it open. Then, one night, he tried to climb into bed with her. That was the last straw. she simply couldn’t take it any more, she didn’t want to feel unsafe and preyed upon in her own home, by someone who was supposed to be her brother.

Lux knew this and threatened to tell her brother exactly where she was unless she helped her get close to GD.

Rue Coleman

Addicted to opioids & now dealing them

Since breaking up with Jules and Makayla getting sober she's been feeling really isolated and lonely similar to how she felt with Lux heavily bullied her.

Demi Lovato

Started lying for attention in high school when she was feeling left out and ignored by her family. She told a teacher her grandmother had died and that’s why she was upset and it got her time off the coursework. She pretended to be sick a lot so she would get sympathy. Demi even pretended that she’d been followed home one night by a strange man so that her parents paid panicked attention to her instead of her sisters. It’s silly and she still does it when she feels left out or unwanted and she isn’t sure how to stop

Lux heavily bullied her and Demi credits Lux for making her try her first joint just wanting to relax from the constant strain the popular girl put on her. Holds it against all the sorority girls for being mean to her.

Cassie White

During what Cassie told everyone was a “holiday to France”, she was actually in London getting work done. She got a nose job and a breast enhancement and then came back completely new and full of more confidence to suit her new persona. Cassies’s step-dad has the money and will do whatever he can to make sure his little girl gets what she wants, which is helpful when you’re trying to win over the whole school. Though she’d hate for anyone to find out and brand her “plastic” or anything like that, she knows the fallout from these types of things can be bad and she doesn’t want to be knocked off her ledge.

It incredibly insecure when it comes to men and often seeks validation from them. Unfortunately this caused her to sleep with Nate when he was still with Maddy and move in with him. Any boy who really gives her attention and a few compliments she’ll fall for especially when her and Nate fight.

Chaeyoung Son

Deeply insecure about being a lesbian. She forced herself to sleep with Jackson Wang a while back to try and force a relationship out of it since he was popular, and she needed a perfect boy to be with, a power couple… it was horrible and Chaeyoung spent a lot of time denying her attraction towards girls.

She has a crush on Draven Patterson and feels like shit because she actually really gets along with Jiwoo. But secretly she's been trying to plan to get them to break up....somehow.... just so she can get to know her better.

Hayley Marshall

She had a brief fling with Emma’s father years ago. She knew that Emma had always had some… issues regarding her father but Hayley couldn’t help that she found him attractive. It’s not like she ever thought she stood a chance but being so insecure it was nice when an older man like him finally paid her some attention. She was a little silly and slept with him very quickly, but Mr. Roberts was quick to drop her like she meant nothing. It hurt when he just tossed her aside. Again, she felt like she wasn’t good enough, that she never would be, and it hurt to have to see him and act like nothing had happened. She went along pretending nothing happened .... maybe a tiny part of her stuck in the past sometimes wishes she could stop by and still have him be there.

Had fallen for her mother’s boyfriend, ever since the two began having an affair a while ago. She felt dreadfully guilty but she was always still very angry at her mother for divorcing her father and blames the woman entirely for ruining her family, so she never really felt quite guilty enough to stop. Hayley felt like Lewis might be the one for her, she harboured fantasies of running away together, but had no idea that he doesn’t really see it the same way until recently. She soon broke off the affair after getting the harsh impression he only wanted to use her for sex and has been avoiding and cold with him ever since.

Yoongi Min

Hanging out with assholes when he was a teenager, he was dared to set fire to a building. He did it however workers were in it and while none died they were seriously hurt and destroyed the nearby buildings as well. They were rescued before anything horrible happened but it’s part of the reason he left Seoul when she did. They were still investigating after discovering the fire was deliberate though he regularly sends them money anonymously to try and feel better for what they caused. He was never caught but thinks about it a lot.

Beck Avian

Lux and him hooked up a couple of times.

The night Lux went missing before the halloween party She pushed him out of the window after he caught her in his father’s office, trying to crack his safe. His dad keeps a gun, lots of money, and some valuable items in there. Beck confronted Lux about it and lux chased him up to his bedroom, saying that he’d ‘better not open his stupid mouth’, and ranting something about someone being out to get her and she needed ‘protection’ and ‘escape money.’ Beck didn’t understand what she was talking about, she was too worked up because of the alcohol they’d been sneaking up in his room before Lux pretended to slip out to the bathroom. Beck’s window was already open and he’d gone over to close it, maybe slam it shut in her frustration… which is when Lux shoved her, maybe out of panic, maybe out of spite, He landed on teh bushes under his window and only wound up with a broken arm. She then left to the party

Beck never said anything because, stupid as it was, he didn’t want to get Lx into trouble. Then Lux was gone and it didn’t seem to matter if he said anything or not.

Hes also sleeping with Tyler and has been taking pills with Tyler. He feels bad because Makayla is his favorite cousin but he likes Tyler more.

Jaebum JB Im

his parents divorced years ago when he was still a teenager, and packed up, moving out of Seoul to go their separate ways. His father went to shack up with his new family and his mother moved to another country. They shipped him off to school, left him money and the house and often sends him extra money out of guilt at leaving him alone, even though he pretended he was fine with it. Since, JB has been embarrassed to admit it because he doesn’t want people to think his parents ditched him because he was pathetic or there was something wrong with him. His loneliness and the fact His parents ditched him has a tendency to make him seem a little distant scared to get to close to anyone in fear they will leave..

Shownu Son

Before he was at the school he took part in a stupid prank that inevitably blinded his friend. Everyone involved fled the scene and never spoke of the incident again and he moved here.

Robin Hemlock

His mother used to be a porno star / high paying escort in Europe and she made enough money that she was able to scrub her videos from the internet mostly. His father was a client of hers and she got pregnant with Romeo, while his father took neglectful responsibility, he is a porno baby.

he drowned his 'friend' as a teenager because they threatened to out what they knew about him. Everyone thinks it was an accident, but he was the one holding them under the water.

Jackson Wang

Thinks that he has developed some kind of a problem with alcohol and doesn’t really know what to do about it. If he’s stressed or sad or angry… he’ll go out or grab a bottle and doesn’t seem to have any other coping mechanisms and feels quite alone and helpless with it.

Jinyoung park

During a fight with his parents, he said something he regrets and convinced his father to commit suicide.

Shawn Mendes

Will go to jail for all he knows about his fathers businesses, but mostly because he helped kill a man who tried to betray his father.

Namjoon Kim

Learned how to count cards and became quite good at it. however it did give rise to a slowly building addiction to gambling.

Taehyung V Kim

Intense stress and depression is causing him to have trouble sleeping and now can't go to sleep with out popping two sleeping pills

Jungkook Jeon

Angry after Draven's rejection, Jungkook beat a man flirting with him out of the club. The man thinks it was because he was gay but in reality he was just trying to take his anger out on anything he could.

Really just wants to be friends with her again

Jooheon Kim

Was heavily bullied growing up before his blowup in high school. One night he saw one of his bullies walking down the street and retaliated, sending the other boy to a hospital with a concussion and at a risk of having his lungs punctured due to broken ribs. He was never caught for doing this.

Matthew Kim

While in Seoul before he found his group, Matthew found himself finally getting caught up in the party scene. He fell in with a bad crowd who got him addicted to loud music and alcohol fueled nights. He was on the verge of failing all of his exams so he seduced and slept with two of his professors in order to blackmail them to get the grades she needed to pass the course. He wouldn’t be where he is now if he hadn’t set the women up that way and he knows that he’s perfectly capable of the work… that that time in his life was just a mistake… but he does feel some guilt and worry about somebody finding out. It would ruin his credibility, possibly get kicked out of school because his qualifications weren’t really earned.

Steven Clifford

has an online blog where they post drawings of various people around town. He mostly focuses in on Lux’s old group of friends. He sketches them with knives in their heads or even scenarios that have actually happened to them. They can get quite gruesome but his sketches can also extend to those connected to the girls too. He’s even drawn some of Lux herself. A lot of locals do gossip about this and some of the images have been taken off the site and sent to the people they were depicting (though this was not his intention). He knows it’s a bit weird and insensitive to draw these things but he’s become quite fascinated by them all.

Irene Bae

Is YoungJae’s stepsister by marriage and has been hooking up with him when shes bored. She knows that her mother would be so disappointed in her if she ever found out… But its just meaningless sex to her. She doesn’t love him. Last year, the Summer that she went missing, Lux discovered the secret when she happened upon the two of them on the hill just outside of town together, looking much closer than brother and sister. She put two and two together very quickly and every time she saw Irene she would tilt her head and smile that knowing smile of hers that drove Irene mad. She was happy when she disappeared – she knew Annie’s track record at keeping people’s secrets.

Olivia Delgado

Slept with her step-sister Alison, after she was rejected by Adi during one of her many advances. When Ali had come into her room and attempted to comfort her, it had just happened… she looked so much like Adi and he was so kind and she realised the reason she’d always unsettled her was because of a crush she’d developed. However she mostly just avoids her now neither girl talking about that night knowing her parents would kill her and she would be completely blacklisted. Ali is now dating Edward who Olivia does not like and every so often she realises she feels jealous more than annoyed. Maybe she does still have some feelings but isn’t that normal? She still wants to be with Adi.

Pressured Alison to get the plastic surgery to make her look more like Adi.

Harry Styles

has been rather promiscuous. Words glide smoothly off his tongue and he has always just been naturally charming. His curly hair and cute dimples help too, and it seems as though he could make almsot anyone fall for him within seconds. For a while, he used this to his advantage. Until he found Kitty. He actually loved her until she started showing more attention to Robin feeling insecure he cheated on her with Kendall...and Jules.....Gigi.... Irene...and Taylor. Kitty found out and broke up with him and he went to Taylor then she told him she was pregnant and he panicked.

He seeked comfort and later wound up sleeping with Louis before he moved back to England. now he is unsure if he is actually straight or if he’s bisexual or something else. he of course likes having fun and flirting but sometimes he just doesn’t know what any of it all means.

In the beginning of the year he did have a brief fling with Kyle. The two shared a very rocky secret relationship but he wanted to experiment more with his sexuality. Unfortunately he did / does still miss Kitty and thinks thats when he was his happiest. However he still does labor feelings for Louis.

Seokjin Kim

Before he was at the school he took part in a stupid prank that inevitably blinded his friend. Everyone involved fled the scene and never spoke of the incident again and he moved here. He still feels incredibly guilty.

Roman Grant

Lost his ex girlfriend when it was found out she was sleeping with his father. When he found out he and Shawn set his father up to be jumped by Negan’s gang.

Since then he works for Negan by shaking down clients for money to try and satisfy the part of him that craves violence.

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sfnewsvine · 2 years

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Bullet Smashes Through Window Leaves San Francisco Family Shaken Up NBC Bay Area

Generally the distinction between life and loss of life is a really advantageous line. A San Francisco lady mentioned a bullet smashed via her bed room window and shattered her dresser mirror. The incident occurred at a time and place the place she usually would have been in hurt’s manner. “When it went via the window, it made a sound like a balloon popping,” mentioned Dillon Jordan. “That’s what it appeared like, it was loud.” That’s how the 9-year-old described the sound of a bullet crashing via his mother or father’s bed room window, blinds and drapes Saturday, shattering the mirror on the dresser. His mom Sarah Jordan found the scene a short while later. She was shaken. “On a traditional night time I might be mendacity down round 9:20 and studying, preparing for mattress,” mentioned Sarah. “However by likelihood I used to be not. If I had been there it could be going proper over my head. If I used to be standing it could’ve hit me.” The Jordan household was at a loss as to the place the bullet got here from. No excessive rises close by, however the bullet had a downwards trajectory. Police figured it out. “As soon as they noticed the bullet and the way giant it was they knew it was an assault rifle and if it was fired any nearer it could’ve shot via the wall,” mentioned Sarah. Jordan mentioned that police investigators imagine it could have come from a shootout close to Jefferson Sq. Park, practically three-fourths of a mile away, and the bullet was slowing down over that distance. Sunday night time was clearly very tough for the Jordan household. “Clearly rattled and a bit of disturbed and a bit of tough to sleep however grateful we have been all OK,” mentioned Sarah. She is the daughter-in-law of former San Francisco Police Chief Frank Jordan, and desires to ensure this isn’t merely a narrative about weapons and crime in San Francisco. “Is it unhealthy in San Francisco? Sure it’s. Is it soiled? Sure. Do I really like the town? Sure I do and we’re not going wherever. If something, we wish to make it higher,” mentioned Sarah. Supply hyperlink Originally published at SF Newsvine

#SF Newsvine

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headcans-oneshots-and-stuff · 3 years

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Overworked

Fandom: DC Pairing: Batsis!reader x Batfamily Word count: 3k Summay: Your on your way to be the next C.E.O. of Wayne Enterprises, but the road is filled with challenges and a lack of self-care that your family can’t help but worry about (based on this) Warning: Slight angst and unconciousness, near death experience Requested by a pretty great Anon: Can you do a one shot of future ceo batsis overworking herself with long days and vigilante nights and she’s basically not sleeping or taking care of herself and batfams gotta step in and make her listen to reason.

The cup of coffee had already grown cold, the liquid inside it stale and surely undrinkable, when you reached for it. Hardly the first few drops of the liquid had ran down your throat when you realized the horrible transition it had gone through from the nectar of productivity to the lovechild of tar and sulfur, your face distorting into an expression of utmost disgust as you quickly put it back down and besides the other six paper-cups that were all half-filled at most. You sighed when you realized that it must have already been an hour since you had made - and after completely forgot about - the coffee. It really was a cursed circle that you had been going through for the last eight hours. You made a cup, brought it to your office, drank a bit, forgot about it and realized how horrible it now tasted half an hour or so later and then you took at least another twenty minutes before deciding to head for your next cup. Was it already time for the next one? No, it could wait a bit longer. You turned your attention back to the screen in front of you - or rather the three screens - and let your eyes fly over all the data and graphs and numbers that you had to have in a presentable form by next morning for the monthly debriefing. This time would be your first time without Bruce on the sidelines and overlooking your work, a fact that made you feel proud at your accomplishment while simultaneously scaring you to the core. You knew that logically it wouldn’t be different than the last two - which you had also done basically solo with Bruce only sitting beside you silently observing - but there was still that internal voice that told you that without your father by your side the board would rip you apart until nothing was left over. You didn’t know what exactly caused it but suddenly you felt dizzy and the letters and numbers in front of you started swimming around, turning into absolute gibberish, the neon-lights of the screen hurting your eyes. No, not the screens themselves, it was the contrast between the brightly lit screens and the darkness that spread out behind them. It was only then that you let your gaze move behind the confines of your office and through the glass doors to the rest of the office space that was completely engulfed in darkness. Now you realized that it wasn’t only that, it was more, there was no soul wandering the floor and no sound beside the ever-so-steady growling of the computer fan and the clicking of your keyboard. “Fuck,” you couldn’t help but mutter when you looked at the clock beside you which already read half past nine. Which meant that you only had half an hour at most before your patrol started. Ignoring the pounding that built up in your head you tried to remember how it was possible for the time to surprise you like that. You had come to work at eight that morning and had spent two hours calling around, checking on contracts and meeting with potential clients, then you had your daily briefing with the department heads - which had extended into almost an hour because Brad from PR really couldn’t get his shit together - then you had to talk to HR about finding a possible replacement for Brad from PR and after you had started working on the numbers. And now you were standing in the elevator on your way to the car park. Did you have Lunch today? No, you had to skip Lunch break for Brad. What about Breakfast? No, wait, you forgot about that too. You rubbed your eyes and felt the need to curse rise again when you realized that you’d have to get right back to the numbers as soon as you had finished patrol which meant that you wouldn’t be able to sleep yet again. What was that? The fourth night in a row? Your only solace was the possibility that you’d maybe finish quickly and get a good one to two hours before you had to be back in the office, but deep inside you knew that it was unlikely. It hadn’t worked the last four nights either. But you’d pull through. There was a light at the end of the tunnel. After tomorrow’s meeting you’d go home at a normal time and indulge yourself in that full meal your stomach had been begging you for, sleep for a full eight hours and maybe even watch a movie if you felt especially crazy. Just for one night you’d really let yourself go. But for that to be possible you had to bite your teeth together and stay on your path.

The elevator arrived at the car park and you quickly rushed to your car and made your way to your apartment which - for maximum efficiency - was only a five minute drive away from the Wayne Ent. Tower, where you quickly rushed into the hidden side room to change into your gear. As you checked the time you realized that you still had a good five minutes before you had to check in with your father and you had to very quickly decide between your two options: quickly eat something or make and drink another coffee. You decided for the second one, but as you made your way to the kitchen counter where your coffee machine stood you caught a glimpse of the unopened stack of mail on the kitchen island and with a sigh decided to just get that over with, effectively ignoring both your previous options. The letters were rather quickly sorted through and before you knew you were standing on a nearby ceiling and activated your comm. “Y/H/N reporting from area 7.4 in central Gotham.” “Good evening Y/H/N, it’s Oracle, I’ll be your voice in the background tonight,” Barbara’s voice echoed through your ears and after exchanging the usual greetings she quickly gave you the location of a robbery in progress. With quick, experienced movements you jumped over the roofs until you stood on the ceiling of a jewelry which was - luckily for you - made out of glass. There was only a single man in the darkness of the store below you, using a flashlight to clean out the display cases, and he wasn’t especially silent so you used the noise to your advantage as you opened one of the few ceiling windows that were openable and let yourself glide down with a hook. “I think you have to pay for that,” you interrupted the robber who quickly turned around, his face hidden by a black, knitted hat with badly cut out holes for the eyes. He was definitely no professional. The man - obviously panicked - got out a gun with shaky hands and pointed it at you, but before he could even think of shooting you had thrown a batarang and the piece of weaponry landed on the floor too far from him that he could reach it before you. Seemingly not seeing another option the man started charging at you and you just sighed and said: “I wouldn’t do that if I was you,” but by the end of the sentence his fist tried to make contact with your masked face, but you caught his hand expertly and used the momentum to twist it behind his back, grabbing the other one too and with quick movements you had used a pair of handcuffs that you had in your bat-belt™ to chain him to one of the displays before letting him go. “If you’ll excuse me for a second,” you mumbled before walking a few feet away where you told Barbara to contact the police and tell him they didn’t need to hurry. You had just finished the conversation and muted your mic again when the same dizziness as earlier in the office hit you but this time tenfold. It was like the ground was swaying below you and you had to take ahole of a countertop so that you didn’t fall. “Hey, are you okay, you look kinda sick,” the robber asked in an actual concerned voice, but you didn’t answer, instead you quickly used the hook you had attached earlier to let yourself swing out of the window again. “Y/H/N?” Barbara contacted you and you tried your best to swallow down the weakness in your muscles that suddenly seemed to grow over you. “Yeah?” “Bats asks you to meet him on the roof of the Jefferson building down in third.” “Tell him I’ll be there in a minute.”

You gave yourself another few seconds to collect yourself before you did as you were told and made your way over to the roof of the builduing Babs’ had told you to go to, the dark silhouette of your father’s persona already expecting you there. Like you had done so often before, you started to run towards the edge of the building next to it - the one you were currently on - and made yourself ready to jump, only for your muscles to suddenly give up on you and the only thing you felt next was the rushing of air as you were falling and then the sudden stop and pain in your wrist as something caught you. Bruce quickly pulled you up and even with the cowl you could see the concern. “You okay?” he asked, his voice worried which definitely sounded uncanny in connection with what he was wearing. “Uhm yeah, my legs just kind of gave up on me there,” you tried to wave it off with a chuckle, not wanting him to see that you were frightened to your core. “Y/H/N?” he asked again in that voice he had always used when you tried to sneak out at night and lied when he had caught you. He hadn’t used that voice in so long. “I’m serious Batman, everything is okay, it’s no big deal,” you huffed - now defensive - and stood up with your arms crossed in front of your chest. “It is when you suddenly fall from a roof. What would have been if I hadn’t been there to catch you?” he asked, now slight anger edging through the worry, but you couldn’t blame him. “I’m sorry, okay, it won’t happen again,” you sighed and hoped he would just let it go, especially considering that the dizziness started to return. Along with it came the heaviness of your eyelids that you had gotten used to that somehow now seemed to actively pull you down. You raised your hand to rub your eyes - hoping it would put some more live back into you - but even that slight movement seemed to be too much as the world started swaying again and you felt gravity getting the best of you. Something black started moving in front of you and you weren’t quite sure if you were falling unconscious or if it was Bruce who came towards you to catch your falling form, but it turned out to be latter when you found yourself being lowered to the ground and propped against the end of one of the vantilator shafts of the building with Bruce kneeling beside you. “You’re definitely not okay,” he muttered as he held your face in his hands to get you to look at him. “I’m just a little bit tired is all,” you tried to argue, but your voice was weak and almost started lulling. “When was the last time you slept? Or ate?” You shut your eyes in concentration as you tried to remember. “Wait I know the answer to that one,” you muttered but almost fell asleep, only being kept away when your head started falling downwards, “What did you ask again?” “When was the last time you slept an entire night?” he tried again, this time more specific. “What day is it today?” “Friday.” “Then I think it was Monday,” you whispered since suddenly the loud noise of your voice seemed to pierce your skull apart. “You were on Patrol from nine to two a.m. on Monday,” Bruce disagreed and you almost chuckled. “Yes, and after I went to bed and got a full five hours. That’s pretty good isn’t it,” you couldn’t help but smile almost proudly, your mind starting to fog up with bubblegum coloured smoke that made it impossible to think straight. “And when did you last eat?” Bruce sighed, worry and recognition crossed his face. He himself must have known too well what you were going through. You averted your eyes and looked down at your lap where you played with your hands like an embarrassed child. “Also Monday,” you mumbled and Bruce immediately shook his head. “That’s not okay, you have to take care of yourself Y/H/N, you’re no good for anyone when you don’t.” You weren’t sure if it was only tired paranoia that made you see only disappointment on your fathers face - that ignored all the worry - but suddenly the prospect of having disappointed him, the one thing that you were trying to avoid ever since you could remember, made tears well up in your eyes and your lip quiver, “‘M sorry,” you could just press out before the tears started rolling. Bruce immediately regretted his tone of voice, but he knew nothing he would say now would be remembered by you so he just pulled you up from the roof and started carrying your already passing out form towards the batmobil. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow…”

The feeling of waking up rested was foreign to you, especially since it wasn’t one of your four separate alarms that woke you, and caused you to immediately sit up, only to be pulled back into the mattress. Your eyes flew open and explored your surroundings. The chandelier above you, with rainbow-coloured glass-pendants and the dark blue dealing with the painted stars immediately calmed you again. This room was your childhood bedroom which meant that you were in the manor, which in turn meant that you were safe. For a moment the calm was pretty nice, but then you remembered your case of immovability and looked down at where your wrists came out from under the cover. They were bound by silky bands and a move of your feet told you that the same was the case for them. While you were contemplating ways to get out of the unbelievably good, but still comfortable restraints, the door started to open and you turned as well as you could towards where you smallest (figuratively and literally) brother entered. “Your awake?” he asked in his usual stern voice, but you had known him for long enough to recognize the hidden worry. “Yeah, mind telling me why I’m strapped to my bed?” “Forced self-care,” he stated matter-of-factly and you couldn't help but narrow your eyes. “What?” “You fainted on Patrol, father says you haven’t eaten or slept since last Monday so we took measures to make sure you wouldn’t kill yourself with how careless you are.” You wanted to reply with something snarky, but you were well aware that what he said was probably right. “I’m sorry okay, I just had a lot on my plate, but you’re right and I feel a lot better now that I had some sleep, so you can let me go again,” you tried to smooth your way out of there, but you had the slight suspicion that it was hopeless. “I respect your try but you will not be let go until father is certain that you’re better.”

“But I am better!” you whined and tried yet again to wiggle yourself out of the restraints. Damian just raised his eyebrows unimpressed. He walked over to a chair that was standing beside your bed and as you followed him with your eyes you noticed the shutted curtains and the small gap of light between them. “What time is it anyways?” you sighed and felt surprise when you had to hold back a yawn. “It’s about 8 a.m.” Your eyes widened. That meant you had enough time to get to the office! “Please Dami, you gotta let me go, I have to get to the board meeting,” you begged, starting to wiggle more and more, but to no avail. “But Ukthi, you-” “No you don’t understand! This is my first time alone, I can’t let dad down, I have to be able to pull through with this if I ever want to make it as the next C.E.O. Dad wasn’t allowed a break either.” “Ukthi-” “Damian please, please, I promise I’ll come back right after and take care of myself, but I have to do this if I-” “Ukthi! The board meeting was yesterday. You slept for over 24 hours!” Damian shouted to get you to stop interrupting him and when you realized the weight of his words you sunk back down into the pillow. “What? But I was supposed to…” “Father just postponed it, he didn’t leave room to argue, he also gave you the week off from patrol and work.” If your hands weren’t bound you’d probably sunken your face into them in shame. You tried to hold tears back as you looked away from Damian. “Y/N?” he asked and came closer. “I’m sorry, It’s just- how am I supposed to handle being the C.E.O. of Wayne Enterprise if I can’t even handle little things like board meetings? How am I supposed to take after dad?” “Y/N, you keep on saying how father managed to lead the business on his own, and how you should be able too, but you’re not alone. You’re not supposed to be either. You have all of us by your side for a reason and we won’t leave you alone with this. We’re here for you and you shouldn’t be ashamed to ask for help. We’re family, we love you and we want to support you with all we can. “For now, how about you rest a little bit more and then I’ll let you out of bed to get a proper meal, Alfred made your favorite. After that I’m afraid Father will want to have a word with you.” “Oh shucks….”

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wpdarlingpan · 3 years

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hello, just wanted to tell you how wonderful your work is, keep it up and keep rocking :) I was wondering if you could do a yandere Peter Parker x reader oneshot where the reader has powers and she's completely badass? But she kinda has self esteem issues and thinks her feelings aren't important. I'm sorry if I made you sad TvT

I will try my best! And thank you so much for the compliments ♡

Silent Shadow. That’s what she was. At least that’s what it was before the Avengers came. She was a assassin for a group called Hydra. Hydra was all she knew and that’s all she thought there was for her. She was there strongest asset, she was even able to rake down the Winter Soldier. She had beaten every hydra agent in a fight and she had many skills. You’d think she would just run away since she was able to overthrow them but Hydra made sure she would have no one to go to outside of them so they killed her parents and took her. She was alone. At least that was until she grew a relationship with her partner. A platonic one. She thought she had no one.

Until the day they showed up.

“Cap, how’s it looking out there? Need Code Green?” Bruce said from inside the quinjet.

“No, I think we are good Bruce. Tony is taking out the rest alongside Thor. Guess this base wasn’t as important.” Cap replied through the coms. It was true. It was a pretty easy mission, that was until they went towards the cells.

Bucky Barnes alongside Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver got rid of every Hydra Agent in the cells. At least the thought they did until they reach the very end cell with a complex lock. Bucky nodded at Wanda and she quickly used her powers to undo the lock.

Once inside they see a girl. She looked around 16 years old. Bucky froze.

Another assassin.

He knew her.

He rushed to the cyrochamber and opened it to the dismay of the team. They didn’t need another Hydra Soldier to deal with but he was not going to leave her in there. Steve walked into the room and saw him opening the chamber.

“What are you doing Buck?”

“I’m getting her out of here.” He spoke leaving no room for arguments.

“What if she’s dangerous?”

“I know her. She was my partner. She never wanted this. She always fought.”

“How do you know she will still fight?”

“I don’t.”

and finally it was open and he grabbed her then made his way back to the quinjet. The team that didn’t go to the cells were already there.

Tony was the first to notice Barnes carrying a girl.

“What do you got there?”

“...” Bucky didn’t respond. He wouldn’t explain back at the compound. He just wanted her to wake up. He wanted his little sister back.

Back at the compound

Her senses slowly came back to her and she woke up to her hand resting in somebody’s. She opened her eyes and saw.... Bucky! She lightly shook his hand making him shoot up.

“Doe!”

(I thought Doe would be a cute nickname since it forms from the only name they know which is Shadow.)

“Snowy!” She said happily. She was free. She was with her older brother. Everything would be okay.

And it was. For awhile. They took a blood test from her and found out she was Tony’s missing sister who was taken after the car crash with her parents. Her name was Y/N but some still called her Shadow or Doe in Bucky case. She didn’t blame Bucky but he sure blamed himself but he wouldn’t let himself cut her out of his life because of guilt. She developed relationships with the team. Tony and Bucky were her protective older brothers, Steve, Bruce, Clint and Thor were like uncles. Natasha was her aunt. Pietro and Wanda were like siblings. Then there was the day she met Peter. She had finally worked back up her courage and bravery, not to mention her cunningness. She was herself again, just more confident than before the accident. She walked around in stride, almost matching up to Natasha. She would work on her powers with Wanda and then make sure to spend time with her family.

He had come over to the tower after hearing about the new person at the tower from Tony. He had invited Peter to come over and meet his sister, Peter being addicted to pleasing his idol said of course and made his way over.

He was of course expecting a older woman since he knew Tony’s parents had died many many years ago, he was not prepared to see her.

Peter made his way up the elevator of the expensive tower after telling Jarvis what floor he wanted to be on. The elevator opened and there the team was in all their glory sitting on the couch waiting for him and the other guest to be ready.

“Hello Man of spider!” Thor boomed loudly as Peter stepped out of the elevator. Peter waved shyly at Thor and the others followed with their hellos. After a little more waiting Tony was impatient and called his sister to come down.

“Alright, Alright I’m coming! I didn’t even take that long! It would take longer to say your full title thing you like to say about yourself. Isn’t Genius, Billionaire Playboy, Kiss ass?” She smirked as she walked into the room. Peters eyes widened.

She was Tony Stark’s sister?

“Who’s did you want me to meet?” She questioned her brother as she smiled at him cheekily after forgetting the name of the person for the billionth time.

Tony rolled his eyes but he couldn’t stay mad at the sister who came back miraculously from the dead.

“Peter meet Y/N my little sister and Y/N meet Peter Parker aka Spider-boy.” Tony introduced and Peter stepped forwards almost in a daze and held out his when to shake formally.

“Nice to meet you.” Y/N said cheekily as he continued staring. He lightly shook his head and blushed embarrassedly.

“Nice to meet you too.”

She was more confident now away from hydra and he liked her personality.

And it truly was because that was the day that started his obsession with the one and the only

Y/N Stark.

He always came over to the tower to hang out with her as they had grown to be friends but Peter wanted more. Sometimes he came over and stalked her outside of the windows. Peter had hacked the tower from the inside to not detect him as Spider Man on the outside of the tower. Whenever he was in her room he’d touch everything he could and he secretly undid the latch to her window. He snuck into her room every night just to watch her sleep, watching as her chest raised and called from her steady breathing . He took pictures of her whenever he spied and had a secret collection of them filling his closest. He had even entered the room when the other Avengers had decided to run to the store for groceries dressed in their typical jacket, sunglasses, and baseball hats disguises. He cuddled into her blankets and breathed in her scene as he held into her pillow.

He was undeniably in love with Y/N Stark.

And he wanted her to be his.

His plan was soon put into action. He knew her schedules, wasn’t too hard she was required to stay at home as it was too dangerous because of Hydra.

One day he just got lucky, the team had to go out on a mission and she was required to stay home but Tony didn’t want her by herself so he called his trusted intern, Peter Parker. He was asked to go over to the tower to keep Y/N company and he immediately said yes.

And the day started off as usual for Y/N. She woke up and had breakfast, then sat by the tv watching her favorite show Once Upon A Time. She always like watching it because the character Jefferson reminded her of Bucky. She was halfway into episode 16 when Peter arrived in the Elevator.

“Hey Peter!” She called from the couch. She didn’t even look at him. It made him slightly mad. He should be her one and only. Not the stupid tv show.

“Hey Y/N.” He replied after he got over his anger.

“What do you want to do?” She questioned looking at him with a eyebrow raised.

“There are so many things I’d like to do.” He thought to himself but restrained from saying.

“It’s up to you.” He replied shortly continuing to think through his plan. He was confident it would go right if he followed each direction.

They went to the gym and she began to work on her powers while Peter watched her intently. He needed to know her powers if things were to go south with his plans. She first turned invisible then made force fields.

She continued to make the force fields bigger and Peter had to continue to back up to avoid getting hit with it. He began to get too far away. He also didn’t want her to thing that she could push him away like this.

“Y/N stop. You need to get food in you before you continue practicing. Your low on energy.” He faked looking concerned in order to manipulate her to feel bad. Of course she was usually defiant but she just wanted Peter to be happy. So she gave in.

“Alright.” He nodded in praise at her giving in. He knew how to get her now. She needed to please others. Probably a side effect from Hydra but it could be used to his advantage.

They then began baking... well more like Peter while she watched he made her sit down after he was worried about her burning herself. She needed to be taken care of. He also didn’t need her catching onto his plan, taking a pill out from his pocket and crushed it onto the cupcake he was going to give her. It looked like sugar. After being at hydra you’d think she would check her food before she ate. But she didn’t. She had to trust Peter of course. That’s what her brother wanted from her. She felt bad not being able to help around the tower. She felt as if she wasn’t contributing enough. Y/N thought it would help if she did what she thought was expected of her, not what she wanted. She wanted to bake. But if Peter didn’t want her to then she couldn’t deny it.

Then they watched tv but Peter hated it because again her attention was somewhere else. Halfway through Star Wars he turned off the tv and waited for it to work.

Just as he looked at her he could see her eyes be going to droop.

“Oh Y/N are you tired?” He questioned with fake concern.

“Oh, I am. Just a little bit. I slept well last night-“ she was cut off by a yawn. “I don’t know why I’m so tired. I’m sorry Peter. I knew you came over to hang out.”

“It’s fine Y/N. Just got to sleep.”

Just as he said that her eyes shut and he smiled victoriously. She was his. And she wasn’t ever going to leave.

He picked her up bridal style and took her into her room and sat her down on the bed while he changed into his Spider-Man uniform and packed her some clothes. They wouldn’t be coming back here. After packing clothes into a small back pack he picked her up once again and they went swinging out of the tower with Jarvis not even alerted because of Peter hacking it before to not detect his suit.

He arrived at a small house in the middle of the woods and carefully opened the door and brought her inside. Peter glanced around the rooms just in case then sat her in the bed, attaching a chain to her ancle. The clasp part of the chain had a little padding so it wasn’t hurting her but it did keep her there. He kissed her on the head and quickly changed out of his suit. Then got into the bed wearing boxers climbing in next to the sleeping girl. He wrapped a arm around her waist and sighed content.

She was finally his.

The Avengers got back to the tower and saw no one there. No struggle. Nothing.

Tony Lost his sister. Again.

Bucky lost his little sister. Again.

And

Peter had taken the love of his life to be all his.

At least until they check the tapes.

Sorry it’s taken me forever to write this. This was my first shot at a Yandere and I hope it’s good. Sorry if I should have done less back story and more Peter but I hope you like it. Anyways thank you for the suggestion. ♡

#peter parker #yandere peter parker #bucky barnes #tony stark #spiderman #peter parker imagine #peter parker x reader #Peter Parker x Stark!reader

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wellhellotragic · 3 years

Text

These Wounds Won't Seem to Heal 3/4

Summary: It’s not her fault. She’s still new and doesn’t know. He’s not flawless. Not anymore. He’s got scars, ones she’s seen first hand. Ones she helped tend to. His body is covered in them. There’s a thin red line where he took a bottle to the face during his early beat cop days. There’s another angry red mark on his torso from where he was stabbed with a knife in his ribs. The one where he had his hand slammed in a locker as a teenager has long since faded, only the barest hint remaining, only visible in just the right lighting.

There’s two oval scars now too. One in his stomach and one on his chest. Those are from the worst day of her life.But none of those scars compare to the ones he carries on the inside. The self-inflicted cuts he makes to his soul never quite healing over. He blames himself. It’s not his fault.

There’s a scar on her soul now too. One he left. A piece of her heart forever missing.

Rating: Mature (mostly for language)

A/N: Guy, I suck so hard core. I don't even know how I let so much time lapse between chapter 2 and now, and then to really top off my suck-o-meter, I realized that there's going to have to be a chapter 4 because I can't fix what I've done so easily. Not realistically at least. I promise, and happy ending is coming though, and it won't take me another 8 months to get it up. I hope to have it up and finished by the weekend.

The AO3 version

It’s been a hell of a night. She’s not sure where exactly it falls on her list of worst days ever, but it’s in her top five. It has to be. It’s not the worst, that honor is saved for the night she almost lost Killian, but it’s still up there. She’s spent hours now going through all of the details over and over again with Graham and Lance, her story never changing. Getting poked and prodded by EMTs, despite telling everyone that she’s fine.

She’s not, but they can’t stitch up her insides.

David, her partner, on the other hand has a bullet hole in his leg. Better than his head though.

She’s not even sure if she can fully reconcile everything that happened. She and David were investigating the death of a low profile importer, a nobody, interviewing some dock workers that had found the body. Some gruff looking men who easily blended in with the usual fishmongers and cargo sorters.

But they weren’t. She realized it just a second too late, right before a bag was pulled over her head. She fought like hell, but she was at a disadvantage. From what she heard, David had put up a fight as well, but in the end, it was useless, and she lost consciousness with a sharp blow to the head.

She woke up strapped down to a chair with David the same a few feet beside her. She shouldn’t have been surprised, Jefferson had always given her a bad feeling, but she never actually thought he’d go dirty. She certainly never expected to be facing the wrong side of his department issued sidearm.

Even now, everything is still a blur. Graham assured her it’s the shock, that it’ll fade once the adrenaline wears off; that everything will clear up after a good night's rest. She’s not sure about that though. It’s four in the morning now and the adrenaline seems to be hanging on for dear life still and she knows she's not going to rest any time soon. Humbert offered to drive her home but she declined, choosing to wait for August to finish wrapping up his report.

She’s not sure what time it is when they finally arrive at her apartment. The battery in her cell phone died ages ago. Neither of them even make a move for the fridge, choosing to bypass the beer she keeps stocked for the hard nights. Instead, the two of them move in silence to her room. She plugs in her cell before crawling in bed next to him, like when they were kids in Ingrid’s foster house. She’s not sure who’s comforting who at this point, but she knows that she just needs to be with family.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

She doesn’t, but she knows she needs to or it’ll eat her alive. She’s tried that once already and it ended up with her almost having a complete nervous breakdown and a three week leave of absence with daily Archie sessions.

“I don’t even know where to start.”

It’s true. So much has happened in the last twelve hours, there’s no one easy to pinpoint place to begin. So August goes first. He fills in the blanks that he can, so that she might be able to piece together the rest. He tells her about Killian sending him undercover, about Jefferson and missing drugs and money. How Jefferson was helping to conceal evidence that would link Walsh and the Nikko empire to a wide distribution of pixie dust.

Some of it is just speculation, that Jefferson must have figured out they were closing in on him and that’s why he went for Emma, and David was probably just collateral damage. How he most likely picked Emma because he knew how much she meant to him , and while he didn’t say Killian’s name specifically, the implication hung over her like a heavy cloud.

“Before you got there, he told Killian to choose. Between me and David I mean. To pick which one of us would live and which one would die. And then he just started laughing and screaming in this crazed voice that I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget.”

It was the single most terrifying thing she’d ever heard. The mania that accompanied it. She already knew that it was going to haunt her for months to come, if not longer.

It’s a real Gracie’s choice. Gracie’s choice Killian. GRACIE’s CHOICE!!!

She felt August shift next to her.

“Gracie was his daughter. She died while he was undercover with a Southie Gang. Killian was undercover with Cruella at the time. It was a freak accident, a gas leak and the house went up in flames, but he was convinced that she was killed by one of the De Vil boys. He told me once that he knew Killian had given him up as a snitch to prove his worth. The De Vil’s had nothing to do with the Southie boys, but he’d twisted it up in his mind. I never thought he’d do anything about it though. It was just crazy drunk venting one night.”

She knows August. Knows that he’s blaming himself for what happened tonight, but she ignores it. Nothing she says will stop him from tormenting himself, and she’s not done.

“I told him to choose David. He has this whole perfect life, you know. An adoring wife and a new baby, all of these people that would miss him if he were gone. I told Killian to save David, and I-” She hates how small she feels when she cries, but she can’t hold back the tears. “He gave me this look. He’s been cold, but this was something different. There was just so much anger in his eyes.”

And that’s when she breaks. Knowing that hated her was one thing, but watching him train his gun on her. Seeing the pure darkness in his eyes. She doesn’t know how to voice it to August, but she knows that if August hadn’t arrived when he did, she knows he would have done as she asked. That he wouldn’t have had to think twice about it. And it’s that knowledge that sliced open the last piece of her heart that had been hanging on by a thread, even after all that time.

August holds her through the tears, until she finally exhausts herself enough to sleep. And so she drifts off, completely unaware of the new voicemail alert waiting for her.

________________________________

The February air is cooler on the water and he kicks himself for not bringing a heavier jacket. It’s been ages since he’s been out on this boat, and time has helped him to forget everything except for the things he wishes he could. Liam always used to tease him, so much so that Killian would reject any offers of warmth from his brother just to prove a point. He wasn’t some silly kid that needed to be minded anymore. He was capable of doing everything on his own, except for bringing an extra coat. He forgot everytime, and today was no exception.

Luckily for Killian, the spare that Liam kept on the boat just for him is still in its place, folded neatly in a small storage locker below deck. It hits him in the gut a little, that Liam could be so right about some things and incredibly wrong about others.

It’s eating Killian alive, not talking to his brother. Not being able to express himself because despite everything Emma has done for him, Liam still doesn’t approve of her. Liam often still thinks of him as the teenage boy, awkward and desperate for approval from anyone that will give it to him, even if it means getting taken advantage of.

He’s not that kid anymore though. He isn’t letting his crush steal his essays and letting her claim this as her own. He isn’t using all of his hard earned money to buy her jewelry that she’s just going to pawn for cash later. He isn’t following after Emma like a lost puppy dog.

He’s in love with her, and he has a sneaking suspicion that she feels the same way. But at this rate, he’s never going to get Liam’s blessing, the only approval he needs anymore.

He shouldn’t be thinking about this now. He really shouldn’t. Not when he and Liam are sitting in a rented dilapidated loft across from an abandoned fabric warehouse waiting for the Canal Street Cutter to emerge. There had been a lot of chatter that morning about where he might be hiding and Liam assembled teams throughout South Boston hoping to catch a glimpse of him.

Emma and August were stationed about eight blocks over. Lance and Arthur were on the edge of South Boston and Waterfront. Other teams were scattered, but too far away to get to if they needed assistance.

Killian had tried to tell Liam that it was a bad idea to spread everyone so thin, but the elder Jones brother had been instant and headstrong as ever. It would have been a career making arrest, and Liam, ever aspiring to be more just wouldn’t let that chance pass him by.

“I just think that you have other obligations that require your attention right now.”

“If this is the bros before hoes speech you can just save it.”

“Killian,” The exasperation evident in his brother's tone, “you know I detest such vile language. It's crude and you are better than that little brother.”

“What obligations?” He has to quash his desire to correct his brother’s description of him.

“I just think that you are meant for so much more in this life and I worry that you gave up so much when you left the narcotics division to follow her into homicide. You were a rising star there and now you’re having to cut your teeth all over again.”

“It’s not as if I’m starting all over. For God’s sake Liam, I just made Lieutenant. But there’s more to life than a job.”

His brother takes his gaze away from the binoculars to turn to Killian.

“Look at father and all of his vices. It strayed him from the path. But you, Killian, you persevered and now everything you've wanted is in your grasp.”

“This isn't the same thing and you know it. Emma isn't some pathetic man’s addiction. Liam, I'm in love with her.”

“Killian,” Liam pauses, taking a deep breath. “She's a distraction. Think of all that you’ve accomplished in the year that you were undercover. You brought down an entire crime syndicate. You did that without her taking your attention away.”

“I didn't bring the De Vil family down because ‘we’ were apart. I did it because we were ‘apart’ and I knew the only way I'd be able to see her again without putting her in harm's way would be to find the evidence and make the arrest.”

“Fine, if you need another reason, have you thought about working directly with her, or even over her in a supervisory position? Have you considered how your personal relationship with a subordinate could affect your judgment?”

“It’s not-”

Liams sees movement in the distance, cutting off Killian’s rebuttal, but his view is obscured so he motions for Killian to follow him, to leave the safety of their little room. They stay silent as they walk downstairs and head out a propped-open door leading to an alleyway. They had to wind through hallways to get from the loft outside and now they’re further away from the warehouse with no cover.

Killian even tries pointing out how visible they are, but Liam shuts him down, determined to close the case. He’s halfway sure that Liam’s trying to prove a point about how Killian can’t be successful and be in a relationship with Emma. He’s seen it before, the way professional jealousy destroys couples. But Emma’s not like that. She wouldn’t see his success as her failure.

They try to skirt the perimeter and he knows he should keep his mouth shut, this just isn’t the time, but he’s just so frustrated that he can’t keep holding it in.

“Please don’t make me choose between you.” It’s an angry whisper, more to himself than anything, and even though he did his best to keep his volume low it’s still enough that Liam’s heard and turns back to him, missing sight of the empty beer bottle at his feet.

The glass battering against the gravel echoes through the night as they both stay silent, waiting to see if they’ve been heard. The air is still around them, and Killian thinks they just might have lucked out.

And then he hears the gunshots ring out.

Liam is on the ground before Killian has time to register what’s happened. He runs to Liam, but gets knocked to the ground before he can get to him. His body hurts and he can see blood covering his hand from where he just touched his abdomen. He’s always heard people say that the shock blocks out the pain, but they must all be liars, because the longer he lays there, the more the pain intensifies.

It takes everything he has to pull himself behind a dumpster, half crawling, half slithering like a snake.

The shock eventually did kick in though, because even to this day he has no memory of radioing in for help. Just the vague memories of Emma leaning over him. The look in her eyes as she tried her best to hold back tears.

The same tears he fought back the night he left Boston, like the coward he was. But Archie was right. He needed to get his head on straight, to distance and center himself. He had to leave, for her.

He’s still wrestling with the guilt. He talked about it with Archie, how she begged him to kill her and save David. And that he actually considered it for about two full seconds. Not because he wanted to, but because he didn’t want her feeling the way he did. The burden of knowing that someone else was dead, and knowing that no matter how good you are, how hard you try, that you’ll never live up to them. He didn’t want her hating herself the way he did. Didn’t want her to destroy herself like he had.

But then something snapped inside of him and rage bubbled up. The audacity of her to beg him to kill her. For her to try and force that decision on him, with no regard to him or his feelings.

It was at that moment that he finally realized what he’d been doing to her ever since Liam had passed away. He finally understood the choice she’d been forced to make that night. And he knew - he knew that despite it all - he could never live with himself if he’d chosen anyone but her. That he couldn’t let her go just like she didn’t with him.

The only thing that saved him was Boothe. In the moments that passed after August arrived, while the two of them tried to wrestle the gun away from Jefferson, he felt the weight of Liam’s death wash over him. And then he heard a shot ring out and there was nothing but panic. Panic and guilt.

It felt as though ages had passed as he searched for Emma in the smoke filled room. The SWAT team had moved in at some point, but he’d been too focused on fighting off Jefferson to notice. He pushed through the sting in his eyes and the tightness of his chest as he looked for her, but all he saw through the haze were armored cops everywhere.

It wasn’t until he was forcibly escorted outside the building that he saw her, saw that she was safe, and then his stomach turned. He ran around a corner away from all of the prying eyes, and for the first time in his career, he gave in and let the night overcome him.

It’s been nearly a year since that night and he’s been running ever since. Some days are better than others. The anger is mostly behind him, but some nights he still wakes up in a sweat clutching his bed sheets, ready to fight. But there’s never anyone around to take a swing at, because he’s all alone. He’s pushed away anyone that ever mattered and isolated himself on that damn boat.

He thinks of Emma, wonders if she’s moved on or not. He’s too cowardly to call her, partly because he has no idea what he will say if she answers, but mostly because he’s terrified that she won’t answer. So he broods. He takes to the local bars as he sails the coastline and drinks a little too much before stumbling back to Liam’s boat alone. It’s a wonder nobody’s robbed him yet for what a careless sot he’s been.

Tonight is one of those nights. He’s made his way down to Florida and back, only a few hours away from Boston, and his demons are screaming again. He’s hoping against all hope that the rum in the tumbler across from him will help quiet them. Just holding the small glass in his fingertips helps a bit. A placebo of sorts. He doesn’t want to be this man anymore though. This pathetic lonely human. He doesn’t want to feel this way anymore, but he doesn’t know how to fix it. Archie said that him realizing it was a good first step but he’s not sure if he agrees. He’s called Archie a lot over the last year. Somehow doing therapy over the phone as the boat sways back and forth under his feet has helped to ease his hesitancy. There’s something about knowing that he can hang up at any time if he wants, and that no one knows. No one will judge him.

They don’t talk about Emma, not in present tense at least. They’ve had conversations about the way he’s treated her in the past, about his complicated feelings for her, the way it’s all shaped him, but they never talk about her now. He’s not sure if it’s because Archie doesn’t know if he’s ready for that, or if Archie knows something that he’s absolutely not ready for.

Archie is here tonight though, the rum is.

He’s still twirling the amber in his hand as he hears the familiar scraping of a nearby barstool against a wooden floor. There’s a scent that follows, a floral perfume that doesn’t match with the musk of the dive bar. He doesn’t look at her directly, doesn’t need to when he can see her from the mirror behind the bar. Her top is low, flashing more skin that it’s covering. She’s closer than he thought.

“Is that for me?” She’s bold.

He’s reminded of those early days on the force, when he wouldn’t even have to talk to a woman. When he could just flash her a smile and she’d be on his arm heading out the door to her place. He’s not that guy though, he’s salty and cynical, and the look he flashes her is closer to a smirk.

“Excuse me?” “Well, you’ve been toying with it for almost twenty minutes. I just thought maybe you were waiting for me to walk into your life.”

Was he this bad at picking up women?

“Look, I’m not trying to be rude, but I’m not in the mood for woman.” “So you’re gay?”

It’s a good thing he hasn’t started drinking yet because he damn well might have chocked otherwise. He doesn’t get a chance to respond though. The bubbly blonde that served him his rum has returned with a spray bottle in hand. “Mary of Mothers. Didn’t I already have you escorted out of here tonight, Teresa?”

“Bite me, Tinkerbelle.”

The girl behind the bar might be all of five foot tall but there’s a beast inside her that towers over any man in that bar and before he knows what’s happening the bartender is drowning the girl in what smells like stainless steel cleaner and the words coming out of her mouth would make any Navy man blush.

The girl ends up running away and Killian isn’t sure what to make of any of it. He’s broken up bar fights before, but he’s never seen anything quite like that.

“Sorry about that. I know this little bar might not seem like much, but it’s all I’ve got and I’ll be damned if I let the likes of her selling her body in here.” “Oh, she wasn’t-” “Trust me, where you had agreed upfront or not, you would have been light whatever cash you have left in that wallet before the night was up. And I’ll bet you dollars to pennies you would have had a lovely little itch or two down there.” She nods her head towards his crotch before switching the subject like she hadn’t just implied the poor woman from before was an STD ridden whore. “So, I haven’t seen you here before. Where you from?”

He’s not sure how she’s disarmed him so quickly, but he finds himself telling her all about himself over the next hour. Business has slowed down and her other barmate seems to be more than capable of handling the few strays still walking in.

She makes him laugh too with her feisty spirit. It’s been far too long since he’s felt at ease like this. They talk and talk. Not about much in particular, just random conversation. She bought the bar about six years ago, and tells him about how it’s let her build the family she always wanted and never really got. She’s carved out her own little place in the world and he envies her that. The way she can just lay her whole life bare to a complete stranger while he can’t even talk to the people that know him best.

The night rolls on and it’s time to close up. He half expects that she’s going to invite him upstairs, to the little apartment she mentioned earlier, but she surprises him. She’s done that a few times tonight, but this one hits him in the gut. “So, what’s her name?”

This time he actually does chock on the water she’s poured for him.” “I’m sorry, what?”

“Killian, in the last few hours, you’ve told me your entire life story, everything from your shitty father to your arrogant brother, your job, your leave of absence, but you haven’t mentioned a girl one single time. You’re holding back, which means there’s something to hold back.”

“You don’t know that. I could be gay.” “Um, ya, I saw you check out Teresa’s rack earlier, definitely not gay. So what’s the deal.” He doesn’t want to talk about it, but he doesn’t want to be rude either. So he gives her as little as possible, but she sees through him. In fact, she actually asks him what the hell he’s waiting for as she pushes him out the door.

He doesn’t really know what he’s waiting for to be honest. He’s wanted to go back to Boston, but there’s just so many threads he left unravelled when he left.

#These Wounds Won't Seem to Heal #Captain Swan #captain swan ff #CS fanfics

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shmegmilton · 4 years

Note

Can you explain how Aaron and Alexander stopped being friends and started fighting?

They were never really ‘friends.’ I assume you got that idea from the play, but I have no idea why the play tried to push that narrative. Civil? Sure, but that was necessary. New York was less than 50,000 people at the time, and they were both accomplished lawyers & statesmen who had to work and interact with each other on a daily basis. Politics is politics, look at how people are acting right now during our election.

As for your question, it’s a long line of policy & personal disagreements, mostly. They were on opposite sides of the aisle on pretty much everything. Lots of small things, but a lot of big, BIG things.

Burr was (ironically) kind of a pacifist; he kept mostly to himself, didn’t really speak much publicly & didn’t necessarily go out of his way to confront people unless he’s been pushed long enough (everyone ‘snaps’ at some point, y’know?)

But that’s why the ‘Burr is an evil mastermind’ myth is so pervasive today. Burr just… didn’t bother defending himself, or correcting anything, because he (mistakingly) had faith in the inherent goodness of people that someday people would see him for his true character. So for that reason, we don’t really have a good timeline from Burr’s perspective as to how he felt about Hamilton—but BOY howdy did Hamilton never shut up about Burr.

----

Trespass & Confiscation Acts (1782ish)

During the Revolution, the British confiscated the property of patriots that fled the city. New York did the same thing, & for a while it was this game of: ‘Oh, you’re gonna take my stuff? **draws a line in the dirt** Well, everything behind this line is mine now.” It was all very bad, and after the way Tories & Loyalists faced a lot of honestly very fucked up discrimination & forfeiture of their rights. Hamilton (like most Federalists) was pro-British, so he represented a lot of these people in court. I’m sure it wasn’t purely out of the goodness of his heart--most of his clients were loaded--but the sentiment is there. On the other hand, there are multiple records of Burr buying up property around this time, most likely confiscated Tory property, which he would usually flip or give away to people that he knew, so he was taking full advantage of this. Burr also, most likely, went head-to-head with Hamilton on a few of these cases, because Burr tended to work with the ‘common folk.’

French Revolution (1789ish to 1799ish) & Proclamation of Neutrality (1793)

Burr (like most Democratic-Republicans) was pro-French, so much so that he took in French refugees fleeing the Revolution into his home. He was very sympathetic to the cause.Hamilton was not. He basically saw it the same way that right-wing Conservatives see the Black Lives Matter movement is the best way I can explain it. He also hated it for the amount of immigrants that were now fleeing to the U.S.

Burr Gets Chosen For NY Senate (1791)

Key word: chosen. As in, he didn’t actually run. That wasn’t how politics worked back then. The Hamilton musical just fucking lied outright about that, let’s be clear. He also never switched parties. Ever. Back then you were nominated by the people who were already in government--usually by one of the powerful families like the Clintons or the Livingstons, or yada yada. So Burr didn’t actually do anything. He didn’t even really want the position either, if I recall. But back then if you were ‘called to serve,’ you were obligated to do it. Hamilton was furious either way because it meant that Burr was replacing his father-in-law, Phillip Schuyler, meaning that he wouldn’t have that extra ear in government that he wanted. Burr also had a lot of views that were considered ‘extreme’ at the time, like getting extra rights for women, immigrants & black people, but I have no idea what Hamilton thought of those individual policies other than he just didn’t like women, immigrants or black people.

1792 & 1796 Presidential Election

Burr wasn’t really that serious about either of these elections, I don’t think (in ’92 he wasn’t that well-known & barely got any support, but it’s worth noting the fact he was nominated to run at all was really impressive. He’s tied with William Jennings Bryan as being one of the youngest people to ever receive an electoral vote, at 36 years old.) In ’96 he faired a little better—he got 30 votes, which is nearly half of what you need to get the ticket nomination, also very impressive.Hamilton was super staunchly opposed to both of these runs, though, and did his typical Hamilton thing of openly campaigning about how the people shouldn’t vote for Burr, yada yada.

Jay Treaty (1794)

I highly suggest looking up supplemental information on this because it’s a bit complicated, but it was basically a treaty between us and Great Britain to reaffirm that we were going to continue to not mess with France, as well as a couple of other weird hang-ups. It was not popular, at all, especially with the Demo-Republicans. There is a specific instance (that is actually kind of insane) where Hamilton gave a public speech in defense of it, and the Democratic-Republicans in the crowd started pelting him & the other Federalists with rocks. Hamilton got SO mad that immediately challenged a man to a duel, and threatened to fight each of the Democratic-Republicans one-by-one.

Reynolds Affair (1797)

Burr had a personal relationship with Maria Reynolds; he was her divorce attorney in 1793/1794, helped her out financially, & successfully petitioned (+paid for) her daughter Susan to attend a boarding school. I believe they also stayed in his him with him during the divorce proceedings, but don’t quote me on that. He never said anything publicly that I could find, but Burr probably had a personal investment in the Reynolds Pamphlet, since it painted Maria in a really damaging light.

Alien & Sedition Acts (1798)

These were some of the most worst laws ever passed in the history of the country. Like, these were AWFUL. It not only limited immigration, but it limited the freedom of the press and freedom of speech (ESPECIALLY immigrants, my god.)

Burr was right on the front lines helping defend people in court, he actively opposed it & is probably the thing that propelled him into Jefferson’s orbit as a potential Vice President.

John Barker Church Duel (1797)

John Barker Church had accused Burr of taking bribes (which was unfounded & untrue) and they ended up dueling. JBC was the husband of Angelica Schuyler, Hamilton’s sister-in-law.

Neither was injured (though, JBC apparently put a hole in Burr’s coat), but it supposed infuriated Hamilton & his associates so much that they would send out fake letters “from Burr” challenging people to duels.

The Manhattan Company (1799)

Burr was getting sick of the difficulty he was having getting loans from the Federalist-run banks and decided to do something about it. There had been several seasonal epidemics of yellow fever—caused by mosquitos but, at the time, it was thought to be caused by improperly treated water, miasma (‘bad air’) or (if you asked Hamilton) stinky evil immigrant refuges who were fleeing France and Haiti. Burr saw this and spearheaded a campaign to get a proper water treatment plant, even getting Hamilton to help him. Through some really weird loophole that I don’t quite understand, Burr was somehow allowed to use the ‘surplus capital’ for banking, which essentially turned it into a bank. The actual water treatment portion of the company was plagued with problems due to improper management and things like that. We’ll never know his exact thought process on this (people normally assume it was malicious trickery because people are biased to hate Burr anyway) & I highly doubt that Burr knew the extent of the issues (he was on the Board of Directors, but so were a dozen others--INCLUDING John Barker Church) so I don’t entirely think it’s his fault, but the fact of the matter is that it most likely exacerbated the existing problems & indirectly led to more people getting sick/dying until they finally fixed the problems.I would say that it’s completely justifiable for Hamilton to be mad at Burr, but, as we established, Hamilton hated both poor people & immigrants (two groups most likely affected by this) so he wasn’t actually mad at him for the reason a… y’know, a normal person would be mad at him. He was mad at him because Burr destroyed the monopoly that Federalists had on banks, making it easier for Democratic-Republicans & others to get loans. He was literally mad at him for making the economy fair.

1800 Election & 1804 NY Governor Election

These two are self-explanatory, I think, and I’ve already been writing way too long, lol. My hand hurts.

#Aaron Burr #Alexander Hamilton #Hamilton #AmRev #History #American Revolution #Long Post #Anecdotes #THIS TOOK SO LOOOOONG

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bookofmariokingofmaiami · 3 years

Text

This is the second time making this post because i am angry as fuck because for some reason when I added the names it didn't save so I'm doing this shit again

Hey! I had a stupendus idea, the past few days I've gathered a bunch of mitten squad quotes and captain sauce quotes

Soooo, I'll put wich book of mario characters would say each quote and we'll see what happens

Yes I know 99% of the mitten squad quotes is gonna be bolivia and carbon

Also, some quotes reference characters and locations, so I'll put an [ ] with what I think the book of mario counterpart would be

MITTEN SQUAD SEGMENT

Lewis:"I have successfully turned an ordinary kitchen utensil into the most valuable fork in the known universe, no one man should have this kind of power, but I am not mortal man, as a sexualy identity as a big rock being thrown into the ocean"

Princess of peaches, talking about 1 TEC-20"The robot wasn't able to pick the lock and I lacked the fire power to blow the bitch open"

Marc:"I left a broom there too so my bucket wouldn't be lonely"

Carbon:"Calm down vegetarians I am talking about animals in video games, animals in real life matter way less"

Barney one:"Killing it isn't the hard part, the hard part is getting away from the explosion of the goddamm Nagasaki bomb strapped up its ass that was rigged to explode once it died"

Bolivia:"Todd Howard [barbie], even in death you find a way to fuck me"

Bolivia:"We came back to the little shit with the ant problem and killed most of the ants, I left one alive for the boy, either he becomes a man or that ant will have a very good day"

Goomb:"Me brain fixed gud no hurt no more"

Marc:"Picked up trash for the make a wish kid"

Bolivia, talking about maria:"Because she hits like a bull with down syndrome and has the personality of a piece of plywood"

Belize:"You might be wondering, who is the boy and who is the girl? I won't give it away but I will say this, the knife is a whore"

Maria:"I had armor, i had supplies, i had pockets full of room temperature tomatos"

Bolivia:"For some reason I thought that stupid the horse v2 could fly, bad decision on my part"

Carbon:"For some reason this shrapnel character had 200 BB's, what a weirdo, who caries around 200 BB's?, anyway, I talked to daddy and brought my 300 BB's and headed off to clear off the Jefferson memorial"

Goverman::"Get a juice box and strap on your helmet, because we're going to hell"

Carbon:"I punched a puppy to death"

Marc:"My iq is similar to that of a 14 year old block of cheese"

Lewis:"Theres an oxygen exhaust pipe, the second best tipe of pipe to suck on to keep yourself alive, for those who need hand holding, that was not a drug reference, this is a family friendly channel, it was a suicide joke"

Bolivia:"I got an amazing slow motion shot of dogmeat getting fucked to death by a nuclear warhead"

Maria:"My only option was to become a vampire, wich sucked"

Bolivia:"But just as when like how every virtual dog goes to hell when it dies, what the fuck does that even mean?"

Carbon:"I took advantage of a unconscious military officer and beat him to death"

Barney one:"Nothing else says more victory than overdosing on drugs after a war"

Prof. Ceasar reality:"And decided to go to the much bigger and much more research facility x-13 research facility facility center, WHAT? I think I had a stroke"

Bolivia:"Used more than 3% of my frag mines to blow up a dog"

Carbon:"The last few coursers ran for their non existence lives and I went after them because I'm not letting anyone get away, one got away"

Maria:"I got a warning saying that nuka world is intended for those level 30 or above, Mathematics show us that me being lv11 is close enough to lv30"

Carbon:"Killed a pain-maker and got a glimpse into the big G in the sky who manifested himself as a fire axe floating in the air, this voodoo shit has no place in zion so I chopped of the pain-maker's legs and arms so If there is an afterlife he will be a cripple in hell for all eternity"

Goverman:"Its head turned into jelly, I threw its egg down into the nightmare bellow, and then I jumped after it"

Carbon:"A herd of big hornets paid the ultimate price for being alive"

Goverman:"Used his gun to turn off a woman"

Maria:"Me being the player can't open the door, theres a know you have to twist it its a whole process"

Goverman explained why maria survived the fall:"One of them belonged to God and refused to die"

Goombell, talking about hoko saba:"The dragon I pretended to not exist a few minutes ago is one of my mom's friend's kids so I had to play with him even tho he's weird"

Belize:"There was no hamster's luck in a garbage disposal chance that I would follow this giant fuck all the way to the cit ruins"

Lewis:"Along the way i saved a shopping cart from drowning and returned it to its family"

Prof. Ceasar reality:"Its about 24 million cheez its away from New vegas"

Bolivia:"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to bedworld"

Carbon:"With enough notches in my pistol to spell psychopath in braille"

Gooverman:"I spie with my little eye a ville whore who deserves to die, I cleaved her back in half with my stick and what I saw was glorious"

Maria?:"Its kinda like playing the floor is lava, but you can't see the lava and instead of burning to death you turn into a vegetable"

IDK"I hid from Ringo by hiding in ringo"

Bolivia:"The plate worked as well I thought it would, wich means it didn't work"

Bolivia:"There was a 3 for 1 discount on dead raiders if you use the promo code granade at checkout"

Belize:"The only explanation is that has a 5th appendage wich he pulls out on special occasions, wich probably isn't the case, we all know elmo doesn't pull out"

Goomb:"You don't need those things, Jesus got trough his life without any guns"

Goombape:"When i played it as a children"

Barbie:"Its like how you don't know if your life has any meaning until you die and see your score"

Belize:"This was the most stealth oriented part of the game by a metric mile"

Bolivia:"I stripped him naked, talked with Elliot [lewis] whose face bothered me for some reason,Talked with the samurai[maria], talked with red dead redemption [barney one]"

Carbon:"Some idiot spilled red paint on the clouds"

Bolivia:"Before traveling with the wizard, I spent some time pestering earnie with the prospect of friendship, by walking back and forth in front of him, making him think i wanted to talk to him just for me to keep on walking,I was voted the quietest guy I high-school and I know how loud earnie is screaming inside his head right now, it's kinda fun to be in this side of it :) ,also this isn't related to the video in any way, I just wanted to make it known that i have a sealed copy of elmos letter adventure for Nintendo 64 and you don't"

Maria:"I knew I could use that as a lighthouse of sorts in order to cast myself further into the ocean until i drowned in my own disappointment"

Goombell:"Vulpes[carbon] was adopted, his mother is both infertile and imaginary"

Belize:"Being alone is mental, you can be surrounded by friends family laughs and love on Christmas morning and still be alone in your head"

Bolivia:"I acted in self defense by committing various war crimes"

Carbon:"My throwing spears were broken and wouldn't fly,stupid fucking game"

Bolivia:"That wasn't a lie, it just wasn't the truth"

Maria:"If there's anything Shaun b knows to do is die"

Boombell:"The number of bear traps I activated for sexual reasons turned my angles into a fine powder"

Goverman:"Where the grass is green and the air is even greener"

IDK"I consulted a doctor who flucked out of medical school and followed his advice by killing myself"

Belize:"Being a futuristic[X-nauti], nazi dominated world version of polly poc,etc it has its own set of drawbacks"

Marc:"They're mass effect 3 of fallout 3's 5th dlc, I've never played mass effect"

Lewis:"Who loves their father like how their brother loves his mother's sister"

Carbon:"Like most existential crises it went away after I killed somebody"

Carbon:"If you're wraped in chains and dropped into an empty bathtub to drown, a snorklew won't save you"

Goombape:""A wise man once said "hi! Jeanie may's here" and he's right, there has to be a better way""

Browser:"After it took 3 grown man to kidnap a baby with a gun"

goldbob:"The lever action gun riffle can kill a mutant in a single shot if you land a shot that can kill it in one hit"

Maria:"Its 2020, Noone wants to use their hands anymore"

Bolivia:"Before journeying into more death, some jackass hit me with a granade and killed me, not the explosion, the granade bouncing off my soon to be corpse is was what made me dead"

Belize:"Some Neanderthals gave me their bullets to hold in a pretty rude way >:("

Princess of peaches:"Im not worried about offending blind people, it's not like they'll be watching this"

Carbon:"30 seconds is longer than you'd think, ask anyone whose been on fire"

Lewis:"I was as useful as a comatose toddler with a nerf gun at pearl harbor"

Goomb:"I also poused the challenge to satisfy the curiosity of mine regarding the birds in the sky that Don real because birds aren't exist"

Marc:"Any doctor worth their weight in styrofoam cups can fix a leg with their feet"

Bolivia:"I had me a silenced weapon, but I didn't account for today being his birthday, this changes everything, so I shaped for hollow point"

Carbon:"Maybe if Steve earlin had a gun instead of a snorklew he'd still be alive today"

Marc:"It took me 30 minutes and 3 phone calls to get my food because I'm too much of a pussy to go outside at 10 o'clock at night while drunk in a Christmas sweater after news year to steal my own food of one my neighbors doorstep"

Maria:"We've got rogue, tank dampse, and squidword"

Lewis;"And they're no joke, but I am, I am the big joke and my body is the punchline"

Bolivia:"I got mentally Nagasaki'd by this guy at the stables"

IDK"And went outside where Victor is unhappy with me, after killing Victor, Victor came out of the lucky 38 to avenge victor"

Bolivia:" i shot a kid, i sent that little bitch to the moon"

Sushiya, testing her products:"The door was of its axis, a plate was misbehaving on the chair, a cattle was dancing on the table like the whore she is"

Carbon:"And went shopping for dead bodies, they weren't in stock, but i know a guy who knows a guy who could help me out, both of those guys are me"

Bolivia:"Now vault yosh is I your head too, and he won't be going anywhere"

Maria's son:"As much of a monster that I look like, I think it's gonna work"

Sushiya:"But you know what they say, imagination is what happens when annoyance meets drug use"

Carbon:"If they're stupid enough to be in my way they might as well be my enemy"

Goverman:"But the slippery bastard was too clever, he walked around it, I didn't even know that such a maneuver was even possible"

IDK"Homeland security at this point has yet to be impregnated by a sentient barrel of oil"

Bolivia:" if I drunkenly put a giant hole on my sink with a goddam coffee cup imagine what I could do with a gun"

Belize:"Got ambushed in the freezer while searching for chicken nuggets"

Goverman:"But the fucken bullet Williams come flying out of fucking nowhere"

Maria:"The next second you're in a universe where everything that exists is the sick bastard child of a drunken fuckfest between a pin screen and a light brush"

Bolivia:"Ask the cashier if they have a granade, if they say no, say nothing for a few seconds, put a big smile, put your hands on theirs and quietly ask, would you like one?"

Sean hampton:"Can't do anything until I have my arms around a fat man"

Barbie:"The premise of this run is that I have no arms and I must dab"

Maria's son:"I told you before that I was a genetic disaster"

Bolivia:"And in that cabin, theres some west Virginian mountain folk who are so deep in incest that one of them somehow managed to be his own father"

Bolivia:"Can you hear that? It's…. It's an air conditioner! And it's so fucking anoying, aw no I hurt it's feelings :( "

Goverman:"He could probably put the end of his musket inside his mouth, pull the trigger and still miss"

Barney one:"The big beaver ended his life in stile, he even made a summersault into the afterlife"

Goverman:"Im a good Christian boy, I'll save my ammo for my suicide"

Carbon:"I am not Cinderella, I'm a parasite"

IDK"I played with a doggy too, it used the flesh on my arm as a chew toy, and I booked his nose with a nuclear newspaper to show that that kind of thing isn't allowed in the mitten squad household"

Sean hampton:"The crusable is a magical weapon like divorce papers, capable of tearing everything it comes across in half"

Barbie:"The curse of grandma sparkle managed to reach me all the way in hell"

Barney one:"If you are gonna get a cat, you might get a gun aswell"

Belize:"Corn on the Joe sat back not helping his brother's"

Carbon:"I bought 24 regular bullets,28 hollow points, and 60 that need to wear a helmet"

Bolivia:"After the squad died I had to content with the leftovers, the scraps, statically speaking the majority of what remained"

Lewis:"What I need to face is like a toddler with a learning disability, that would be fair"

Carbon:"I took both left eyes of this dead guy "

Carbon:"It took longer to pull out the Esther than it took of kill the general"

Sushiya, while high:"Deeper inside shit got weird, i killed a giant skeleton right? Nothing weird about that, but then his body just kinda danced in place really slowly, I tought speeding up time would fix it, that was a massive fucking mistake, and changing time back to normal was an even bigger mistake, he'll be hunting me until I die, but until then he'll still be dancing"

CAPTAINSAUCE SEGMENT

Carbon:"They're old, how hard can it be to turn them into blueberry jam and ram them into the grass"

Belize:"I guess if you do electrocute a tank enough it would just explode"

Boliviz:"Id have a better chance of finding a snowball down here than winning a coin toss"

Marc:"How does my Christmas lights break to a stiff breeze but these ones are practically terminators"

Barney one:"I never tought id see the day where I would have to hire a sniper to assassinate a troublesome light bulb but here we are "

Lewis:"I get the feeling if you try to milk a minotaur then you're gonna be its wife"

Sushiya:"In the history of mankind do you think we've ever seen a snake fight an octopus?"

Goverman:"Lets see if you can wobble your way trough the grim reaper" [the grim being carbon]

Goldbob:"Its a steaming pile of something ill tell you that much"

Goverman:"He died? How! Did he have an allergic reaction to the sun?"

Goomb:"Michelangelo is Swiss cheese and where good to go"

Bolivia:"It really looks like I'm taking a sharpened stick to a bazooka fight"

Maria:"HOW DID I GO FROM FIGHTING AN OCTOPUS IN A SUIT TO WW3???"

Princess of peaches, talking about 1TEC-20:"Im playing pictionary with a blind robot"

maria:"Theres on the nose dialogue and then there's punch you in the nose dialogue"

Bolivia, talking about barney one:"This lady looks like her father was half refrigerator"

IDK"Im supposed to sabotage the mail missile assembly line but it looks like someone got here before me"

Belize?:"And the ghosts of previously murdered pianos???"

Maria:"Im getting outsmarted by puppets"

Bolivia:"After careful deliberation with my associate we've come to the conclusion that the local government must have Removed all quarters from circulation, the laundromat went under and before you know it the entire society fell into nudism and then anarchy "

Carbon?:"This is like the hunger games of sesame street"

IDK"Im a weird shotgun santa"

Garlic?:"Oh damm! CTHULO IS THICC"

Krump:"What kind of interdimensional time traveling toilet is this?"

Carbon:"Wheater it be cultural appropriation or demonic abomination, i don't realy care im just gonna try to hit it with a pee bucket"

Carbon:"THIS IS THE MEDIEVAL RUSSIAN VERSION OF DRIVING INTO BATTLE WITH A TANK BUT SHOOT PEOPLE WITH A BB GUN"

Belize::"I DIDN'T KNOW GRANNY WAS TAKING GRAVEDIGGER TO CHURCH THIS MORNING"

Goombell:"This isn't a bridge its just the worlds weakest motorcycle trebuchet "

Bolivia:"Oh hellow mr berry"

Carbon:"Giant alien space worm 2020, make America worm poop again"

Bolivia:"When did snuffy[barney one] decide to judas me and join the hobbits?[origamis]"

Lewis:"Theres a surprisingly high amount of chickens in this map and a dramatic lack of eggs"

Bolivia:"Im pretty sure we've sent the first claim to the moon"

Maria:"And yet I'm forced to defend myself from stuff like bloodthirsty scp's using nothing but uncooked t-bone stake, I mean technically its doable but it doesn't make It any less ridiculous"

Barbie:"What's the point of a metal detector if literally everyone here has somekind of cybernetic, like I swear to God If I walk trough here aND you guys start pounding the shit out of me just because I got a couple of extra inches of robo-dong IM GONNA BE PISSED"

Bolivia:"Everyone's wearing slick black suits meanwhile I look like somebody skinned a couch from the 70s"

Sushiya:"Is this bacon flavored weed or weed flavored bacon?"

Sean hampton:"Do you think that Darth Vader ever had to deal with a rebel or a henchmen who was into getting chocked? Like starts force checking them and they tell him to go harder?"

Koopley:"I was stabbed to death by a naked man with a spear and my arm is perpetually running"

Koop kotu:"So I'm crazy enough to be locked behind bars but not crazy enough to think I can fly*

Bolivia:"Usually spooders have 8 arms not 8 abs"

Carbon:"I just bludgeoned Jesus to death with a stick of meat, I'm guessing he's gonna be back in a couple of days he's gonna be looking for me so we'll start running now"

Carbon:"Im done with words, shooty goody time"

Maria?:"Id have a better time cutting down bushes then these strange little robo hobits"

Belize:"Dad this is not the time to be dancing with crabs!"

Maria:"Thats my little brother, who has a fully posable deny devito action figure,I've always been jealous of that one"

Bolivia:"The turns are tabbleling"

Maria, talking about barbie:"She's not exactly the brightest tool at the picnic"

Belize:"Are you kidding me mom? Realy?, you were the one that said you're sick of seeing donkey kongs donkey dong"

Maria:"I have no idea what was in that Wonster energy drink that made him go master roshe style"

Bolivia:"I want to file a complaint against Stacy [belize] for T-posing to assert Dominance over me"

Marc:"Believe it or not dangling a padlock the size of a shoebox from a doorknob does as much work as I want to"

Caesar reality:"You can never have too many rotten floor bananas"

Carbon:"Poisoning your boss is probably not the best way to skip work, but ya boy gotta do what he has to do"

Goverman:"I'll take nicknames of my penis for 300$ alex"

Starvinden?:"I guess we'll just leave you in your special sarcophagus mr tutan-deez-nuts"[browser]

Lewis:"I've been skipping work for 2 weeks now and I'm starting to think that my computer isn't even plugged in"

Bolivia, talking to maria:"Your suit smells like a wet fart and your mouth smells like a ashtray"

Bolivia:"If anyone needs me I'll be on the insane asylum, why am I caressing a mannequin on top of a boat?"

Carbon:"Would you like to hang yourself or be crucified? Dealers choice!"

Bolivia talking about carbon:"He's doing something ingenious probably diabolical……..or he's dressed as a panda"

Marc:"We should really pay for security around here not only are people breaking in there is also a giant spine breaking chickens"

Maria to Bolivia:"You are very angry at that stake"

Sushiya, after using its products:"I wonder why was I twerking at the office statue"

IDK"WHY IS THERE A GIANT NAKED MAN IN THE LOCKER CHOCKING ME TO DEATH WITH A CHAIN??!!!"

goombell:"I guess we're gonna leave the cookie monster dildo in the locker"

Sean hampton, to Maria:"My love for you is like diarrhea, sometimes I just can't hold it in"

Bolivia:"You're watching me In a Google video platform playing a game from a Google gaming platform that was translated using Google translate, if this isn't a dystopian future I don't know what is"

Bolivia?:"I couldn't have predicted the run after her like a velociraptor made out of pool noodles"

Lewis:"Jumping Jack neighbor help me!"

Bolivia:"Bread! There's no bread,there's your bread! That's a cookie God dammit"

Belize:"So I can be invited to the worlds saddest birthday party"

Maria:"I guess we're playing ring around the Rosie till I lose his dumb ass"

Carbon:"If you see jehovah's witness you tell them to eat shit"

Bolivia:"HOW CAN YOU AFFORD A GUARD BIRD AND NOT A DOOR STOP?"

Bolivia::"For my shopping list I need to find a floppy disk with a s, but for the distraction I could use a floppy dick with sunglasses and a tie"

Carbon:"I really hoped that your little bird bath had a couple inches of water so I could steal a tiny toaster to throw it in with you"

Belize::"Its pretty safe to say Mr voice bad Benjamin good, but we just saw Benjamin talk with the grim reaper and pull around a cart wich is about the size of a child's body"

Goombell:"She may have a crush on the interdimensional death fox"

Maria:"Its like the herpes of craft supplies"

Barney one:"Everyone wants to split checks for keano Reaves, even if they're a 10ft dragon made out of logos and seizures what is going on right now?"

Sushiya, high, again:"When I dilapidated the banana and poked the mayo's brain then had an indept conversation with the strawberry cocoon did bread get arrested? I didn't see the police come by, that would make sense because the alcoholic cat ran away"

Carbon:"IF THEY HAVE AN ASS TO PULL PUNS OUT OF THEY HAVE TO HAVE A BRAIN TO THINK THEM UP"

Goombell:"I think I graduated for the university of food torture"

Well, this is all, took some time but it's here, hope you enjoyed

Frequent reblogers

<《{[(@boom-fanfic-a-latta )]}》>

<《{[( @gumdorp )]}》>

PLEASE REBLOG!

#funny #mario #paper mario #book of mario #bolivia #mary #barbie the bob omb #1000 infernal air sleeves #quotes #captainsauce #mitten squad #paul #goomb #goverman #goombell #carbon

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angelqueen04 · 3 years

Text

Hamliza Month, Day 26

@megpeggs @historysalt

Farm Offend Summary: Eliza and Liza have a talk after a difficult visitor. Note: A good deal of this is inspired by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie’s version of events in their novel, My Dear Hamilton. I added some of my own thoughts and twists to it, but their version lays at its heart. All credit to them.

Eliza stood at the parlor window, her back straight as a board, her hands clenched in fists at her sides. This set of windows had a good view of the road leading away from the Grange, which provided her with an excellent view of the comings and goings of travelers as they sped by, on their way to Albany or New York, depending on their direction. The view it gave her at this particular moment was even more agreeable, however, as it allowed her to watch the gig[1] carrying James Monroe drive away from the house.

Good riddance, she thought with a measure of grim satisfaction. The Virginian had come here hoping that time had softened her, had made her amenable to accepting some well-turned little speech that he’d obviously planned out in his mind beforehand.[2] Well, he’d now learned otherwise.

“Mama?”

Eliza slowly turned from the window. Standing just inside the parlor door was her dear Liza, with good Mr. Holly and Eliza’s fifteen-year-old nephew, Alexander Malcolm. All three were staring at her, their eyes wide and full of shock, which was more than enough to tell her that they had all heard most, if not all, of her interview with the former President.

Eliza met their gazes head on, refusing to be cowed or chagrined by her behavior. Her words and actions toward Mr. Monroe might not have been within the bounds of societal convention – all right, they most certainly weren’t – but they were only the minimum of what he deserved from her. “Yes, dearest?” she asked her daughter.

Liza didn’t say anything else, clearly startled by her mother’s nonchalant attitude. Mr. Holly also seemed to have been astonished into silence. Young Alexander, however, managed to find his tongue.

“My goodness, Aunt!” he exclaimed, shocked enthusiasm filling his voice, “I did not expect to see or hear anything like this when I came to visit! You dressing down a former President of the United States like he was an errant schoolboy!” He glanced at his cousin and asked, “Does this sort of thing happen often, Cousin Liza? Perhaps I should come ‘round more often!”

Eliza saw her daughter and son-in-law exchange a meaningful look and, for a moment, a wave of sadness splashed over her. She had once had someone to exchange such glances with, but not for a long, long time now. She shook her head and held her chin high. Now was not the time for grief.

Off the look from his wife, Mr. Holly dropped a hand on young Alexander’s shoulder and said, “Come, cousin, let me show you the new fishing rods I purchased. I think you’ll enjoy them.” Without waiting for a response, he guided the boy out of the parlor and out the front door, leaving Eliza alone with her daughter.

Eliza turned from Liza’s gaze, intending to settle herself in a chair near the fireplace. Spring had come, but it was still quite chilly, and a fire was still necessary to keep the house warm. With a sigh, she sank into the seat, and waited for Liza to speak. Her daughter was by nature outspoken, a trait she came by honestly. How could she not be, with two such parents? Liza would have her say, no matter what.

She did not speak immediately, however. Instead, Liza crossed the room and took a seat in the other chair just across from the one Eliza had seated herself in. That chair had been Alexander’s once, Eliza thought wistfully. They’d sometimes sit together here in the parlor, late into the evening after the children had gone to bed, and just enjoy the silence and warmth of one another’s company.

She and Alexander had hoped to have many years to do such things, but that wretch, Burr, had had other plans. And so Eliza, more often than not, was left to sit by the fire in the Grange alone. Only rarely did any of her family or other visitors dare to sit in that chair.

“Was that wise, Mama?” Liza asked her, her tone soft. Her dark eyes, mirrors to Eliza’s own, were steady and thoughtful. “Mr. Monroe might no longer be President, but he likely still has influence. Given the positions some of your sons hold, surely it was ill-advised to offend him like that?”

A snort escaped Eliza before she could stop it. “He’ll do nothing to your brothers, you may rest easy on that score,” Eliza told her. “These Virginians pride themselves on their honor, and your brothers have nothing to do with why that man came here today. And besides,” she added in a colder tone, “he offended me first. Perhaps it is childish, but there it is.”

Liza stared at her. “He came here seeking a rapprochement with you, Mama. Is that so very bad?”

Eliza could feel the fire, the rage, rising in her, but she kept it contained. Liza did not deserve her fury. She shook her head. “He could claim he sought peace all he wanted, but what he really wanted was forgiveness. He wanted me to forgive him for making a mockery of my private pain, for humiliating me before all the world in his efforts to wage war on your father.”

Liza blinked, and confusion was soon writ all over her expression. Eliza sighed. “I suppose I never did tell you everything,” she admitted. Only once had she ever spoken to her daughter of that cursed pamphlet and of Alexander’s infidelity. It had not been a conversation that Eliza had relished, and so had kept it short and to the point. She suspected that her sons had likely told their sister more, but she did not know for certain. Even if they did, they did not know all of it.

“When government officials came to investigate your father for improper speculation, your father revealed the truth of the matter to them – that he was paying off the husband of his mistress.” Liza winced at the harsh phrasing, but didn’t interrupt. Eliza, long used to the tale, kept speaking without pause. “He exhorted them to keep quiet about this, as his private failings had no bearing on his public integrity. To this, they agreed, for they all knew that there was no improper conduct in the course of your father’s duties as President Washington’s Treasury Secretary.” That there was more than enough to say about his improper conduct as a private man went unsaid. “Your father also entrusted the proof of all of this to them, but he requested copies.”

Liza shook her head, a pained expression on her face. “Mama, what does this have to do with President Monroe?”

Eliza gave her a chiding look for her impatience. “Everything, dear. Mr. Monroe was the leader of that little delegation of investigators. It was to him that your father gave the papers – Maria Reynolds’ letters, James Reynolds’ blackmail, the record of the payments, all of it. When your father requested copies, he assumed that Mr. Monroe would make the copies himself, in keeping with his promise to keep the knowledge of it as contained as possible.” She could not help the sneer crossing her face. “But Mr. Monroe decided that this was not worth a hand cramp, and so entrusted the task to a clerk within the House of Representatives. Mr. Monroe later claimed that this clerk made copies for himself as well.” She shook her head. “In any case, Mr. Monroe decided that he would ‘entrust’ the papers to a ‘trusted friend in Virginia’, who would theoretically keep them under lock and key, particularly when Mr. Monroe was out of the country.”

Her daughter was not a fool. She stiffened, catching on very quickly. “President Jefferson.”

Eliza nodded, her fingers gripping the armrest in a vicelike grip. “’Tis like trusting a fox to behave himself in a henhouse. Later, when it proved most advantageous to them, the papers were given to a vile newspaperman, who did not hesitate to print them and use them against your father. Of course, the focus of that odious man’s accusations was, again, in leveling the charge of speculation. Your father’s response was to call upon the three men who had cleared him of that charge, asking them to reiterate that they had been satisfied in their investigation. Two of them agreed without hesitation, but the third…” she trailed off. The memory still hurt, even now.

“Mr. Monroe would not,” Liza finished for her, her voice soft.

“No, he wouldn’t,” Eliza confirmed, the bitterness settling in the back of her throat like bile, burning. “He declared that him getting involved would only cause more chaos than there already was.” She sniffed. “He was already involved, as he was the one who handed the papers off to the very man who saw to their release into the public consciousness. But the fact that he himself had not done so was enough for Mr. Monroe to split hairs and to claim and declare that he was not in any way responsible, and that your father should just leave it be.” Of course, Alexander could not leave anything be. That was not his way. He had to meet every accusation, every attack, head on.

“So Papa wrote that pamphlet.”

“Yes.” One terrible word, one terrible truth. “James Monroe knew your father very well, despite them being political opponents. He knew Alexander would react to preserve his political reputation, for the sake of the country’s existence. If the public believed that the founder of the country’s credit, its wealth and prestige, was corrupt, it would shake apart for good. He knew Alexander would fall on his sword, would admit his private sins for the sake of the public’s greater good – and that’s exactly what he and his friends wanted. Alexander Hamilton would preserve the nation from the crisis they had invoked, but at the cost of all his credibility. He would cease to be a threat to their ambitions.” And that was what had happened. Alexander’s reputation suffered for his confessions, and only once after that did he wield any real semblance of power – when he stood at the head of the army he had begun to build, and that had been ripped away when Mr. Adams made peace with France and declared that the United States needed no army. The fool.

“But in getting what he wanted, Mr. Monroe had sullied his honor,” Eliza continued resentfully. “He knew it. I knew it. And Virginians are very prickly about their honor. He had sworn to not reveal those documents to anyone, which Alexander asked him to do for my sake and that of our family. But he broke that promise, and opened the door for his own allies to attack me, someone he considered an innocent party.” Some of those infernal newspaper headlines still stung.

“That is what he wanted, Liza,” she said. “James Monroe wanted me to clear the mud off his honor. His health is in serious decline. His wife has passed, and he’s not long in following her, I think. He wants to die with his conscience clear, and that I will not give him. I will not forgive the man. Not because he humiliated me, mind you. But because he and his friends, most specifically that reptile now mouldering in his grave at Monticello, set out to destroy your father, a man they viewed as unworthy of anything he touched because he was not like them, not born here, not born to inherit some Godforsaken speck of land. Your father earned all he gained, and that they could not abide.”

Liza leaned back in the chair. “And I thought all men were created equal here,” she murmured.

Eliza snorted again. She seemed to be doing that quite often these days. Her mother would be appalled. “Oh no,” she said, “They talk prettily, but in the minds of many people, there is still a hierarchy, where people ought to ‘know their place.’” She paused, her eyes turning from Eliza to the fire. She stared into the flames, could feel its heat seeping under her dress to her feet. “Your papa was a good man, if a very flawed one. He believed in the promise that this country holds, and in those very words that Mr. Jefferson put to paper. Whatever his shortcomings, of which he would have been the first to admit that he had many, he did not deserve the slander they threw upon him.” She looked up again. “So no, I will most emphatically not pat James Monroe on the head and tell him all is well and forgiven. Not when he showed himself as having no remorse for his actions.

“Perhaps that makes me self-righteous,” Eliza admitted. “Perhaps the good Lord will frown upon my unkindness. But I am no saint, no angel. There are limits to what I can give, my dear, and we just found what those limits are. Justice shall be done to the memory of my dear Hamilton, and that justice will not come in coddling the men who sought to erase every trace of him.”[3]

Liza nodded, and they both fell into silence. They sat together for some time, until Mr. Holly and young Alexander finally returned.

#my fanfiction #hamliza month #hamliza #elizabeth schuyler hamilton #eliza hamilton holly

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eirian-houpe · 3 years

Text

Modern Wonders - Chapter 2

Fandom: Once Upon a Time (TV), Alice (TV 2009)

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Relationships: Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold

Characters: Belle (Once Upon a Time), Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold, Mad Hatter | Jefferson, Jiminy Cricket | Archie Hopper, Evil Queen | Regina Mills, Snow White | Mary Margaret Blanchard, Prince Charming | David Nolan, Red Riding Hood | Ruby, Grumpy | Leroy, Hatter (Alice TV 2009), Dodo (Alice TV 2009), Queen of Hearts (Alice TV 2009), Carpenter (Alice TV 2009), Mad March (Alice TV 2009), The White Rabbit | Agent White (Alice TV 2009), Doormouse (Alice TV 2009), Widow Lucas | Granny, Captain Hook | Killian Jones, Henry Mills (Once Upon a Time)

Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - In Storybrooke | Cursed (Once Upon a Time), Wonderland, Drug Use, Recreational Drug Use, Pining, UST, Violence, Psychological Torture, Torture, Exploitation, Revenge, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, Reconciliation

Summary: Revenge, they say, is a dish best served cold, and when Regina casts Rumple's Dark Curse, just a few words here and there creates Storybrooke in a very different place, with a very different atmosphere, and very different issues to deal with. Alliances and enmity permeate the lives of the citizens of Storybrooke, (and beyond), as they tiptoe around the various dangers they face every day. Who is awake? How can they break the curse within a curse? And what of the power struggles rife both within, and outside of Storybrooke itself.

Read previous chapters on AO3

Chapter 2 - Storybrooke

The gold handled cane did him little good in the surroundings outside, the broken terrain, but within the confines of the shanty town that was Storybrooke Gold’s stride was long, and confident, more like a lord measuring out his demesne than a poor crippled pawn broker living on the deals and heartbreak of others. He smiled wickedly to himself to think of the impression he gave to others, and the thrall he kept them under in spite of appearances.

Oh, if only they knew.

Storybrooke was not as ‘dead’ as they thought - or rather, as Regina thought - because Storybrooke was a tiny little bubble within the larger cesspit that was Wonderland, and he had the advantage. He had been here before… with Jefferson - and he frowned.

Since their arrival he couldn’t remember having seen Jefferson, not even lurking in the mansion that Regina had meant as his prison… his torment, to be shut away from his Grace. He made a mental note to pay the man a visit, determined to unlock the conundrum. Of course no one else cared. No one else was awake… and he wasn’t meant to be, he was sure of it - another conundrum for him to unravel.

“Um… Mi— Mister Gold, I ah… that is…”

Gold halted on the paved sidewalk, and turned his head to watch as Archie Hopper, umbrella in hand - in preparation for what rain, Gold wondered - cross the deserted street toward him.

“Doctor Hopper,” he greeted the man with false cheer. “A pleasure, but out with it, man, I haven’t got all day.”

“Oh, I… um…” Hopper pushed his glasses up along his nose, back into place, “I wondered if you’d had a chance to consider my… ah… proposition?”

“Ah, yes,” Gold purred. “Walk with me, won’t you?”

Gold turned without waiting for the good doctor’s agreement or otherwise, and set a slower pace toward Granny’s diner. With the library still closed, it was the one place left open for informal, communal gatherings. Of all of Storybrooke’s other, cursed, inhabitants, the proprietor was someone for whom he had a good deal of respect. Tough as nails, no nonsense, Widow Lucas was as upstanding a pillar of the community that Storybrooke possessed.

All the rest were crumbling; as crumbling as the buildings and the streets of Storybrooke itself. Gold wondered if anyone else had noticed.

It was subtle. The odd crack in a sidewalk here, the tendril of a vine there, a wall, beginning to crumble and weeds reclaiming a spot or two in the well manicured gardens. Subtle, but unmistakable. Wonderland was reclaiming its own.

“I’ve give it a good deal of thought, as a matter of fact,” Gold told Hopper before he allowed his observations to run away with him. “And while, obviously, as an upstanding member of our town council, I can’t condone what you’re suggesting…” he left a long pause as they reached the diner’s doorstep, whereupon, lowering his voice to a dangerous growl, he blocked Doctor Hoppers path with his arm, stretched across the doorway, and said, “I think it might be just what some people in this town need.”

Whale growled softly and turned away from the window. It wasn’t the paint, peeling, that was the cause of his frustration, but the fact that he couldn’t reconcile the feeling that was flowing through him, and the sky outside of the hospital. It was almost cloudless.

He was, he tried to tell Sheriff Humbert when the man called in to find out about his latest patient who had been found wandering - raving by all accounts - about some kind of ‘door,’ a doctor and not an investigator. The sheriff however, refused to help him get to the truth about his patient’s ramblings.

“This isn’t Narnia,” he said in a somewhat poor display of bedside manner, “there are no doors to other, magical kingdoms. No witches, no wizards, no—”

“Yeah?” the citizen interrupted. “How do you explain this then?” Whereupon he pulled back the sleeve of his jacket to reveal the strange, abstract shape standing out raw and painful looking on his arm.

“A uh… tattoo?” Doctor Whale suggested in an overly patient tone. “And a somewhat fresh one from what I can tell.”

“Uh-huh,” the patient argued, “And you get em just like that,” he snapped his fingers somewhat inexpertly, “do ya?” He jerked his head toward the window. “When the sun shines on ya?”

“Sheriff Humbert, please,” Whale turned his attention to the man hovering uncomfortably in the doorway, looking as guilty as sin and extremely distracted. “You see? You can at least tell me where you picked this man up, and if there were, indeed, a door there?”

“I’m sorry, Doctor, but… there’s nothing I can tell you,” Humbert answered. “I’d like to tell you I saw a door, but the truth is, I was far too worried about your patient here to pay too much attention. His safety was my priority.” He took a breath and added far too hurriedly in Whale’s opinion, “Anyway, I just called round to see how he was getting along. Can’t stay though,” he said. “I’ve a council meeting, that I have to get to in,” he glanced at his watch, “ten minutes. And the mayor doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

Then he left, and Whale remained, alone and without explanation standing beside the hospital window staring at the wrongly colored sky.

Gold sighed softly as the bell over the shop door tinkled to announce an unwanted caller. He wasn’t sure why he expected that simply displaying a ‘closed’ sign would discourage random visitors, and mused to himself that perhaps locking the door might be a more effective deterrent.

Taking his time, he picked up the cloth from the workbench and carefully began wiping his fingers clean of the gear oil which he had been using on the innards of a delicate clock, even as he made his way out of the back room, and into the shop, limping as he went.

“Madam Mayor,” he said as he set eyes on Regina standing practically tapping her foot with annoyance at having to wait. He kept his tone light, appreciative, as if to imply he respected that someone so important was going out of their way to be in his presence. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Cut the crap, Gold,” Regina snapped, by way of a return to his greeting. “What did you do!”

So she has noticed.

“I’m… sorry,” he said slowly, “I don’t follow.”

“It’s a simple question,” she growled. “What. Did. You. Do? Everything’s coming unraveled.”

“Unraveled?” he echoed, deciding that he would continue to feign ignorance for as long as he were able; see what he could find out - what she would let slip. “I’m afraid I haven’t done anything, and I really don’t know what you’re talking about.” He put the slightest hint of pique into his voice at the end of his assertion, to make it convincing, then for good measure, added, “If it’s something woven, or a knitted blanket, I’d be happy to take a look at it. It wouldn’t be the first time that—”

Regina’s hand slammed down onto the top of one of the glass cased, rattling the contents within as she snarled, “Drop it, Gold. I know you’re awake. Not that you’re supposed to be. Jefferson was the only one I—”

So, my old friend is in Wonderland too. He’s not going to be happy with that.

“Awake?” Gold interrupted, then with a confused laugh in his voice he added, “Regina, you’re not making any sense. Of course I’m awake. I’m standing here, talking to you - was just fixing a clock out back, so unless I fell asleep while I was working and this is all a dream—”

He made a mental note to take another walk around Storybrooke some time very soon, to check on Grace, and hoped with all his heart that she was safe; almost that she wasn’t here - that whatever had diverted the curse to Wonderland had spared her.

Regina growled, cutting off his words, and his train of thought. He raised an eyebrow, undecided whether to reveal himself in that moment, or to play the game a little longer. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“The borders are failing,” she said harshly. “This wretched realm is encroaching on my town. So if you had anything to do with that, Gold, so help me…”

It was the threat that broke his resolve to pretend he was not awake. No one, least of all Regina threatened Gold on his own turf, and the shop was his turf in more ways than one.

“Well, well, well…” his voice was more of a low rumble in his chest, and he took his cane in hand and walked toward, and then around Regina until he was barely behind her, and purred in her ear, “…Dearie…” Even so, confessing he was awake was one thing, revealing he had magic, that was quite something else. “Things not going quite how you planned?”

“I know you have something to do with this,” she accused.

He circled around the rest of the way to come and lean against one of the display cases, looking far more casual than he felt as he looked her up and down, before he said, “Now, what makes you think,” he pointed at her, “that even if I had the power to - what was it you said - ‘unravel’ this little town of yours, that I’d even waste my time trying.” As he spoke of himself, he jabbed his thumb against his own chest, the grandeur of the gesture far more reminiscent of his Enchanted Forest form than the upright, uptight Mister Gold of Storybrooke.

“What you should be asking, dearie,” he rumbled, “is who would have the kind of magic necessary to mess with my Dark Curse?”

#rumbelle #au.#cursed storybrooke #wonderland #drug use #recreational drug use #pining #ust #psychological torture #violence #torture #exploitation #revenge #eventual romance #eventual smut #reconciliation #Modern Wonders #i will always write jefferson

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astralaffairs · 4 years

Text

voltaire to versace 03 | thomas jefferson TEASER

title: voltaire to versace 03 TEASER

pairing: professor!thomas jefferson x reader

words: a lil over 10k

warnings: sex jokes n references again, dolley simping for james again, but probably more this time, implied sex except dolley’s having it instead of mc, maria and angelica are girlfriends, lafayette is basically everyone’s plug for weed so like,, drug references and alcohol references??

desc: from francis bacon to foucault, descartes to dante, your political philosophy seminar doesn’t promise to be a blowout — and yet, one mysterious stranger and a risqué evening later, your burberry-clad professor gives you the feeling it won’t be quite the snoozefest you’d expected.

tags: @lunariasilver @tinywhim @nyxie75 @wreakhavoconmacroissantdiggs @checkurwindow @katierpblogg @cubedtriangle @lunariasilver @lexylovesfandoms @fanfic-addict-98 @stephyra17 @notebookgirl30 @exorcisms-with-elmo @kmsmedine @itshaileyn @honeyand-roses — let me know if you’d like to be tagged in future parts!

"Are you sure I was included in that invite?" Y/N's voice was skeptical as she crossed the green toward Thomas's office. Apparently, Dolley and James had spent their afternoon together, taking a walk through the city. (When Dolley told Y/N that the two-mile loop near the Lincoln Memorial had taken them two hours to walk through, she had a sneaking suspicion walking wasn't all they were doing. Hopefully, they'd at least escaped the watchful eye of our oversized 16th president.)

"Yes, I'm certain you were," Dolley insisted from the other end of the phone's line. "He said it'd be great if I brought you."

"... This sounds suspiciously like a pity invite."

"It isn't a pity invite!" Y/N could hear the indignance in her voice.

"Dolley, why, exactly, would he want me there if it wasn't a pity invite?"

"... Because you're my best friend, and he's decided to make an effort to get to know you better?"

She laughed. "As much as I appreciate this idealized James Madison, I have a feeling it was more to the effect of 'I just saw your roommate and feel obligated to invite her'," Y/N corrected her. "But go to the party without me! Don't let me hold you back from having your fun, alright?"

"Please come? It wouldn't be the same without you." Dolley's voice was high, containing traces of what almost smelled like desperation. "It'll make me much more comfortable to have you along."

Y/N groaned. "So when you and James go make out in the bathroom, I'm supposed to, what, play truth or dare with all the other PhD candidates?"

"Why not?" Dolley's tone was mild, which made Y/N roll her eyes.

"No offense to James's friends, but I'm not sure I want to spend an evening making stunted small talk with them."

"You're such a warm person, though! You'd be quite alright."

"It'd be awkward!"

"Please, Y/N? I'll beg you if that's what it'll take."

She scowled at how soft, forlorn Dolley's voice had become. As far as she was concerned, this was akin to emotional manipulation. "Does it really mean that much to you?"

"Yes. I like him so much."

She sighed. "I'm gonna say yes solely because I have somewhere to be and can't deal with this argument anymore. But you owe me."

Y/N could almost picture Dolley’s sappy smile. “Thank you so much, dear. You’re too good to me.”

"Yeah, yeah, what else is new?" Her words elicited a laugh from Dolley, and Y/N continued, “But you know I’d do pretty much whatever you asked if you asked it in that I’m-about-to-cry voice, so I’m not sure this relationship is healthy for me anymore.”

“Oh, of course; I’m truly a parasite,” Dolley sighed. “Taking you in as my roommate, paying for your ramen — how evil of me.”

“I pay half the rent, and ramen costs fifty cents!” Y/N defended, but the words were lighthearted nonetheless. “Next time you give up five perfectly good hours of a Friday night so that I can get laid, we’ll call it even.”

“Don’t make any calls about Friday just yet. You haven’t even seen James’s friends.” Dolley’s voice was just teasing enough to placate Y/N. “I may not be the only one having some fun.”

“Have you even seen James’s friends?” Y/N asked dubiously, and Dolley’s silence told her all there was to know. “That’s what I thought. He’s an econ student, so it’s probably gonna be about eighty percent entitled rich men attending school on family money.”

“Or they could all be just your type,” Dolley reasoned, but by then, any efforts to talk Y/N out of her convictions were futile. “Tall, hot, and older.”

“First off, I don’t have a type, and second, just because you’re dating an ‘older man’,” — The final two words were said mockingly — “doesn’t mean that his older friends aren’t still douches.”

“I hate to have to be the one to break it to you, but that is absolutely your type.”

“Based on what?”

“That professor of yours?”

“Dolley!” Y/N scowled, turning down the volume on her call just in case some passing pedestrians were notorious gossips with super-hearing. It was certainly possible. “Can you please stop talking about him like that? Don’t make it a thing,” she murmured, jaw tense.

“Oh, we’re well past that, dear,” Dolley said matter-of-factly, and Y/N could only roll her eyes. “But if you’ve agreed to the party, I won’t push my luck.”

“Smart choice,” she muttered bitterly. “Anyway, I’ve gotta go. Talk to you later tonight?”

“Of course.”

With that, she hung up the phone before Dolley could take advantage of her giving mood and start making further outlandish demands, tucking it into her coat pocket as she pushed open the door to Melos Hall. Unfortunately for her, the elevator was broken, and Thomas's office was several flights of stairs above her.

After at least eight long pauses for her to catch her breath, heaving as she leaned against the railing in the stairwell, and three stomach cramps, Y/N knocked on his door. "Anybody home?"

"C'mon in." His voice was soft, muffled through the door, and she opened it to find him all but slumped on his desk, resting his head on his hand as he graded papers he appeared to be rather cross with, and with more of said papers covering the entirety of the desk’s surface (and much of the floor). He glanced up when she entered, and a soft grin split his expression. "Hey, I thought that was you."

"I'm in absolute awe of your pattern-recognition skills, really," she replied, tone dry as she let the door fall shut behind her, and despite the playful smile she wore, Thomas rolled his eyes.

"You actually here for anything, or am I gonna have to kick you out?"

She laughed. "I'm not here to derail your work, I swear." He raised a dubious eyebrow. "I was just stopping by to let you know that, assuming it's still on the table, I'd love the TA position."

"Oh, yeah?" His smile widened almost imperceptibly at her words, his eyes crinkling at the corners. "'M glad to hear it. Could've just shot me an email, though."

She shrugged. "I was headed this way anyway. Figured I may as well stop by."

"I'm not complainin'." She let out a soft huff of laughter at the words, but she could feel heat beginning to creep up the back of her neck. "'S good timing, anyway. Intro to IR just turned in an essay on Kant."

The soft groan she let out only served to amuse him further as she surveyed the wreckage of his office. "That's what all this paper is?" He nodded in confirmation, and she scrunched up her nose. "I'm not sure if I feel worse for the freshmen who had to write them or for you having to read them."

"Well, I should hope it's the freshmen," he said matter-of-factly, sitting back in his chair. The smile he wore was concerningly self-righteous. "'Cause, now, readin' these is your job, too."

Her eyebrows shot up; the dread in her gaze was the furthest thing from contrived. "... Is it too late to rescind my application as a TA?"

He shook his head. "Mm-mm. You're welcome to abandon ship."

She didn't like the satisfaction which grew in his gaze as she weighed her options; they both knew she wasn't considering turning down the position in earnest — that simple fact left Thomas unnecessarily smug. Another beat passed, and she sighed. "You're lucky this is going to look good on my grad school applications."

He laughed. "Sure am. I could use all the help I can get, right now."

"I can see that," she replied, voice laden with amusement at the state of his office.

However, Thomas said nothing more, and she shifted on her feet, uncomfortable with the drawn-out silence. He raised an expectant eyebrow, and it took her a moment to grasp his intention. "Wait... d'you mean, like, right now?"

"Unless you're busy." He shrugged. His gaze was hopeful as she eyed warily the small stack of papers she'd spent the past few minutes trying not to crush under her boot. She sighed.

He grinned when she bent over to pick up the papers that'd floated to her side of the desk. "As depressing as it feels to say, I've got nowhere else to be on this fine Friday night."

"That's the spirit." He winked, and though she rolled her eyes, her amused smile was deep-set. "So, you're gradin' for accuracy and watchin' out for grammar, of course, but the points are really earned for analysis. The paper's on changes in the international system. They’ve gotta connect ‘em back to Kant's maxims."

She let out a low whistle as she took a seat across from him, plucking a red pen from his cup and dropping her bag onto the floor. "That certainly sounds pretentious."

He laughed lightly. "You really tellin' me you didn't have to do anything like this as a freshman?"

"Oh, I wish I could say that, but unfortunately, my professor was apparently every bit the pseudointellectual you are.” She nodded sadly, and Thomas rolled his eyes.

"Hilarious, sweetheart, really." In the dry sarcasm of his tone, the casual pet name didn't seem to register with him, but Y/N couldn't help but notice, and her breath caught. "Here, lemme get you a copy of the rubric. 'S nothin' too complicated; go easy on 'em. Got some STEM majors in the class who're just takin' it for the graduation requirement, so I'm not expectin' much."

She pursed her lips. "Are the essays that bad?"

He deadpanned as he turned back to her, sliding the rubric across the desk. "At least as bad as I'm makin' 'em sound."

Y/N let out a long, dramatic huff, rubbing her temples, and Thomas looked thoroughly entertained at her reaction.

"I'm in for a long few months, aren't I?"

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aion-rsa · 3 years

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The Sopranos’ Best End Credit Songs

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There are so many legendary aspects of The Sopranos that it’s hard to pick just one. Between masterful storytelling, deep character development, and uncanny acting, everything comes together to create a show that has been enjoyed for over two decades now. The most artistic aspect of the package, however, may just be the use of music, specifically the unique songs curated personally by creator David Chase that run during each episode’s end credits.

Ranging from oldies, foreign ballads, jazz compositions, and pure instrumentals, the variety is stunning and can keep you exploring the track list of the series for days. We’ve decided to narrow all of the end credit songs down to the best 15 in the series, listed in chronological order of airing. Enjoy!

Season 1 Episode 4: Meadowlands

“Look on Down from the Bridge” by Mazzy Star

The nice father-son moment between Tony and A.J. at the closing of this episode is accompanied by this beautiful track from Mazzy Star. A.J. sees his dad in a whole new light after Meadow tells him that he’s in the mafia, but a simple smile and wink from Tony reassures the youngest Soprano child that he certainly will still “look on down from the bridge” and see his family as the only priority in his life, no matter what criminal occupation he tries to hide on a daily basis.

Season 1 Episode 7: Down Neck

“White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane

This one follows the pattern of the show choosing to play a song earlier in an episode and then again during the final scene and credits. The Jefferson Airplane hit refers to drug use and being intoxicated, therefore changing as a person in the process. The song plays when Tony is taking prozac mid-episode and during the final scene in which Tony and A.J share an ice cream sundae and some whip cream together. No matter how much the therapy and the meds try to alter Tony’s life, he’ll remain the same man: a depressed mobster and a father who softens for his children.

Season 2 Episode 10: Bust Out

“Wheel in the Sky” by Journey

If you haven’t noticed by the time you’re done watching the show, The Sopranos loves to point out how trapped all of the characters are in the lifestyles they have either chosen or been forced into. Tony has betrayal surrounding him at every corner at the end of the second season: Richie and Janice plotting his removal, Carmela falling for a painter who is working in the family home, and Pussy’s FBI informancy reaching a climax. Still, the “wheel in the sky keeps on turning”. Tony finishes the episode having some fun with A.J. on the Stugotz, and he doesn’t “know where he’ll be tomorrow” but he’ll enjoy the time he has in the present.

Season 2 Episode 12: The Knight in White Satin Armor

“I Saved the World Today” by the Eurythmics

Tony returns home after disposing of Richie Aprile’s body because Janice shot him to death over a domestic dispute. After informing Carmela of the night’s bloody events, she quickly moves on to the list of chores and homemaker responsibilities she is going to lay at Tony’s feet for the next week while she goes on vacation with Ro Aprile. This apt song from the Eurythmics exemplifies everything Tony has to be in the lives of friends and family around him: always there to save the world for them.

Season 3 Episode 4: Employee of the Month

“Fisherman’s Daughter” by Daniel Lanois

This Dr. Melfi-centric episode is one of the most deservedly acclaimed hours in the drama’s history. When the final scene gives her a chance to let Tony loose on the monster who assaulted her, she powerfully takes the moral route and declines his services. The camera pans to black solemnly with this haunting instrumental track by Daniel Lanois, a perfect backdrop to allow the audience to ponder everything that just happened and why Melfi was able to maintain strength that so many others wouldn’t have mustered. Anything with singing would have detracted from the environment the writers were trying to create, so this is a great song choice.

Season 3 Episode 12: Amour Fou

“Affection” by Little Steven and the Lost Boys

The penultimate episode of the third season features the climax of the relationship between Tony and Gloria, in which the crazy affection that they have for one another boils over into violence. Yet another of the brilliant musical choices this show made was to use the same song twice: once earlier in an episode, and then again in the final scene and credits. This tune, sung by Silvio Dante (Steven Van Zandt) himself, plays with Tony and Gloria spending time together mid-episode and then again at the end credits.

Season 4 Episode 4: The Weight

“Vesuvio” by Spaccanapoli

Another example of double dipping on the same song in one episode. The above scene between Carmela and Furio dancing and falling in love right underneath Tony’s nose uses this romantic Italian track by Spaccanapoli, and then uses it again in the final seconds when Carmela is daydreaming about Furio while having sex with Tony. So sensual and heavy, the audience knows that Carmela is going down a path she can’t see through to the end, but the music signifies the passion that she will inevitably entangle herself in for the time being.

Season 4 Episode 7: Watching Too Much Television

“Oh Girl” by The Chi-Lites

When an assemblyman starts an affair with Tony’s ex-lover, Irina, there is quite a bit of jealousy and ownership that exudes from the mob boss. This classic from the Chi-Lites plays in the car on the way over to the assemblyman’s house as Tony drives over to confront him about “taking” his mistress from him. It is a song which causes deep reflection and nostalgia for a lost love, and prompts Tony to get emotional listening to it. Wonderful acting by Gandolfini and superb use of in-world music that plays over to the credits, something the show got down to an art and a science simultaneously.

Season 5 Episode 10: Cold Cuts

“I’m Not Like Everybody Else” by The Kinks

No, Tony Soprano is certainly not like anybody else. He insists that Janice see anger management counselors at the beginning of this episode, and when she actually improves her mood because of it, his narcissism makes him antagonize her until a typical Soprano family fight breaks out at dinner. Tony walks out of the house with a despicable smile on his face to the tune of this intense rock anthem.

Season 5 Episode 11: The Test Dream

“Three Times a Lady” by The Commodores

In an episode in which Tony spends 20 minutes literally dreaming about past and future problems in his life, culminating in the murder of Billy Leotardo by Anthony Blundetto, The Commodores soft romance hit plays us out. Tony calls Carmela to report about said dreams, part of which were repeat ones that have happened previously in Tony’s life. It’s nice for the audience to see these two having a tender exchange rather than the tense arguing that normally characterizes their marriage, especially because this was when the two were still separated previously throughout the fifth season.

Season 6 Episode 4: The Fleshy Part of the Thigh

“One of These Days” by Pink Floyd

Paulie Walnuts is a fan favorite for a myriad of reasons. Between his gray-haired wings and his immature one-liners, many forget that the mobster had one of the scarier violent streaks in the show. After discovering that his mother was actually his aunt, Paulie gets jealous of Jason Barone’s mother trying to protect him from the mafia after selling the sanitation business that serves as a front for the DiMeo crime family. This psychedelic, hard-rock snippet from Pink Floyd that blares in the credits after Paulie threatens Jason’s life at the end of episode is a strong reminder to the viewer that this is a character who borders on sociopathic most of the time.

Season 6 Episode 12: Kaisha

“Moonlight Mile” by The Rolling Stones

Unlike other iconic dramas, The Sopranos loved ending their season finales (and “Kaisha” is technically a season finale with season 6 split into two parts) with relative closure and absolutely no cliffhangers. The family has an enormous Christmas gathering at the Soprano residence, marked by A.J. bringing over an older girlfriend and Meadow’s rare absence from family time. This classic from The Rolling Stones that describes the feeling of trying to get back home off the road fits lovingly with the rare moment of calm before the storm that is the final season of the show.

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Season 6 Episode 14: Stage 5

“Evidently Chickentown” by John Cooper Clarke

This closing piece by John Cooper Clarke is actually considered a poetry performance, and the anger and fury that it inspires as Phil Leotardo laments being taken advantage of a few too many times is palpable. This is when we knew that war in New York was going to be bloody. The song also symbolizes the perpetual frustration both Christopher and Tony have with one another when they hug at the former’s baby’s baptism. The final season was certainly kicked up a couple notches as these final credits rolled.

Season 6 Episode 17: Walk Like a Man

“The Valley” by Los Lobos

This somber piece plays alongside Christopher picking up a tiny tree in his front yard after Paulie had attempted to destroy everything on his property as revenge for a violent incident. After Christopher thinks they’ve made up, Paulie and the gang start making fun of his infant daughter and laughing in his face. It is at this point that Chris understands he is forever an outsider, not loved by a single person on the planet. He will just trudge along and try to keep upright, which are themes displayed in this chilling and melancholy song of choice.

Season 6 Episode 21: Made in America

“Don’t Stop Believin’” by Journey

The most famous song in the show is also the final one that plays right before the screen goes to black and Tony Soprano’s fate is left up to our own imagination (kind of). It’s technically not an end credits song, but there’s no way it can be excluded from this list. The song represents the nostalgia of sharing one final family meal together, the simplicities of the Soprano family when you strip away the mobster lifestyle and the murder, and it encourages the audience to never stop believing their favorite mob boss is still alive if that’s what they so choose to desire. A special ending to a legendary show!

The post The Sopranos’ Best End Credit Songs appeared first on Den of Geek.

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linkfms · 3 years

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☠️ * what is up, party people ! i’m jojo ( she/her ), 23, and in the pst timezone. it’s been a while since i’ve been in a group so... pls bear with me. anyway, under the cut you’ll find more info on resident emo boy: link ! i’m so excited to write with u all, and, if u ever want to plot give this a lil’ like or send an im over @ yea right#4256 !

lincoln “link” seong was spotted in the fashion district adorning prada combat boots, with some airpod pros on. they’re most likely listening to when you were young by the killers. you may know them as @hyperlink or as that jeon jungkook lookalike. their twenty - fourth birthday just passed. while living in tribeca, they’ve gained a bit of a reputation. they’re known to be erratic but on the other hand vehement. wonder if they’ll be the next person to hit the headlines. ( cis male & he/him )

↳ THE BASICS: STATISTICS.

full name: seong hyunjae ( 성 현재 ) / lincoln seong.

nickname: link, and will probably only answer to link !

age & date of birth: 24 & november 21, 1996.

hometown: born in busan, south korea, but moved to jefferson, connecticut in 2006.

current location: tribeca, new york.

education: completed high school and attempted first semester of university, but decided to pursue music instead.

occupation: drummer for indie/alternative rock band, my time ( sound is similar to bands like the killers, the 1975, and paramore ). also is an affiliate with an esports organization ! doesn’t play competitively, but streams and creates content for them weekly.

sexual orientation: pansexual & panromantic.

gender & pronouns: cisgender male & he/him pronouns.

↳ THE BACKGROUND: BIOGRAPHY. ( tw: mentions of alcoholism & abuse )

seong hyunjae ( later given the english name lincoln seong... thanks linkin park ! ) was born in the heart of busan, south korea. his parents married at the age of 21, due to the cultural expectations of having a child born out of wedlock. while things seemed to be smooth sailing for a while, the couple realized the real struggles of adulthood. financial issues came into play. stress from working multiple jobs every single day took a toll on their mental health, as well as their relationship with each other. link’s mother began to develop an alcohol addiction, and her abusive behavior came following after. their home was falling apart, with four-year-old link falling asleep to muffled screaming and glass being thrown on the next room over. his father was able to withstand it for a while, but he drew the line after coming home from work to see large cuts on the side of his son’s thigh, and a bruise forming across his cheek. that was when he knew his wife was dangerous. so, one night when lincoln’s mother as at work, he packed his belongings, grabbed link, and left without looking back.

for a while, it was just the two of them. they found ways to make it work, and despite the fact that it was a constant struggle, his father never wanted link to lose his childhood. in fact, his father gave him everything he could give — but most importantly, as cheesy as it sounds, his unconditional love and support. as someone who lost his own parents young, he made sure that link would never feel like he’s being deprived of that, ever. they created this tight-knight bond because of that, which can’t ever be broken. and now, link’s fondest memories always involved spending time with his father. one favorite memory of his involved morning jam sessions after breakfast. link’s father was previously a lead guitarist in a garage band with a few of his high school friends, so while he was playing riffs on his electric guitar, eight-year-old link would be banging the coffee table with plastic straws.

when link was about ten, he and his father sold all of their belongings and moved all the way to jefferson, connecticut for a job offer that he couldn’t refuse. fast forward a few years, and he’s a teenager in high school. growing up link was more of an introvert, and would spend his time in the computer lab playing video games or browsing in online forums. he was a regular in this my chemical romance forum ( under the username @hyperlink ), and made a lot of his lifelong friends over there. one of his online friends jokingly suggested one afternoon that they should start a band over their nightly skype call, and while it was initially shrugged off as dream more than an arm’s reach away, my time was born. link had to endlessly plead his father to buy him a secondhand drum kit off of craigslist for christmas. but once he found it under their tree that year, it sparked this drive in him to learn and practice nonstop.

their first official band practice happened a day after link’s high school graduation ( which was also the first time everyone saw each other in person ! ), and they spent that entire summer making music. at first, link only thought of it as a hobby... since, he was attending his first year of university that fall. but after playing their first few shows and making all these memories, he couldn’t keep the band in the backburner. he dropped out not too long after to pursue his music career full-time. moved out, spent the next few months working long shifts at the local amusement park, and shared one two-bedroom apartment with his bandmates. one of their songs went viral one crazy night, and the next thing they knew, they were being signed into a record label. now ? they’re one of the biggest alternative/indie rock bands out there with multiple platinum records, sold out world tours, and millions of streams each year. their time finally came.

↳ THE INSIDE LOOK: PERSONALITY.

link definitely... gets babied a lot ( by his bandmates and his fans ), and he uses that to his advantage :] because of that he gets away with a lot of things, but it’s usually with things that are small like eating the last slice of pizza and it would be justified with “ no he is a growing BOY he NEEDS it ! ”

that being said, he eats nonstop. the guy carries a sandwich bag full of cheerios wherever he goes. his friends know that if they can’t finish eating something, they can always donate it to link for a good cause.

when my chemical romance announced their reunion tour in 2019, he threw his phone across the room and cried. my chemical romance ( with green day and linkin park as a close second ! ) are his all-time favorite bands, and a lot of my time’s sound is heavily inspired by them.

when i tell u that this man is so chill, i mean it. like things could LITERALLY be on fire and he’d be like “ just throw some water on it it’ll be fine 😎 ” ... he’s not the type to worry about things, and is more of a go with the flow type of person. he doesn’t even need to be zooted to be like this. KJFGDG

being in the band and a part of the entertainment industry caused a small shift in his personality. maybe he just blossomed ? who knows ! but because he’s been exposed to the rockstar life, he was able to open up more. he’s always seeking thrills, big or small, and won’t have the time to think about the consequences for his actions.

because the my chemical romance forum that was once his second home shut down, he’s since moved on to reddit. social media isn’t really his thing ( and his fans always get mad at him for posting a selfie once a month then dipping ), but catch him on subreddits making comments or starting fights for the sheer entertainment of proving someone wrong.

this might sound bad but... he still can’t wrap his head around the fact that he isn’t ? financially struggling anymore ? even if he’s already bought a house and two luxury cars for his dad, he still gets ticked off if he sees something small like an APPLE that is marked a dollar and a few cents over the usual. he catches himself using things until they’re ABSOLUTELY worn out, and still leeches off of his bandmates/friends when he can. <3 also, if something is broken, he’ll be the type to figure it out and fix it himself.

people... don’t exactly remember the last time he’s slept. it could be the insomnia ( it’s definitely insomnia, thx childhood trauma ! ) but it’s almost gotten to the point where he’s afraid to fall asleep on his own. he’ll always try to find ways to sleep in someone’s company, even if it’s just him crashing on a couch while someone is watching tv right there. if he’s alone though, he’ll always try to find ways to distract himself like stream for 10 hours straight.

speaking of trauma... he’s also scared of relationships. after witnessing the way his mother treated his father, he’s cautious of history repeating itself... but with him. so whenever he catches himself even falling for just a little, he dips.

his life revolves around the 4 m’s: marvel movies, minecraft, music, and my chemical romance. that’s it.

a link 😏 to his pinterest ! also, i don’t have any wcs, but if we plot, i promise i’ll use my big brain to brainstorm something with u. <3

#wealthyhq:intro #the way i spent too much time writing this.................

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janetbrown711 · 4 years

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“I ask myself what did I do to get as far as I’ve gotten…”

Evelyn Covey had practically planned out her life for the next couple of years. Sure, she was just in seventh grade, but that meant she was close to highschool, which is close to college, which is close to the rest of her life, and soon enough she’ll be dead. Planning everything out in her life hadn’t been her first idea, but her mom and dad insisted she and Eric plan things out. After all, they were heirs to a pretty large fortune, they had to be careful what they did.

Basically, Evelyn planned to be head of the yearbook committee in middle school so she’d easily climb up the ladder in high school to be head by, at the earliest, sophomore year, then become head of the student council by at least junior year. Senior year would be more reasonable but, as her mother put it, “my children are exceptional, not reasonable”. She would also be head of the dance team and become a master of point ballet so she’d be several years ahead of her class by the time she gets into Julliard and before she knows it she’s Prima Ballerina just like her mother. Also, at some point soon she was supposed to start dating, but only rich boys that were approved of by her mother.

Along the way, she was supposed to make friends with powerful people’s children and use them to her advantage. For the most part, Evelyn was good at that, with a few exceptions (Odette Jefferson, for one). Evelyn had a pretty tight squad and was pretty well-liked, and she was even cool with Eric and his sporty guy friends who were supposed to help him with his future.

However, there was one friend that was completely unpredicted and probably a liability in the eyes of her mother, and her name was Hazel.

Evelyn had no idea what really drew her to Hazel. She was the cousin of one of her dad’s business partners (and a very powerful one at that, but for reasons beyond Evelyn’s knowledge, she and Eric weren’t close to) but she knew she definitely wasn’t rich like Selena. She was nervous and kinda dorky. She always wore a scrunchie with a messy curly ponytail. She was naturally beautiful, which was all the odder as Hazel didn’t even seem to notice it. In fact, Hazel seemed to always be hiding in a sweater of some sort. Needless to say, Hazel was nothing that Evelyn was used to. Maybe that was it...

She knew that her mom would probably not approve of their friendship, but after the fall formal dance, Evelyn found herself hanging out with Hazel more and more. They didn’t have the same lunch, but Evelyn would find her after school and they’d chat for a little bit, and Evelyn sat near Hazel whenever possible during science and PE. She knew it was suspicious, especially to her friends, but Hazel was just... enticing.

Her smile, her eyes, her laugh, the way she drummed her fingers on her desk when she was thinking, the way she would just ramble on and on until she caught herself... she was...

Evelyn thought Hazel was cute, but she didn’t admit that to herself often. It didn’t matter, she had ‘the plan’ to think about. Grades, friendships, eventual relationships, her whole future couldn’t fall apart because Evelyn thought maybe that one girl was kinda cute.

However, despite the little warning voice inside her head, she had invited Hazel and her cousin (Hazel never went anywhere without Selena) to her and Eric’s 13th birthday party. If anyone asked, Evelyn would say Selena was the daughter and future heiress of Louie Inc. and despite not being big in the social circles, she was still important and her cousin was just a tag along. Eric knew better, of course, but her friends (and more importantly, her mother) bought it.

Anyway, that was how she got to the present moment; at her house eating pizza with her group of friends- plus Eric and Selena- with Hazel in the corner on Evelyn’s window seat, reading something on her phone, and the rest of her friends gossiping and playing games while also posting to Duckigram.

“Enjoying the party?” Evelyn asked, taking a bite of her pizza.

“O-oh yeah! Totally!” Hazel blushed and laughed. “J-just a little tired is all.”

“I get it,” Evelyn gave her a smile, which seemed to relax her. “Selena’s kinda a natural, I didn’t expect her to click with all my friends that well, since she doesn’t really know them and all,” Evelyn commented.

“Oh yeah, she’s very amicable like that,” Hazel nodded. “She just chooses not to get involved in popularity contests- n- no offense or anything-!” Hazel bit her tongue.

“No, it’s cool, I get it,” Evelyn chuckled. “I get a little tired of it too sometimes, but I find my own ways to cope.” Hazel nodded in tired agreement.

“Here- you wanna go outside?” Evelyn stood and set down her plate on a nightstand.

“Y-you wanna leave the party?” Hazel glanced over at Evelyn’s friends.

“Psh, they’ll be fine. We’ll breathe just for a minute, it’ll be fun,” Evelyn offered her hand. When Hazel glanced at it, she realized how stupid the gesture was and was about to pull away when Hazel took it and Evelyn helped her up. The two snuck out of the room and eventually made their way to the balcony. The night air had done exactly what Evelyn had hoped, Hazel seeming to relax in an instant.

“This is pretty cool,” Hazel said, remarking on the fairy lights wrapping around the ledge, giving the balcony a nice soft glow.

“Thanks,” Evelyn said, going to the rail and leaning on it. Hazel joined her.

“You can practically see all of Duckburg from here,” She said, eyes shining like diamonds as she looked out.

“Yep yep,” Evelyn found herself lacking anything else to say, so she just took a deep breath.

“Are you okay?” Hazel asked, which made Evelyn blush a little.

“Yeah, I’m just a little more tired than I realized,” She chuckled.

“I feel you,” Hazel nodded.

“You know, I think you should consider yourself lucky that you weren’t born into all this. There’s so much politics involved in every single friendship and party, it’s honestly one big headache,” Evelyn rubbed her arms and leaned more on the ledge. “I can’t even count the number of times I’ve just sat and wondered what the heck I’ve ever done to get as far as I’ve gotten... It’s hard to tell what’s real and what isn’t.”

“W-well I’m sure it’s not all bad. I mean, you do have a lot of friends. That’s nice,” Hazel said.

“It’s hard to tell if they’re genuine or not though. A lot of my friends were simply formed because of our parents,” Evelyn said. “Not you though! You’re a lot different than most of my friends.”

“What do you mean?” Hazel questioned.

“Not in a bad way-! I-i mean... you’re actually pretty cool. I choose you to be my friend, you know?” Evelyn cursed internally. Hazel smiled a little.

“T-thanks. You’re pretty cool too,” Hazel said. Evelyn felt her heart give a flutter.

“Thanks,” She smiled. They looked at each other for quite the moment, before returning their gaze to the city. Evelyn took a sip of her soda.

“You know... you’re really pretty. Have you ever been told that?” Evelyn asked, realizing it was a pretty stupid question to ask someone only after she said it.

“I mean- outside of my dad and great aunt and uncle and Selena? No, not really,” She said, scratching the back of her neck.

“It’s true, you’re really... really pretty,” Evelyn glanced at Hazel, but their eyes met, and they went back.

“Thanks,” Hazel smiled more. “You’re really pretty too.”

Evelyn felt her heart do a summersault.

“Th-thanks,” She said, turning her face away as she felt herself become a blushing mess.

There was a moment of silence between the two, minus the ambiance of the night and the background music of the party not too far away. However, it wasn’t unbearable, in fact, it was relaxing. Just two girls enjoying each other's company on a cool Friday night...

“Evelyn..?” Hazel asked.

“Yes?” Evelyn responded, turning to her.

“Y-you don’t... I-i mean... Do you...? I-...” Hazel couldn’t get the words out.

“What do you mean?” Evelyn tilted her head a little. Hazel glanced at her before shaking her head.

“N-nevermind. Forget I asked anything,” Hazel shook her head. Evelyn decided it was probably best she didn’t push and left it at that, taking another sip of her soda.

“You know... I’ve never really been to a birthday party outside of my family,” Hazel said.

“Oh?” Evelyn said.

“Yeah... and I know that sounds a little stupid, but... I’m not the best at making friends... so... I just want you to know... I appreciate you. A lot,” Hazel said, facing Evelyn.

“I appreciate you too Hazel,” Evelyn said, suddenly aware of how close they were. She looked into Hazel’s eyes and Hazel looked right back.

“Y-yeah... I get really shy and quiet around people, a-and you’ve really helped me reach out and grow, even if it’s j-just a little. I never would’ve dreamed of this last year,” Hazel said, leaning in a little.

“You’re really cool Hazel, I’m lucky to know you,” Evelyn replied. Hazel blushed a little.

Just then, Evelyn closed her eyes, leaned in, and kissed her.

To her surprise, it felt good. Really good. It was better than any kiss Evelyn had ever had before. Those countless dares she had taken with her friends were nothing compared to this.

However, right after the moment passed, both girl’s eyes snapped right open, and they jumped away from each other in shock.

“H-hazel- I-”

“Hey, Evelyn, where’ve you- oh hey Hazel. What’s going on here?” Eric appeared on the balcony door right on time. Hazel turned away.

“Nothing much,” Evelyn cleared her throat to quickly get a grip on herself, though her heart was pounding a thousand miles a minute. “We were just about to head back, right?” she said, turning to Hazel.

“Y-yeah,” Hazel said, still not able to look at her. Evelyn’s smile fell.

‘Great job Evelyn, you just screwed up the best friendship you’ve ever had,’ Evelyn facepalmed internally. Silently, the three of them went back to the party and Evelyn did her best to act like it didn’t happen.

It wasn’t easy though, as a voice in the back of her mind kept screaming at her.

‘You’re such an idiot. Hazel doesn’t like you like that! Now she hates you.’

‘You can’t like Hazel, this isn’t with the plan. Mom will totally kill you.’

‘What the hell is wrong with you?! Who kisses a person they barely know?’

‘You can’t risk your future like this.’

‘None of your friends would approve.’

‘How do you even know what love is? You’re thirteen. You can’t like someone like that, especially a girl.’

‘Mom is gonna kill you.’

‘That was a mistake.’

‘You’re such an idiot.’

Evelyn wished she could just turn her brain off.

Eventually, Hazel asked if she and Selena could leave. Evelyn managed a nod, expecting that. They left not long after that, and it was safe to say the rest of the party felt like a waste. Evelyn’s mind was eating itself alive and she wished she could take back the whole thing.

But Evelyn knew she couldn’t. Sooner or later... this was going to have to address itself again. The thought wasn’t comforting; it only got her thinking about how her friends and family would react, which filled her soul with dread.

So for the present moment, it was a lot easier to deny the truth. She just... couldn’t risk what she had built; what she was going to build. She had her whole future, she couldn’t just... drive it all off the rails. Not right now.

She was just confused... there wasn’t anything really there. And even if there were, it couldn’t be worth it... right?

Evelyn took out her phone and gave Hazel a quick text.

“I’m sorry for everything” and sighed. She hadn’t meant to screw this up so badly...

Hazel read the text but didn’t respond.

Evelyn pressed the phone against her forehead, cursing herself for being an idiot.

Evelyn added: “We can pretend it never happened if you want”

Hazel started to type, but after a long moment, stopped. Eventually, she gave the message a thumbs up. Evelyn groaned internally. She hated this, she never wanted to make Hazel feel bad, and yet... she sighed.

Then again... maybe it’d be easier this way. Evelyn could just move on and pretend it never happened. Their regular old friendship would return in no time and everything would be fine and as planned. Evelyn would just play the part she was always meant to, and she’d move on and everything would just be okay. After all, she was only 13, none of this meant anything.

“Evelyn, you good?” Eric asked, noticing her worried looks. Evelyn glanced around to see if anyone was paying attention to her, which no one was.

“I screwed up,” she sighed. “But I’ll fix it, it’ll be fine... it has to be,” she muttered the last part under her breath. Eric gave her a sympathetic look but didn’t push further than that, which was good. Evelyn wasn’t sure how well she’d be able to hide this from him. He was her twin after all.

That didn’t change anything though. This whole... Hazel thing was against the plan, so Evelyn would just pretend it never happened, keep being her friend and move on.

She had to.

#evelyn covey #eric covey #my fics #hazel duck #ducktales #dt ocs #gay fic #my ocs

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tsarisfanfiction · 4 years

Text

Long Way From Home: Chapter 2

Fandom: Thunderbirds Rating: Teen Genre: Family/Friendship Characters: Scott, Tracy Family

Well, the first chapter certainly got some reactions, so I’m back again to either answer the questions from last chapter or make things more confusing. Or both, because why not? I’m planning weekly updates, but we’ll see what actually happens. Thanks, uni.

<<<Chapter 1

Logic screamed that he was actually facing the Hood, the twisted man adopting his own appearance for some scheme or other that Scott really didn’t want to know about. His gut told logic to go take a hike – there was no way the Hood would be standing there, barely two feet from his uniform, and not raiding any and all technology he could get his grubby little paws on. Nor would the Hood leave him unrestrained when he’d had plenty of opportunity to secure him during the gap in his memory.

Besides, the Hood was a perfectionist. His disguises were flawless, a product of technology Brains rolled his eyes at but acknowledged was an engineering masterpiece, if sadly in the wrong hands. This Scott in front of him was not a carbon copy.

For starters, much to Scott’s chagrin, the man’s hair was a healthy brown all over. No grey traitors wormed their way along his roots, signs of stress he desperately tried to ignore even as his brothers taunted him for their existence and pulled stunts that felt designed to increase their number. The brown was also slightly lighter than his own, although that could just have been a product of more washes and less gel. Despite the lack of grey hairs, he also got the impression that this man was actually older than him, if only by a year or so.

“How did you get here?” His voice was different, too. The pitch wasn’t the same, nor was the tone quite right. Virgil could give a better summary of the nuances, he was sure.

The words, though. Those were all Scott, right down to the sharp delivery and clear expectation of a prompt answer. Skipping pleasantries, and heading straight for the heart of the matter because they didn’t have time to dance around the issue.

“I might have a better idea if I knew where ‘here’ was,” he challenged. “What is this place? Where am I?” Where were his brothers?

The Other-Scott (Fake Scott? Hood-Masquerading-As-Scott?) locked gazes with him. What he was looking for, Scott didn’t know, but he refused to cower away from his doppelgänger and met his steely, searching look with one of his own. Logic still insisted that the Hood, or at least the Hood’s technology, had to be responsible, but he’d learnt to trust his gut long before he’d even heard of his father’s dream of International Rescue and that was adamant that Kayo’s miserable excuse for a family member had nothing to do with the man in front of him.

What it couldn’t tell him was who the man was, aside from an imperfect clone of himself. The unusual technology surrounding them – alien, Alan might call it for lack of a more rational explanation – was another piece to the puzzle that wasn’t slotting together.

Puzzles were more of John’s thing, not his. There were many times his ginger brother had rescued the poor pieces from his hands as he tried to force them into the wrong places.

Why had John not made contact yet?

“Who are you?” he demanded when it became clear that the other man wasn’t intending on answering his other questions. “Why am I here? Where are my brothers?”

“Brothers?” Other-Scott repeated, frowning deeply. “We found you alone.”

“Found me?” Scott spat. “Where? Last place I remember was the securest part of my own home! There’s no way you got near me without passing my brothers!” His brothers, sleeping soundly in the belief that they were safe in their own home. Even John had gone to sleep, secure on Five, but if they’d reached Thunderbird One’s hangar they’d have reached the space elevator docking system. “So where. Are. My. Brothers?”

“You were in our home,” Other-Scott bit back, hands briefly balling into fists before being forced to relax again. “Alone. Wherever your brothers are, it’s not here.” Scott didn’t like the emphasis on brothers.

“Don’t lie to me!” he roared, temper fraying. His brothers had to be with him, otherwise John would have made contact asking where he’d gone. Otherwise this man – and others beside him – had invaded their home and taken him whilst leaving his brothers but that made no sense. Why take only one member of International Rescue when you could have all five? Why take only one Tracy – even if it was the eldest, the one with the most access to all their assets – when you could take more for additional insurance?

They hadn’t tied him down, and the wires hooking him up to the bizarre machines had long since lost their hold on him from his earlier movement. A rookie mistake. With years of Air Force training behind him, Scott launched himself at the other man.

Blue eyes widened just before a fist made contact with his cheek, and Other-Scott staggered backwards before catching his balance, his hand tenderly brushing over the injured area. The movement had put him to one side, no longer between Scott and the door, and Scott took full advantage of that. If this man wasn’t going to admit where his brothers were, he’d find them himself.

It was his turn to receive a punch as he jumped towards the door, putting him off-course and allowing Other-Scott to block his way again. This time, his curiously wary look had changed to an angry one, and as they met in a flurry of blows Scott couldn’t tell which of them moved first.

“Let. Me. At. My. Brothers,” he spat between blows, gasping as an elbow caught him in the solar plexus just as Other-Scott doubled over from a fist to the gut.

“They’re not, argh, here!” Other-Scott insisted, hooking their ankles together and bringing them tumbling to the floor, where they pushed and shoved at each other, trying to get the upper hand. Something fell off a table as Scott’s back slammed into it, shattering into many glass fragments and dousing him with a cool liquid. Another bottle hit Other-Scott’s shoulder on the way down, before smashing on the floor and adding to the mess.

They were equally matched, neither able to get the upper hand as they rolled around on the floor, fists flying, heads clashing, and elbows jabbing whatever fleshy body parts they could reach in all the chaos. Broken glass dug mercilessly into bare skin wherever it was visible, the liquid contents of the former bottles oozing through their clothes. Other-Scott’s head slammed against the bed, but he barely paused before Scott found his own head colliding with a metal table, darkening his vision for a split second.

“What’s going on here?” an unfamiliar voice demanded. Scott ignored it, and Other-Scott met his latest attacks with equal fervour. “Scott, stop!”

Scott had no intention of stopping. He didn’t recognise the voice, but Other-Scott had flinched so he did, which meant they were working together.

Strong arms grabbed him, hauling him away from Other-Scott with a grunt, and he kicked out at the warm body restraining him. Other-Scott had been captured too, a shorter brown-haired man built like a tank firmly hooking him under the shoulders and frowning furiously as he fought to keep hold of Scott’s doppelgänger, who was as determined to get free as Scott himself.

“BOYS!” the voice thundered right in his ear, no doubt belonging to the owner of the arms restraining him. “What is this nonsense all a- oof?” Scott threw his head back, clashing with what felt like a nose, from the way it gave.

“Where are my brothers?” His demand came out almost as a scream, all his frustration at the situation pouring out of him as at least two more hostiles made themselves apparent. Other-Scott was stopping short of causing any damage to his own captor in his bids for freedom, suggesting that while the man was breaking up the fight, he was still on Other-Scott’s side.

“I told you!” Other-Scott shouted back at him. “They’re not here! We only found you!”

“They must be here!” Scott insisted. “Don’t lie to me!”

“E-nuff!” the man behind him joined in, the imperious tone ruined by the clear sounds of a broken nose. “Shedate im!”

Scott fought harder as a ginger man entered the room, looking at him with wide brown eyes before surveying the mess in front of him with trepidation. He picked his way across glass-strewn floor carefully, but Scott was more interested in Other-Scott, whose attempts to get free had reduced to a token effort as his attention was briefly stolen by the ginger man. He recognised that look of concern too well, far too used to seeing it in the mirror.

“Oh my!” a frail woman’s voice sounded from the doorway. “Oh, what a mess. Jefferson, what are you doing to that poor young man?”

Jefferson. The name was so familiar it hurt, but at least he had a name for Other-Scott – or so he thought until the man holding him responded.

“He’s quith ou o conthrol, muffer.”

Unable to help himself, Scott tore his gaze away from Other-Scott, who had now stopped resisting capture entirely in favour of looking in the direction of the doorway almost sheepishly, to catch a glimpse of the man holding him. Silver-grey hair and a receding hairline weren’t immediately familiar, however, and the hold he was in preventing him from seeing much more. He could, however, see the elderly lady who had interrupted the fight. Rosy cheeks, a slightly bent back and a quiver in her hands all pointed towards a particularly advanced age.

“Where are my brothers?” he asked again, reigning his voice in to an almost-level, if still intense, level.

“I told you-” Other-Scott started forwards again, only to be brought up short by the man still holding him tightly.

“Your brothers, dearie?” the old woman interrupted. “Oh, I’m afraid I don’t know. Jefferson, why don’t you help the young man find his brothers?”

“They’re not here, Grandma,” Other-Scott said, and Scott flared up again.

“Well then, dearie, it seems to me that instead of all this fighting, you should be looking to find out where they are,” Other-Scott’s grandmother pointed out. “I’m sure their absence is terribly distressing him. I know you’d be terribly distressed if your brothers were missing.” She pottered towards him, the ginger-haired man sweeping back to her side and nudging broken glass out of the way with a foot before she could tread on any. “Jefferson, let him go. Are you hungry, dearie? I’ve got an apple pie that’s just finished baking.”

“Muffer!” the man holding him protested, but the woman was no longer paying her son any attention, bespectacled eyes homing in on Scott. He looked around the room; Other-Scott was still held by the brown-haired man, and the ginger was hovering awkwardly by the elderly lady but shooting him assessing looks. The grip on his arms was slackening, and it became clear that no-one wanted to fight with her in the midst, Scott himself included.

“Well, dearie?” the woman prompted, and he slid out of the other man’s grasp. The instant he did so, a hand, just as frail and delicate as the rest of her, came to rest on his forearm. “If apple pie doesn’t meet your fancy, I have an orange tart, or some banana bread. Oh, if none of those tickle you, I’m sure I can find something,” she wittered as he found himself being coaxed from the room.

“Uh, apple pie would be… fine,” he said haltingly. Behind him, he heard a noise of protest. “Thank you, er, Mrs..?”

“Oh dear, I didn’t introduce myself.” She sounded mortified at the omission. “I’m so sorry, dear. It’s Mrs Tracy.”

It shouldn’t have bothered him. Tracy wasn’t an uncommon name, for all that there was only one family famous for it. The elderly lady looked nothing like his grandmother – either of them, even if his recollections of his mother’s mother were faded – but her grandson still looked like him, to the point he still didn’t trust the other man, or indeed anyone in the house. In light of that, having his own surname thrown around startled him.

“Is there something wrong?” Mrs Tracy asked him. “Oh, you don’t look well at all, dear. Let’s sit you down.” He found himself ushered into a seat as they reached what was clearly the kitchen. A young woman was already there, pulling the promised apple pie out of a bizarre contraption that vaguely resembled an old oven. “Tin-Tin, would you be a dear and fetch your father?” the elderly lady asked her. “This young man doesn’t seem very well.”

“But of course, Mrs Tracy.” Tin-Tin had a slight lilting accent to her voice, somewhere south-east Asian if Scott had to guess. “I’ll find him now.” She placed the apple pie, which smelled absolutely heavenly to Scott, compared to his own grandmother’s regular offerings, on the table and left the room.

“Eat up, dearie,” Mrs Tracy insisted, placing a plate in front of him. “Help yourself to as much as you want.”

The apple pie smelled good, and despite his misgivings at the entire situation, a homemade apple pie was far too tempting and he found himself tucking in to a healthy slice.

“What would you like to drink, dear?” she asked. “Tea, coffee? Oh, I have some juice somewhere, now where did I put it..?”

“Water is fine,” he answered between mouthfuls.

“Oh, are you sure?” she queried. “It’s no trouble at all.”

“Perfectly,” he replied, only to blink as a steaming cup of tea appeared in front of him.

“You called, Mrs Tracy?” An older man had entered the kitchen while he wasn’t looking, an impressive and concerning feat considering Scott was still on edge about the entire situation. His accent was the same as Tin-Tin’s, implying that this was her father.

“Oh, Kyrano,” the woman greeted. “This young man, oh, silly me, I never asked for your name, dearie… Dearie?”

Scott barely heard her, the cup of tea he’d started to lift falling from startled fingers to smash onto the table, spilling the liquid everywhere.

Kyrano. Another familiar name, if not a familiar face. First, Other-Scott, who could have been his identical twin. Then, Mrs Tracy, a name he knew all too well even if she didn’t look like his own grandmother. Now, Kyrano, another name albeit one whose owner he hadn’t seen in too long, with a different face but the same intensity about him.

“Dearie?” Mrs Tracy asked again. “Oh, what a mess. He’s as white as a sheet, Kyrano.”

Something reminiscent of smelling salts wafted under his nose and he spluttered.

“You’re bleeding, sir,” the man said matter-of-factly. “Allow me.”

Scott had forgotten about the broken bottles he’d been wrestling amongst with Other-Scott, but now the man had mentioned it, he could feel the sting of glass embedded in his arms. No permission was sought before a gentle yet firm hand wrapped around a glass-free section of his arm, holding it in place as a pair of tweezers were produced. He was no stranger to medical attention, and while he didn’t know the man – Other-Kyrano, apparently, for all that he clearly wasn’t English, and probably couldn’t trump Scott in a fight – he did at least know the procedure for removing foreign bodies from open wounds and watched like a hawk as the man more or less followed the methods he would have expected.

“Please, drink your tea,” Other-Kyrano asked once a nasty, stinging liquid – disinfectant was horrible stuff and Scott would never like it – had been applied and bandages carefully wrapped around the worst of the wounds. “You might find it helpful.” A second cup of tea replaced the smashed remains of the old one, as Other-Kyrano efficiently cleaned up the mess.

How was tea supposed to help? Lady Penelope might insist as such sometimes, but Scott would much rather a strong coffee chock full of caffeine. Still, Mrs Tracy was looking at him with a worried look on his face, and Grandma would murder him for defying or otherwise offending an elderly lady who had done him no harm. He cautiously pulled the cup closer to him, and was startled to discover it wasn’t an ‘Assam Blend’, or whatever other fancy teas Lady Penelope liked to serve up. It was herbal, and surprisingly delicious, he discovered after his first tentative sip.

“Kyrano serves wonderful tea,” Mrs Tracy told him, sitting down across the table from him. She had her own cup of steaming liquid in front of her, and sipped at it delicately. “Now, dear, I’m afraid I didn’t catch your name?” Scott paused, taking another tentative sip of the tea to buy himself another moment to think. Should he give them his name? He didn’t know what they already knew. Was it worth a lie? No, he’d never be able to keep it up.

“Scott,” he admitted.

“Oh my,” Mrs Tracy said. “What a coincidence. That’s the name of my eldest grandson.” Scott’s gut churned unpleasantly, and he put the cup down before he dropped that one, too. “Oh, you even look the same. Isn’t that strange?”

Strange was one word to describe what was going on. Suspicious was another.

“You’re the fella that punched Scott?” A young man barged into the room. He had pale blond hair and light blue eyes that should have made him attractive, except he seemed to have a permanent frown etched into his face. “What gave you the right?” Scott matched his glare with one of his own as the young man – barely an adult at all, if he had to guess an age – stormed up to him.

“Alan!” Tin-Tin was there, resting a hand on his arm. “Please, calm yourself.”

Another familiar name, and now that he’d heard it Scott found himself instantly drawing parallels between the man and his youngest brother. There must have been at least five years between them, but Scott could see Alan looking like that man in a few years, although hopefully without the frown.

“But, Tin-Tin!” Other-Alan protested. “Scott’s face is bruised. I can’t just let that go!” He even had the same personality, a rigid sense of right and wrong with little ability to see the other person’s side, and a reluctance to acknowledge that black and white was joined by a large span of grey.

“Your brother can fight his own battles, Alan,” Tin-Tin soothed. “I’m sure it was all just a misunderstanding.”

“What about Dad’s nose?” Other-Alan demanded. “You can’t expect me to…”

Scott tuned out the argument at that. Dad. He tried not to be a petty person, but there were times when he couldn’t quite prevent envy bubbling up when he heard other people taking about their Dads, taking them for granted as though they’d always be there. Over the years he’d got better at smothering it, but this was a man named Alan, with a brother named Scott, and a grandmother called Mrs Tracy, and they had their Dad.

He’d broken their Dad’s nose when he’d tried to stop him attacking one of his sons. If that had happened to his Dad – if Dad was still around to break up fights on their behalf, no matter how unwelcome the gesture would have been in the moment – he’d be fuming, too. He wasn’t going to apologise though. Not now, when he didn’t know where he was, who he was with, or where his brothers were. He didn’t even know what these people planned to do with him, regardless of whether or not his presence in their home was intentional on their behalf.

“Leave it, Alan.” The blond man’s tirade was cut off by none other than Other-Scott – now confirmed to actually be a Scott himself – as he walked into the room. “Is there any apple pie left, Grandma?”

“Oh, yes, dear,” Mrs Tracy assured him. “Take a seat and I’ll bring some over.”

“Thanks,” Other-Scott said, pulling up a chair a couple away from Scott. His face was bruised, as Other-Alan had said, a beautiful darkening along his cheekbone and narrowly missing his eye. Other-Kyrano set a cup of tea in front of him, which he accepted gratefully and drank without hesitation.

“But, Scott!” Other-Alan complained, and his brother sighed.

“That’s enough, Alan,” he said, tearing into the plate of apple pie his grandmother placed in front of him. “Leave it.”

Other-Alan caved, albeit with obvious bad grace, and stalked out from the room. Scott watched him go. Part of him was glad that the younger man was being openly hostile – at least he knew where, exactly, he stood with him. Other-Scott was less clear, patched up from their scuffle and now sat at the same table, devouring his grandmother’s apple pie. Suspicious glances remained, but there was no open hostility.

The door opened again, and Other-Alan re-entered followed by the two young men from the infirmary, and-

A second teacup smashed onto the table.

“Oh dear!” Mrs Tracy cried, hurrying over to him. Other-Kyrano quickly swept up the remains as she took hold of his hand. “Scott, dear, are you alright?”

“Scott?” one of the men asked. He thought it might have been Other-Scott.

“Oh, Jeff, are you sure there’s nothing wrong with him?” Mrs Tracy was asking. “This is the second turn he’s had in as many minutes! Oh, look at him, he’s gone as white as a sheet again, Kyrano.”

Scott barely heard them. The man who had just entered the room had the obvious signs of a broken nose, identifying him as Other-Alan’s Dad. He also had salt and pepper hair, more salt than pepper, and a receding hairline. Steel eyes fixed on him sharply, hard and unforgiving, and a five o’clock shadow did nothing to hide the dimples in his cheeks. This was the same man that had restrained him, and while a glimpse in his periphery hadn’t been enough to cause recognition, now that Scott could see him properly he looked like Dad – an older version of Dad, but then he hadn’t seen Dad since he was nineteen. No doubt, if Dad was still with them, he’d look very similar to the man in front of him.

This had gone beyond simple words like weird and suspicious. Impossible sounded more like it.

“His medical results all came back clear, Grandma,” the brown-haired man from the infirmary assured her, squatting down in front of him and shining a penlight into his eyes. He recoiled from the bright light, tearing his gaze away from Not-Dad – it couldn’t be Dad, Dad was gone – to frown at him.

“Did you call him Scott?” the ginger man asked, walking over to the table and slotting himself in a chair between him and Other-Scott.

“That is my name,” he said before anyone else could speak up. A hush fell over the room, broken by Other-Kyrano setting a third cup of tea in front of him.

“Drink,” the man said. “It will help.”

“Your name is Scott?” Other-Alan demanded. “But-”

“That’s enough, Alan,” Not-Dad interrupted. The blond frowned, but obeyed. “Scott, is it?”

“That’s what I said,” Scott retorted, taking a sip of the fresh drink. As Other-Kyrano said, it did help. Somehow.

“Scott..?” Not-Dad trailed off expectantly. Surrounded by too many familiar names, Scott decided against answering. He took a longer drink, ignoring the patriarch of the family in favour of assessing the rest of the room. Other-Alan and Other-Scott he already had some measure of, the former more so than the latter. Mrs Tracy was a kind enough lady, and Tin-Tin seemed of a similar temperament. Other-Kyrano was difficult to read, but his focus was the two men whose names he had yet to hear.

The ginger noticed his scrutiny, returning it in kind. There was something familiar about him, but Scott batted away the notion. He was simply off-balance at the number of familiar names and faces already – that was no reason to start looking for more connections where there were none. No matter now much the warm brown eyes of the two as-yet unnamed men reminded him of two of his brothers.

Not-Dad bristled when it became apparent that he wouldn’t give his name.

“I’d like to know, who, exactly, is trespassing in my home,” he said. Clearly the man was used to being obeyed.

“I’d like to know how, exactly, I got here, and where my family are,” he retorted.

“You don’t know how you got here?” the brown-haired man asked, surprised.

“Virgil,” Not-Dad warned. The third teacup was spared the fate of the previous two purely by being on the table when Scott’s grip slacked.

“No,” he said firmly, powering through the unpleasant sensation dousing him again before Mrs Tracy commented on another ‘turn’. “I don’t. I don’t know where ‘here’ is, either.”

“But how could you get here without knowing?” the newly dubbed Other-Virgil asked. “None of us brought you here.”

Scott didn’t bother responding, draining the cup of tea before any more unpleasant surprises could befall it and standing up.

“Thanks for the tea,” he said to Other-Kyrano, “and the apple pie,” he continued to Mrs Tracy, ignoring Not-Dad as he pushed the chair under the table.

“Dear, are you sure you’re alright?” Mrs Tracy fussed. He wasn’t, but he didn’t tell her that. Instead he gave a short nod before choosing a door at random and walking through it, ignoring a protest from Not-Dad.

A corridor greeted him, with a neat row of doors on one side and a branch off to the left leading to who knew what.

“Now look here.” A hand clapped down on his shoulder, and he was halfway to removing it forcibly before placing the voice. Having already broken Not-Dad’s nose, thereby earning the wrath of at least one member of the family, it was probably not a good idea to injure the man further. It didn’t stop him shrugging him off, however. “I don’t want you walking around our home unsupervised, young man.”

“Then supervise me,” he retorted.

“I intend to.” A hand returned to his shoulder – lightly, this time, Not-Dad clearly learning his lesson – and steered him towards what now looked a lot like an elevator from those old, vintage films Grandma occasionally put on even though they were from before her time, or so she claimed. Neither he nor any of his brothers were brave enough to dispute it. “Gordon, I want everyone in the lounge. Let’s start from the beginning.”

“Yes, Father,” the ginger man said – Scott hadn’t even noticed him behind Not-Dad – and tried very hard not to react to the name, even though the situation had flown past anything anyone could classify as a coincidence at this point. Scott, Virgil, Gordon, Alan… all they were missing was a John.

Not-Dad gestured for him to enter the elevator, ignoring what seemed to be a perfectly serviceable flight of stairs, and he did so with trepidation, watching metal shutters slide across sharply before a jerk beneath their feet had them rising.

“Jeff Tracy,” Not-Dad said suddenly. Scott glanced at him as the elevator stopped moving and the metal shutters opened with a clatter. “Call me Mr Tracy.” His cool, unpersonable approach was nothing like how Scott remembered Dad, and that helped, a little. He didn’t intend on calling him anything, though. Not until he knew why there was a clone of his father, and of himself, in this strange house.

Chapter 3>>>

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds are go fanfiction #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #tsari writes fanfiction #scott tracy #jeff tracy #grandma tracy #tin-tin kyrano #kyrano #alan tracy #virgil tracy #gordon tracy #long way from home

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