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messwriting · 3 years

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THE SMUT PILE SECRET SANTA

Golden Eyes

Demon!Kuroo Tetsurou x Female Reader

Rating: E for explicit | Don’t read this if under eighteen.

Note: HOE HOE HOE INDEED! HAHAHAHA

This is my secret santa gift for my dear elf Alisha -- @rivendell101! I do hope you enjoy, I just tried to channel all of Kuroo’s wicked energy into this and sprinkled it with our beloved monsterfucking. Sorry for all the questions, I just wanted to surprise you but also include only things you’d like. ;-; Hope you enjoy and MERRY SMUTMAS <3

Big thanks and lots of kisses to my dear Tay @deathcab4daddy who read this, betaed, and said it wasn't the train wreck I thought it was 😂🥺😘💕

Warnings: This is loosely inspired by the manhwa DEAR DOOR, by Pluto, from which the art above is also from (Satan is fucking hot)! Monsterfucking - Demon. Use of tongue and tail in a very uh naughty way. Magic makes you horny at some point (tho i don’t think is dub-con?), but just to be sure Magic Manipulation. Assplay with tongue and finger penetration. Denials, oh so many denials. Sprinkle of spanking. Soft pain play. Overstim. Oral sex. Rough sex. CHOKING. BITING. MARKING. Demon uhhhh lure? aijaisajisj He’s seducing you with his devilish powers. CORRUPTION. RELIGIOUS BLASPHEMY (sorry jesus).

Word count: ~7.4k. I can’t write anything short, why?!

“So… you’re a demon?” You ask, weirdly not completely panicking over the fact that this brick wall of a man showed up out of nowhere in the middle of your living room as if this were just another Sunday night. The stranger smiles your way with a lopsided grin and the shivers that run through your body seem to support his affirmation.

“Did the horns give it away?” The dark-haired demon asks, with a smile that could make him the single male model of some sin’s propaganda. Your eyes flick to his tail, long and thick, moving calmly in waves behind him, and come up to the unbelievably wide black wings sprouting from his back and threatening to blow a hole in your ceiling.

“Sure,” You say while your eyes come back to his face, taking a second look at the long, twisted black horns sprouting from his high forehead and mixing with his thick raven hair. “Let’s say it’s the horns.”

He snickers but his golden stare is very much sharp on you. Even before it pinned you in place you had found that your legs had begrudgingly refused to move in front of the massive presence in your living room.

“You’re an interesting little thing, aren’t you?” He muses out loud, his arms crossing in front of his body while one hand cradles his own face while he looks down at you. The gold irises glint in the dark like a beacon, the small crystal-like black pupil like that of a wild animal. “Normally people would have been screaming by now. Or passing out. Maybe running.” He doesn’t move from where he stands, but his sentient tail floats over to you, lightly caressing the side of your face as a child stroking their pet; it moves under your chin, over your jaw and cheekbone, pats your hair back, and comes to circle your throat.

It doesn’t squeeze -- but the threat is pretty much clear.

“I don’t think my legs can move.” You tell him in a breathless voice, panic eating away at the corners of your sanity the more you stare at the insanity in front of you. A monstrosity of man with a tail and wings to crown it swaying in your living room as if it’s all okay, as if this is real life. You shudder in place, a whole-body wave of dread that moves along your body and makes you tremble as all the hair on your being stands in place. He grins down at you, wicked and pretty, a cheshire air of mischief in the way his golden irises glint in the dark background of his eyes and mingle with the dim lit room to go with the roll of white pearls of sharp-looking teeth in his mouth.

“Am I dreaming?” Your thoughts escape from your lips in a breath as his tail grounds you to reality, burning hot and heavy around your neck. It contrasts awkwardly with the image in front of you, which your brain keeps trying to deny as true, but the weight of his tail pulls you from the edge of disbelief and pins you in place, your limbs turning cold as you feel unable to move. “Or am I going insane, somehow?”

“Do you think your brain is failing you, little one?”

“Well, seems like the logical reason why there’s a winged man in my living room. With horns and-- a tail.” Your voice stops and you gulp right before your eyes snap once again to his devilish black and golden eyes. “Wait. Are you a demon? Is… a demon in my living room?” The more you speak the least sense it makes. The thing in front of you seems to be very amused by the twinges of panic and disbelief coloring your voice and expression. “Why?”

He smirks and his wings do a fluttering thing before they curve inside his back, two massive black things even when they’re closed. “Must be your lucky day.”

You snort even through your scared haze. “Not exactly what one thinks when considering demons.”

“Ah, bad rep.” Kuroo says and he floats as if he’s sitting on a chair, his legs crossing as he supports an elbow on his thigh and his face on his hand. It’s both parts unnerving and enthralling, and you’re struck with the fact of how big he is once again. “God’s marketing team is hella good. We get the rep for everything going on now-- the crops died? Oh, the devil. Psycho kid? Demoniac. Fucked up government? Send from hell. Sex? Devilish.” He sighs, his pretty lips jutting in a pout as his beautiful face falls into a tired mask. “It’s tiresome to be the poster-boys to all things wicked.”

“Well, seems like you do the part just fine.” You hide yourself through some small sarcasm, as you grumble the remark.

“Hah.” His sharp teeth flash in the dark at the barked laugh, a gasped sound as if he truly found your remark funny. “We get used to it,” He nods your way and then shrugs, a never-leaving smirk on his lips. “And I like the style.”

“Sure,” you say, despite the clear unconvinced tone of your voice as your eyebrows shut up slowly, eating the distance from your hairline until you blink and tiptoe around your next words, “not to be rude, Mr. Demon--”

“Call me Kuroo.” He cuts you off charmingly, as one would in flirting; a playful arch in his brows as his smile spreads just that bit more over his face. You just now realize the appeasing traces of it, the sharp angle of his jaw, the high of his square cheekbones, and the elegant line of his nose; then your eyes fly over the protruding circles of his horns, and your eyes go round almost involuntarily.

“Okay…” It breaches your lips along with a puff of breath. You blink a few times before continuing, still doubting your own eyes as they thread over the massive monster in front of you. You wonder if he’d look better if he’s bent to your height, but then again that wouldn’t do much about those broad shoulders, engulfing your wall where he stands. “Not to be rude, Mr. Kuroo, but…” you steady yourself with a deep breath before continuing, your hand flying to press against your eyes before you can reopen then and see the exact same thing from before -- a demon in your house. “What the fuck you’re doing here, exactly?”

He smiles, pleased with your cussing, apparently. Then his eyes turn focused, predatory, and they’re locked on you.

“I’ve come to offer a deal, little one.”

“A deal?” You parrot, lost in the pull of those golden eyes.

“Yes,” Kuroo smirks, lips splitting unnaturally over sharp canines. He keeps floating in his position, face supported on a big, clawed, hand. “And a quite good one, too.”

“You… You’re at my home, to offer me a deal, right after the small rant on Devil’s bad marketing.” You list the things, doubt thick in your voice.

Kuroo smiles, but it looks wrong. “Yes, dear.”

“Okay,” You risk, though it comes out as a question. Kuroo seems pleased, though. “Go ahead, I guess?”

“I need something from you.”

“Oh shit, is this the soul thing?” Your eyes widened again, hands coming to stand protectively in front of you even as you doubt you could do much to fend him off if he wanted to do you harm. “I’ve seen Supernatural, I’m not selling my fucking soul okay?!”

“Chill, kitten, I don’t really mind your soul.” He’s rather nonchalant, golden eyes completing a circle along his eyeballs before they fall once again on you while Kuroo comes out from his floating position to pace calmly over to you. Then, his sharp teeth split his face wickedly in two, an alluring characteristic in the way his lips form an overconfident grin as he bends over you in your place on the couch. “It’s your body I’m interested in.”

“My… body?”

“Have you ever heard of hell portals?” His face engulfs your line of vision as his tail angles your head back to look up at him, a clawed finger gliding over your jawline at that.

“No? Should I? Who do you think I am to know about hell doors?” It happens again, your thoughts slipping through your lips at the same rate as you think them, the sarcastic tone of your mind also dripping out much as if that had been your intention all along.

He seems rather happy at that, too.You wonder if he’s prying the truth from you somehow. “Well, you’re one.”

“What?” You ask, stupidly, as his face gets further from you and he straightens back into his full height.

“A door, to hell.” Kuroo finishes, cheerfully. It looks, once again, wrong on his face, as if it's more of a threat than a joke.

The seconds pass by as falling rocks over metal, loud and rattling, a restless moment in which you keep staring at the monster --demon-- face and even as his horns stay in place and his curved wings twitch, it stills feels wholly detached from reality; an insane, out of this plane moment in which you doubt your whole being - your eyes and your ears and your brain and your skin, where the weight and warmth of his tail still surrounds your neck.

“Now I know I’m losing my mind.” You murmur to yourself as you can’t make peace between reality and, well, this reality.

“Ah, you humans are such disbelievers. I’m here in front of you, saying you’re a portal, and you still doubt your own eyes as if they’re the origin of your offense.” Kuroo mocks you, crossing his arms in front of his body and for a second your eyes linger on the blackness of his clawed hands, the weird way they’re shaped as if something is enveloping them, elongating claws on the point of his fingers with the color of a moonless night. Still, the acidic tone in his voice makes you perk up with infuriating annoyance, and it seeps from you at the same rate as it fills you.

“Well, sorry if it’s hard for me to believe I’m a fucking hell portal.” You sass him, fiery eyes closing on gold. It’s even more annoying that he smiles through your taunt. “Ten minutes ago I didn’t even believed in hell.”

“You can keep doubting if you want. Aren’t you doing so even when you see me here? All I need is passage and then you’ll be free to doubt once again,” his eyes glow brighter as he closes in on yours in a way that has you swaying in place, a vexatious air around him that’s unmistakable; but then again he is a demon, so maybe that’s just the norm. “That is… if you want.”

A shiver runs down your spine at the promise in his voice, and your own trembles when you ask, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That this can be a one-time thing -- or not.”

You blink, a bit lost.

“What’s this, exactly?” Your brain pulses in pain at the quantity of information it has to make sense and still try to understand. It’s too much and soon you’re pressing your hands on your face in frustration, “Dude, you’re not making sense.”

“It’s easy.” Kuroo says and suddenly you’re yanked up by thin air, floating in front of his fingers at his will as he twirls your body in the air as if you’re some sick kind of roulette. “Inside you, there’s a portal. I’ll activate it, and go to hell. In exchange, I’ll give you something.” As he speaks, clawed hands slowly and maliciously thread over the valley of your breasts and then down your middle, his golden eyes like a lighthouse to your wandering attention. “Something I know you desire, but you may not even know so. May not even accept yourself.” As his fingers approach the appex of your sex, you’re rounded in the air abruptly and set right on your feet in front of him, safe and sound and dizzy, feeling like prey to those eyes. “It may be this single time, or, if you accept my deal, it can be more.”

You breathe some big gulps of air before speaking in a wavering voice, “Something I wish? And you won’t tell me what that would be?”

“Essentially, you know. You just may be in… denial.” His eyes flash that golden glint once again, twirling molten pools of liquid sun on his face. Their constant, slow motion never-ending circles seeping inside your consciousness, making your mind blank, slowly flowing into a haze in which you feel lost but safe; warmth flowing from it over you as if you’re being dipped in melted honey, weighted down but comfortable, as moving against warm waves in a tropic beach.

It tips from your mouth as you’re swimming in the molten pools of gold, pulled out from your body as the warm breath from your lungs, heated and pliant. “Okay.”

The spell crashes as his grin spreads through his face, the self-satisfied smirk of a cat who got its prey. Just as you’re burning in embarrassment and ready to cancel whatever that was you just said yes to, a sudden wave of warmth spreads from your face to your feet, your hair undulating at the force it hits you, and travelling so quickly you can feel the way your toes curve while a buzz crosses them, a pleasant but foreign thrill settling in your bones. You send him a nasty glare.

“The fuck have you done to me?”

“Me? Nothing, kitten.” Kuroo tells you but everything from his expression, to his stance and the fucking satisfied smirk he sports tell you it’s a lie. Your glare turns worse. His lips are curved up in a telling manner but he concedes with a tilt of his head. “I just lowered your inhibitions, relax.”

“Why would you do that?” The questions zap from your mouth just as you think it, and in a fleeting thought you wonder if that isn’t exactly what he meant.

“I told you, I’m going to give you what you want.” Kuroo says as he stops in front of you, a sexy, powerful sway in the way he moves and towers over you that you can’t help but appreciate. “But I need you to accept your darker wishes,” It’s a murmur, raspy in his deep voice, and you breathe the words in as the indecent, luscious feeling swell inside your being and seems to find it’s home in your chest-- and drip from your sex. “And then embrace me.”

“I don’t want you.” You tell him, but it comes breathless, weak, and as Kuroo’s golden eyes pierce yours, you can feel as he pinpoints your lie.

“Then let’s change that, shall we?”

He wastes no time in maneuvering you into his arms, pulling you through thin air until his feral hands close around your middle and neck. Kuroo tilts your head back while grazing a single clawed finger over your pulse-point and up to your jawline, and then his breathing comes loud and misty against your bared skin.

“Wait--” You plead as your breath comes in long puffs and when you wet your lips before continuing, a freakishly long, wet and hot tongue comes to lick a big stripe of your skin and you yelp loudly, “-- the fuck!”

Kuroo, on the other hand, literally hums approvingly and brings his nose to glide over your skin, soft breathing as his hands pull you closer into his massive chest. You realize now, at the proximity, just how big and broad he is, somehow between terrifying and uncanningly acceptable.

His body runs hot, the temperature difference between yours quite clear when your skin feels so heated by his touch, clothes you found nice now feeling constricting the more of you that touches him.

The planes of his chest are hard and toned, lean muscle and strength as he moves you up without effort, your feet dangling way above the ground and still no hint of struggle as he supports your weight. As you get closer, those yellow irises centered in black globes seem to pry inside your mind, big and all encompassing; it makes something coil in your chest, much like panic but tame as agitation.

“Wait--” You breathe out and look down, shocked at the distance you found yourself from the ground. Something crawls from your chest as a distressed groan, “I--”

Kuroo tilts your head back and -- not without sending you a smirk -- delves down to close your lips together.

Whatever you were expecting, it wasn’t this -- you’re swept away by the kiss, amazed at how well your mouths work together, how perfectly plush and soft his thin lips feel on yours, how pleasing the motions of his tongue are against yours, how tasteful his movements are, and before long, you’re breaking the kiss but because you need to breathe, to pull some air inside yourself to battle the haze settling in your mind.

It does nothing to aid you though.

Your body feels achingly flushed, avid, weirdly pliant and it is with mild surprise that you feel yourself drooling inside your panties. Something tells you to be indignant, to kick him, to bite and claw, but instead you’re sighing the weakest of noises, spiralling back to his expert lips, falling deeper inside the slow seduction that this demon offers.

Kuroo moves you calmly, his big, searing hot hands threading across your body and working goosebumps in it’s trail even as all he does is touch you over your clothes. Your hands, previously abandoned by the side of your body start to move up his body, spreading your small palms over his chest, and instead of pushing him off, you’re pulling him closer, opening your mouth wider, your legs hiking over his side as if you’re begging for the moment he’ll pick you up.

“Hmm, what a nice little thing you are.” Kuroo murmurs over your lips, taking in the wrecked expression you sport with just a kiss. “So honest, too.” His claws glide over your thigh, hiked on his side. It doesn’t hurt, but the feeling of something sharp sliding against your skin makes your heart rate pick up and your panties grow wetter.

“You’ll like this too, kitten, don’t worry.” His syrupy voice enchants you as he hooks a razor-sharp claw on the side of your shorts, threads up slowly and precise until the ripping sound breaks through your haze. When you look down, your hooded eyes turn wide, taking in the fact he just ripped your shorts and how easily they slide to the ground once they’re free from your hiked leg. The panties stay, but they’re not exactly much.

“Hey!” You turn to look up at him, puffed cheeks in indignation, and one of his hands yanks your head back, angling your body in a arch as his other hand glides over your thigh to your lower belly, sharp thumb swiftly climbing up your body and with such, ripping your comfy t-shirt. The feeling of something scratching along your middle and the valley of your breasts make your breathing catch up on your lungs, too afraid it will press enough to hurt if you move. You never knew a menace could be this seductive.

Still, the anticipation coils inside you, pours from between your legs as your skin feels too small to hold all the feelings cursing to you, your breasts heavy and your lips falling open in a breath that Kuroo drinks from your lips, attentive and dedicated as his tongue comes out and slides over your lips.

His eyes glint in the dark, sharp and focused.

“You know what? I think I’ll like you.”

The air feels cold on your heated skin, especially when he holds you so close. Small trembles pass through your frame as you melt inside his kiss, falling deeper inside the pleasure he offers you and Kuroo barely started. Your nipples perk up without attention and when his rough palm rolls over them, their new-found sensitivity makes it impossible for you to not let out a sound. It’s something meek and surprised, but Kuroo seems proud of it and decided to pull more out of you.

Magically, you’re yanked up, floating until your middle is at the height of his neck.

“Hey! What are you doing?” Your head is millimeters from hitting the ceiling, your hands touching it as a way to protect yourself, you throw a nasty glare down at his face just for him to make a half-circle in the air and your upper body be launched behind.

“No!” You’re laying on thin air -- your heart beating so fast your blood pulses in your head as you look over your shoulder and notices just how impossible is the situation going on, where you’re levitating a few meters from the ground.

If he stops now, would you go down crashing? Would you die from such a fall? Questions swirl in your mind enough for you to forget whats going on - the way a sharp claw swiftly cuts the side of your panties - until something wet, firm and long prods on your dripping folds.

“What--” Your first action is to hitch your neck up so you can confirm that it is what you think it is, and, granted, Kuroo is slowly prying you open, his huge tongue threading on your most sensitive parts. As he laps a long stripe down your pussy, he looks up at you in flashing gold, seeming extremely pleased.

Kuroo winks at you, depraved.

Your blood is rushing through your veins at such a haste that you feel dizzy, and your whole body is fervent as something very loud breaks through your lips as Kuroo’s tongue moves and presses on your slit, circles your clit, and moves in serpentine movements along your puffy cunt.

You didn’t realize before how the texture of his tongue was a bit rugged but now you’re suffering the full extent of its benefits as he eats you out sloppily, enough that you’re dripping down on the carpet as his monstrously long and dexterous tongue plays with your cunt as if that’s his sole mission on earth. Kuroo hums against your clit, makes your whole body tremble with it, and at some point, he manages to press his tongue flat against your clit and still reach enough that it dips softly inside your entrance, slowly and deliciously prying the inner ring of your sex open, then broader.

You can’t help the noises falling from your lips and when one of his rough, clawed hands close around your breast, the pressure inside you peaks and you’re panicking at how close you are to your first orgasm, from his tongue alone, at an impossible long and sentient… demon tongue.

But he retreats just as your mouth falls open, your throat constricted by the scream that instead becomes an indignated gasp. “Fuck--! I was--”

“Hmmm, I know.” Kuroo answers you, his hands coming to hold your thighs open as you tremble from the effort. His thumb pulls your cunt lips apart and his golden eyes glint, fierce and pleased at the same time. “Aren’t you an interesting plaything? Skyrocketing into pleasure head first when I was just getting a taste.” He licks his lips, his canines making an appearance as his ridiculous long tongue cleans his face and chin where your juices have leaked to.

His grin should be illegal. “Delicious, by the way. But I’m not ready to end this so fast.”

“End this… fast?” You ask, still having difficulty in thinking straight when you’re floating up in the air with your legs spread open in front of his face, his thumbs spreading you open as if you’re his meal and he likes to play before eating.

“Maybe we should go somewhere more comfortable.” Kuroo muses out loud and before you can blink you’re falling, screaming in your surprise until you bounce on the comfortable cushion of your bed. The air is knocked out of you in a oof, but Kuroo just looks down at you happily, his smile still looking mischievous as if that’s his whole personality trait.

You know what, maybe it is.

“Warn a girl.” You tell him, and he winks your way, just as he pulls your naked body to the edge of the bed.

“Consider yourself warned: i’m about to eat you up.”

His massive hands engulf you and arch your body into his eager mouth, where his tongue lavish at your sex in a way that has you feeling as if they everywhere and at the same time. The muscle is thick and long, firm as it presses from your entrance to your clit, as it rounds your sensitive spot and slithers down through your pussy lips, slurping it with his lips as his wicked tongue never stops its prodding.

One of his hands circles your body, closes around your breast and tweeks your hard nipple between his thumb and forefinger, painfully, deliciously, something obscene curling inside you at the way the feelings mix, the pain and the bliss and it doesn’t help that Kuroo moves his mouth to the sensitive and fragile skin of your inner thighs and build a whole trail of bite marks and throbbing hickeys.

Something firm, large and hot slither up your body, circling a breast but finding it’s home at a circle around your neck -- his tail -- and the more vocal you become, the more it seems to close around your throat, your heart beating on your fingertips as they claw at anything of Kuroo’s you can reach, hazy and breathless at the way he discloses your wicked desires so plainly, the way his every move seems to discover layer after thick layer of temptations that you have hidden so deep with partners before.

“Such a pretty little thing you are,” Kuroo coos to you when he presses a thick finger past the tight ring of your cunt. “So honest and eager,” It moves, prods, another one joins and soon they’re scissoring against your walls, opening your tender flesh so he can sink himself in further.

The mere thought has you moaning out loud -- unbelievable and yet, you feel how your arousal drips from your cunt to your thighs.

“Ahhhh~” Kuroo exhales as his tongue laps a long stripe of your juices. “So pure.” He says against your pussy lips, kissing them and then letting his long tongue slide further until it prods between the cheeks of your ass, immediately falling into circular motions on the furl of muscle. You yelp but midway it becomes an embarrassing moan. “This just makes me wanna ruin you more.”

It’s too much -- he has to know it’s too much, and as Kuroo curves his fingers just right inside your sloppy cunt and his tongue breaches just the tiniest bit the resistance of your ass, your eyes are falling open in huge plates, a long moan of his name on your tongue as you’re so close to cumming you can practically taste the high already.

“No, not now.” Kuroo chastises you as he retreats his tongue and fingers from you, the arch of your body ready to snap curling in a tremble of a denied release.

“Too soon, kitten. I want to savor this.” His tone comes out between pleased and patronizing, and it makes your cunt clench, empty.

You heave, unfocused eyes blinking the wicked golden away. “What--” A deep breath. “What do you want from me?”

“Wrong question, kitten.” Kuroo tells you just as his massive frame bends over you, the wicked eyes seducing you in once again -- not that they ever stopped. “Now that I got a taste,” He murmurs practically against your lips, and you lick where his breath hits, captivated, “I want all of you.”

He lets you fall on the bed once again and maneuvers your body without difficulty until your ass is high in the air and your thighs are spread, his tail lighter around your throat, fondly slithering on your jaw. His knee presses on the mattress until it squeaks and his hands massage from your thighs to your ass, prying it open and kneading it with hard, powerful hands.

“Beautiful.” He praises you and you swear your pussy throbs and flutters hard enough to make a gushing noise. By the way Kuroo snickers, it may be true.

His tongue is the first thing you feel right after his laboured breathing on your cunt. It pries you open, thick muscle sliding inside you, big and wet and dexterous and you’re moaning against the mattress in seconds.

Kuroo seems pleased even though all he does is hum, his large hands press on your back and the other opens your cheeks wide for his assault. Something hot prods your asshole, and you’re surprised at how careful his fingers can be while maneuvering the wetness left by his tongue there. They move slowly but surely as he presses and retreats, opening you from two fronts and still seemingly not enough.

He decides to change, his tongue coming out of your sex and then sliding to your ass as his thumbs open your lips for him to watch as he dips two big fingers inside your cunt. The stretch, the massive pleasure of being assaulted by both ends make you clench and cream around his digits, once again climbing up the familiar euphoric road.

This time, however, Kuroo stops you differently.

His hard, heavy hand falls on your ass cheeks forcefully in what must be his intention of being light. You yelp loudly and groan, somehow caught between winding down and flying right over the edge.

“Oh, hoho~” Sounds from his voice and he descends his hand once again on your ass, heavy and startling. It sounds so loud and so lewd in the empty room, your whole being burns in place, trembling from the effort of holding yourself in all fours and the pure elation growing inside you, spreading from your fingertips to the depraved center of your being.

As the sting settles in your senses, it winds down your orgasm but makes a renewed wave drip from your cunt and down your thigh. You’re surprised at how it excites you, the pain, but fuck it still stings. His hand falls on your ass a couple more times but then his hot palms knead the stinging flesh, an exquisite feeling spreading over you as it throbs and burns and you melt.

“Ugh! Fuck!” You groan, biting the mattress, unable to tell him to stop and too embarrassed to tell him to keep going.

“You really are a nice plaything, aren’t you?” Kuroo asks but it seems as if it's more for himself, his digits collecting your wetness as he dips once again inside your cunt, spreading his fingers apart and sliding a third inside just as his thumb circles your clit lightly and you howl, sensitive and wanton, too eager into tasting bliss.

This time, at least you’re half-conscious he’s not letting you cum. Kuroo stops, leaving you clenching for something, anything and gives you nothing. His immoral smirk seems to sound in the air, much as the way his tail leaves your throat to circle your hair and yank you back, stuffing your open mouth with the fingers that were just inside you. You lap obediently at them and he groans in your ear, teeth nibbling at your skin. It’s almost as if he’s tempted.

“We’re almost ready, kitten.” He tells you with a hoarse voice, all sin and flames, “Hold on.”

“Ready?” You question poorly with a mouth stuffed of fingers, but he understands and nods your way, his tongue licking the spit that starts dripping from the corner of your mouth at how broad his fingers open it.

You don’t see if Kuroo undress or if he just magically gets naked behind you, the startling thing being the incredible feeling of his hot skin on yours, the dazzling feeling of his hard planes of muscle on your back, the sublime sight of his skin marked by faint scars; When you feel the scalding, throbbing thick member at the side of your thigh, however, you have to look back.

“Oh my God,” You murmur at the sight of his cock. It’s proportional to his form, but that just means it’s ridiculously big, a veiny, swollen thing that seems looming as it stands close to you, and it clicks in your slow mind just what he meant by almost ready.

“Nope, I’m on the other team here.” Kuroo grins at you as he turns you with your back on the bed, spreads you on the cushion until your thighs hurt from the effort. His tail sways behind him as if to paint a scene, and you realize his wings are nowhere to be seen now, “Though I do think it’s some kind of poetic justice to have you screaming and blaspheming jesus while I fuck you silly.”

The higher part of your cheekbones alights with flames at the implication and you gasp back the words you planned on speaking when Kuroo’s hand pivots your lower back up to his mouth and closes his efforts on your neglected clit as his freak thick tongue enters you in one go.

You cannot explain the sensation of such a soft muscle invading your walls, or the way in which it seems to focus so expertly on your weak spots, but you’re too wound up not to fall head first into rapture.

When he stops this time, you actually curse him, in the most wrecked sound that has ever left your lips.

“Ughhhhhhh--Fuck you!”

The bastard laughs, debauched, then deposits a kiss over your pussy as his golden eyes fix on you. “Now you’re ready.”

Kuroo adjusts until you’re both at the bed, pulling you up on his powerful thighs until his cock bounces over your navel and reaches way too high for you to actually be calm. But then he retreats his hips, bent over you so his lips can steal the air from your lungs just as his large hand palms at your breasts and his tail slither by your side.

“Try not to cum too fast, kitten.”

“Easier said than done,” you grumble back against his lips and let yourself fall into the ruthless ecstasy of being spread open on his cock. His lips thread on the side of your jaw, under your neck, biting and sucking on your skin as his hands divide themselves between holding you up and pawing at every bit of you they can reach.

Everything feels so good, as if he knows your inner thoughts by hint alone -- your toes curl at each newfound area that receives his onslaught, you’re contorting at how good his mouth feels on your pulsepoint as he slowly starts to sink his cock inside you. It’s a weird feeling, to feel so full and yet still so eager, but you’re welcoming him at each torturous inch he manages to squeeze inside your tight walls. Your body trembles from the effort, Kuroo’s tongue slides from your neck to your nipple as his hand climbs up and settles around your throat, his fingers enveloping your neck.

Your heart picks up enough that you feel it beating on your ears as you search for his eyes and finally you’re pinned in place under the sharp gold and their twisted intent.

“Scream for god if you want me to stop.” Is the warning he gives you before his fingers start constricting around your neck, your airways blocked as your chest starts to heave. And in between the small twinge of anxiousness and alarm, you realize just how much that entices you, how much it makes you burn and crave. Somehow you feel corrupted, falling into desires that threaten to peel you apart and leave you exposed.

Kuroo’s cock keeps slowly stretching your insides and his tongue twirls your nipple, your lungs burning for air and your eyes rolling inside your skull as you skyrocket into blissful free-fall.

“Oh, hell yes.” You listen but don’t register as your body seems to be crushed under the massive pressure of your climax, burning and bright, sound ringing in your head that you come to find out it’s from your hoarse moan, your breathing laboured as Kuroo allows you to suck in air during your peak.

It dawns on you as you’re coming back to your body that theres a twinge of soft pain indicating Kuroo has bottomed out, his muscular thighs pressing flush against yours, the feeling incredible but fuck so much right now.

As Kuroo nestles himself entirely inside of you, you feel as if your focus shifts, the task to not concentrate all of your attention on the massive hot cock spliting you in two is difficult. Your body feels tight, and not just from your fluttering walls that are constricting around him.

Kuroo sends you a big smile above your head, twinkling eyes in the dark. “Now, hold on.”

You do your best to do so, your arms latching onto him with all the strength you can muster as his hips retreat and then slam back inside you. You’re jolted at each push and pull, the sensual motions so depraved as the noises echo in the room, and you’re dragged into the ferocious pleasure that threatens to overwhelm you, and despite the fact you’ve cum just few moments before, as his tail slides between your bodies and circles and pats at your clit, you’re screaming and, quite unbelievably, cumming again.

“Now we’re very ready.” Kuroo says in a grunt above you, shameless grin as his eyes do their golden thing once again. He lets you stop trembling, peppering small kisses along your collarbone until you’re breathing normally again, but something tells you you’re just being fooled.

“What?” You tiredly question, the feeling of dread confirming your suspicion.

“We have the whole night ahead of us, little one.” Kuroo nudges at the side of your face, bites softly at the junction of your jaw. “Or we could have more. All you need to do is say yes and i’ll mark you nice and easy here--” His teeth softly nibble on your pulsepoint, “and you’ll be mine.”

“Oh, god.”

“Haha, wrong again.” His eyes pierce yours, swirling gold as molten honey dripping over your body and weighting your mind down. “Go ahead, tell me what you want.”

It tips out, softly and raw, and you have to close your eyes to hide your emotion. “To belong.”

“Oh, my little thing.” Kuroo softly murmurs on your ear, “Belong to me, then.”

You’re swaying despite lying down, something big and heavy coiling inside your chest as you blink, “I don’t want to belong to someone who isn’t mine.”

It’s a big truth to leave out -- the need for companionship, but a mutual one, a lasting one, a trusting one. You don’t want to be alone, but you also don’t want to have someone who doesn’t belong to you, too.

Kuroo just smiles, golden eyes on yours, melting you from the fierceness alone. “Exactly,” he speaks against your lips, the taste of his breath on your tongue and you eagerly gulp it down, wickedly licking at his lips. “But i’ll be yours, too.”

In your hazed state, that’s all you need to hear, so you just shyly nod -- and Kuroo growls, angles your head to the side, and sears a marking bite on your neck -- deep, and painful. You mewl, body arching into his touch, and his tongue laps at the fresh wound, making it nice and numb.

“Now, let’s go to the main course.” Kuroo gives you no rest, retreating his hips and slamming back inside. “Don’t forget to breathe!” He teases between your moans.

Once the fucking starts, it’s a frantic mess, and it goes on forever until the mere feeling of Kuroo’s cock leaving your heat is enough to make you whimper at the loss. The feeling of him inside your walls, a thing that mingles with your being, seares your memory until you cannot remember the feeling of not being split open on his thick cock. As you melt away from the overstimulation of having no rest while Kuroo contently and incessantly keeps pistoning inside you, your painful pleasure mixes until you’re climbing into something that feels weirdly uncanny, your mind -- or is it your body? -- twirls inside itself as if there’s something more than just sweet release ready to burst out.

Kuroo has made you both teeter on the edge of pleasure and fall into it so many times you can’t differentiate the feelings that come now, this sensation of something being pulled out of you like the many orgasms he caused.

“Hmmm… Yes, my time is coming.” Kuroo groans, his hips movements turning sloppy, apparently displeased with his fucking being cut short while you very much suck a thankful breath at being able to rest. Kuroo’s teeth descend on your neck once again, his hot tongue over the pulsating mark of his bite and you feel him shudder and groan your name as he finally - finally - peaks, the feeling of hot spurts spreading inside you.

As he cums, Kuroo brings a finger to rub over your abused clit softly and between your oversensitivity and the fact he angles his fat cockhead to softly pound over your sweet spot as he sails his own climax, there’s very little you can do but be ripped apart in bliss, once again, by him. This time is weird. Even as pleasure keeps swirling inside you and building up with the eerie sensation, you can do very little but hold on and wait until the waves crash and pass and you can blissfully surrender into the darkness of exhaustion.

However, the freakish sensation twirling inside yourself builds and builds until you’re light-headed from the feeling and you just then realize how you’re shining, and how Kuroo has disappeared.

You don’t even have it in yourself to panic. Your body feels heavy and used, spent in the best way possible, but still completely unused to such a frantic session as every muscle in your being throbs, and your eyelids weigh the world as they fall closed and you’re engulfed by darkness.

[bonus scene]

When you wake up in the morning, you are engulfed in a nice blanket, dressed in some mismatched set of pajamas, feeling as if you just had the best sleep of your life - and a weird vivid dream to go with it. You’re blinking up to your ceiling, stretching on your bed and satisfied with how the knots break in small noises as you sit up, when you feel just how sore you are, how your body is heavy despite satisfied, how your thighs burn and your sex throbs.

Everything crashes up on your mind way too fast, and you’re suddenly torn between passing out and bolting up, but as you try to get up your body falters and a big, hard, hot hand plants itself over your middle and pulls you right back at the bed.

Of course, you scream.

“Shh, kitten, there’s people trying to sleep here, y’know?”

“What--How--What are you doing here?” You shriek, looking at what is definitely the demon you thought you dreamed, but in a way more humanized version if the absence of his horns, claws and massive wings are anything to go by. The golden eyes are sharp as ever, but no black background to them, and you can infer by that much that his sinful tail probably isn't around too.

The grin he sends your way gives you war flashbacks that make your skin prickle with goosebumps.

“Well, yesterday was quite nice.” He tells you and you can feel your whole face burn from his tone alone. “So I decided that hell can wait a bit more while I have more fun with you.” His eyes flash with a weird energy, and Kuroo brings his fingers to glide over his bite mark at your neck. The throbbing mark you had forgotten about until now. “After all, you’re mine now.”

“Oh, fuck.”

You’re doomed.

#kuroo tetsuro x reader #kuroo tetsurou x reader smut #kuroo smut #tw monsterfucking #haikyuu smut

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certifiedskywalker · 3 years

Text

Dating Sam Wilson Would Include...

Here’s some love for our Captain Falcon? Just Falcon? Captain Bird? Sam. Here’s some love for our Sam.

You wanted revenge.

When Steve invited you to jog with him, he said that he would keep pace with you.

He was a man of his word, but he didn’t even break a sweat while you were gasping for breath with your burning lungs.

You wanted revenge, and to see Steve sweat.

That was all!

Your return to the National Mall’s park of monuments for a practice jog was your training for that revenge.

It had nothing to do with the handsome, fellow jogger you and Steve had seen before.

When he happened to be there again, you thought you might as say hello to him.

Steve jogged at the crack of dawn each day and this mystery jogger seemed to have the same habit.

Odds were you would see the man again and if you were with Steve, you would want to be able to explain why you were so easily left behind in his dust.

He was easier to catch up with than Steve, though you were breathless by the time he glanced over his shoulder at you.

It took all you had not to stumble over your own feet when his dark eyes met your gaze.

All thoughts and want of revenge were forgotten: it was only you and….him….what was his name?

You needed to know but, talking to him? How could you!? You were already out of breath and he...he was looking at you like...

“You alright?”

His voice, laden with concern, brought you out of your reverie.

Heat rushed up to your face and, for the first time, you were happy that you were flushed from running.

“Uh, yeah,” you said through little pants of exertion, “sorry...I…”

You were loosing steam, physically and mentally.

You were embarrassed he had caught you staring, a stranger!

Talk about weird and creepy.

But the man gave you a half smile, a hint of hope that you didn’t royally mess up your chances.

He stopped jogging and, relieved to find an excuse to stop, you followed suit.

“You sure you’re alright?”

“Y-yeah,” you wheezed, “you’re just, you’re fast.”

“Tryin’ to race me then?”

You glanced up at him and nodded, “a race, sure.”

Your heart beat like a jack hammer; though you weren’t sure if it was because of the running or if you were nervous.

All you did know was that you were light headed and there was a good looking guy standing before you, worried about you despite the weirdness.

When you finally were able to fill your lungs with a decent amount of oxygen, you straightened your posture and met the mystery jogger’s gaze.

“I...do you want to get coffee sometime, or something?”

Had you really just asked that? Right now?

You were about to throw your arm over your face to hide your shame.

Just as you tried to think of other places you and Steve could jog, the man laughed.

It was a heart sound that warmed your chest, and his smile?

You had never seen anything quite like it: wide and pure.

As you shyly met his gaze, you realized it reached his eyes.

“How about water, like right now?”

“Now?”

“Yeah, now.”

The rest was history, simple as that.

He met Steve and Sam became a fixture in your life; and you in his.

Dates became missions and, before long, you shared a room at the Avengers compound.

You and Sam meshed on some silent level, beyond your shared understanding.

He could tell when you were off and you could read him so easily.

“Hey, you okay?”

“Rough day.”

“How about a flight to clear your head,” you suggested, handing him his goggles.

“As long as you’re coming with.”

He holds on to you so tightly as he flies through the city.

The trust you put in those metal wings to keep you both aloft was otherworldly

But never once did you doubt Sam.

He would never let you down.

Only lovingly embarrass you in front of friends and family.

When Sam retells the story of how you met to his sister Sarah, years later, he jokes about how he had never seen anyone looked more shocked in his life.

“I’ve been through war and Avengers training, so when I tell you I’ve seen people look like they’re about to shi-”

“Hey! The boys!”

At that same table, you hid your face and shook your head.

“I was scared I was going to creep you out.”

“Oh, you did,” Sam said with that wide, unabashed smile on his face. “But you were charming about it.”

He tells the story of how you met when you meet his family.

He doesn’t tell them about Hydra, about Bucky, or even the danger your jobs put you both in.

Sarah seemed to know it, and Sam’s nephews were too young to understand.

You get to see a side of Sam that he didn’t show the rest of the team.

“It’s funny.”

“What is?” He asked, drying the dishes you had just finished washing.

“They call you ‘Uncle Sam’, like the propaganda cartoon.”

“Cause we work with Captain America?”

“Yeah,” you said, nudging his shoulder with yours. “It’s funny.”

“It’s not, but it’s fun to see you try to be.”

With a gasp, you tossed a handful of soap suds at him.

White bubbles clung to his shirt and, after he collected himself, Sam looked at you with a playful fight in his eyes.

“Oh, it is so on.”

You both end up covered in suds and cleaning Sarah’s kitchen.

Whenever you and Sam aren’t in New York (for Avengers business) or in D.C. (for state business), you’re at his childhood home in Louisiana.

Sarah and her boys become your little family as you and Sam grow closer.

It’s strange, you’re not sure when you realized you were in love with him

Though, one night sticks out in your mind.

It was just you and Sam, sitting on the dock, basking in the orange light of the sunset.

“Thanks for coming down here with me. I know our missing person search is important, but I had to-“

“No, I get it,” you rested a hand on his muscled upper arm. “Family first.”

It’s then, when the silence falls over you both, that you realize Sam's staring at you

And you’re staring at him.

You’re desperate to break the sudden tension so you blurt out your first thought.

It seems that Sam did the same as you both say:

“You’re my family.”

Sam smiles, a soft smile, not the wide grin you loved; though, you loved this expression too.

Without a word, Sam leans in and presses his lips to yours.

He tastes like beer and the brownies Sarah made for dessert.

His hand cups your cheek and your fingers wrap around his wrist, holding his palm to your skin.

The kiss is gentle, though everything Sam did with you was gentle, as if he didn’t want to risk breaking the thing you had built together.

Not that he could break it.

Nothing could, not really.

When Sam pulled his lips from yours, a smile spread along your face.

“Plus, I get to see your baby pictures which gives me all the blackmail I could ever want.”

“You’re kidding me, right?”

“Only a little.”

He kissed you again, harder this time.

“I love you,” Sam mumbled against your lips.

“I love you too.”

Banter is a big part of your relationship.

Sam is always one for teasing and cracking jokes to keep people at arm's length.

But with you, while he still teases, he’s more careful

He’s not afraid to just stay quiet, savor the fleeting moments between missions with you.

During those ‘between times’, you and Sam stay in.

Work, missions, what have you, takes you both across the globe

So, when there’s peace, you both hunker down in the Avenger’s compound or visit his family.

Sam is an early riser due to his past in the military and is always awake before you.

He’s a sucker for breakfast food?

He’s always making it as you climb out of bed.

“You hungry?”

“Is that-”

“Pancakes.”

When you help him cook, Sam likes to put music on in the background.

You swear he does it on purpose because, when he inevitably starts to dance, he pulls you along with him.

Depending on the music, Sam will hold you close, sway with you in his arms, or shimmies around the kitchen until you become a giggling mess.

“Join me! You know you want to!”

“The food is going to burn!”

“Sure is! Now dance with me, baby!”

How could you not when he gave you that smile of his?

When things started to grow more heated, after Ultron, after Sokovia, your kitchen dance parties became rare.

You stayed with Sam, sided with Steve and you both paid the price for it.

It was only a few days before Steve came to save you all from the Raft but it was pure torture.

You were in the cell across from Sam, watching him pace the floor and tense up with anger.

The moment you were freed, you ran to him.

Being on the run with Sam added a new layer to your relationship.

It didn’t come without its challenges as being a wanted criminal was easy on no one.

There were nights where you and Sam would sleep with your backs to each other.

It was the stress of running that crippled you both on those nights, made everything, every worry and doubt, difficult to talk about.

But it was also running that brought you together, that kept you together too.

You and Sam would run to the rescue of some poor souls

And promptly run back to each other.

When Steve wasn’t around to keep you both in check, you and Sam would explore whatever country you found yourselves in.

Trying all sorts of different foods with him.

“What is that?”

“Delicious, so, does it really matter?”

Late night flights under the stars and holding each other close in the quinjet.

Then...Thanos…

And, despite all his carefulness and his holding you close, Sam was gone

For five years, you had no one to run with or to

You stayed with Natasha in the Avenger’s compound and tried to help Sarah with the house and her boys.

Whenever you went to Louisiana, you came back in tears.

“You don’t have to go back, you know,” Sarah said one time. “You’re always welcome here, Y/N. You’re family.”

It took all you had left of your strength to not break down in her living room, to not cry clinging to an old photograph of Sam in a baseball uniform.

“That’s why I need to go back,” you whimpered, “so we can try to get him back to us. His family.”

It’s a misty-eyed flight home.

Flying is not the same without Sam; the sky is emptier.

It felt like the thing, the love you had built together was about to break when Scott rolled up to the door of the Avenger’s compound with his ‘time heist’ in hand.

It gave you hope and, eventually, it gave you Sam back too.

“It’s been five years right? You haven’t aged a day.”

His joke brings you to happy tears before you fall into his arms, caked with grime from the battle.

“I got you, I got you.”

After Tony and Steve’s strange send off, you and Sam took a stay-cation.

Most of the time, you two stayed in bed, unwilling to let the other go in case something tried to snap reality in half again.

“I don’t know what he wants me to do with it,” he says, eyeing the bagged up shield propped up against your bedroom wall.

“You know,” you replied, lifting your head from his chest to look into his eyes. “He wants you to keep fighting. Be ‘Uncle Sam’.”

“It’s still not funny.”

You shake your head at him before leaning down to kiss him.

You’re careful, just as he was all those years ago on the dock.

When you pull away, you explain, “it’s not meant to be.”

Sam smiles at you, that same wide, pure smile that won you over the day you first met.

No matter what happens next, you know that, as long as you can see that smile, you’ll make it to fight another day.

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sepublic · 4 years

Text

Campfire, Canyon of the Golden Winged Snakes, Hey Ho Whoa!

AMELIA IS BACK BABY!!!

Let me tell you, when I first saw her, I had to do a double-take… Like the way the characters just so casually passed her, I blinked and was like- Wait, was what Amelia?!? And then I realized it was, and I just… WHAT!

I was a bit afraid we wouldn’t see her, but it seems that she’s our NEW fourth companion, to replace Tuba… RIP to Tuba, you had a good funeral, and given the trajectory this season is going as of now, we… Really won’t see you again, huh?

Screw you Simon.

We’ve gotten SO many fascinating revelations in these three episodes… I can’t say I’m surprised at all that Amelia, or at least the revelation of her, would return to help Grace (and maybe Simon) resolve her issues! That was a very neat twist with the massive pile of numbers actually indicating it was AMELIA and her monumental issues, not the Apex! Very clever of the writing team to have us heading towards her the entire time, though it makes me wonder when we’ll get back to the Apex given how we only have TWO episodes left…!

What’s interesting is that according to Amelia, there’s ‘corrupted code’ in some cars, and apparently this refers to any cars that SHE made while trying to figure out the perfect world? Amelia mentions ‘quarantining’ them, and One-One wants them gone as well… Given what Amelia says about ‘ejecting’ cars, does that mean they’re all transported to the very end of the Infinity Train, and just… thrown off?

Are there a bunch of cars strewn about somewhere in the wasteland, is there even an END to this Infinity Train??? Or are they all just lumped together and some sort of force-field is placed around them, or some other barrier, to keep the corrupt code from –presumably- infecting the other cars around them?

It is a bit weird to see One-One insist on getting rid of those cars, though… I hope the denizens inside are okay, especially those corgis! Given his lesson with Tulip about not blaming himself worked, I feel like this is contrary to what he’d learned? Or is he simply allowing those worlds to exist, and remain ‘weird’, while still fixing the corrupted code so it doesn’t spread and disrupt the world of other cars who have their own thing going on? Regardless, as Amelia said… it seems One-One is still working on his issue of viewing passengers as ‘numbers’ to fix, like the cogs of a machine! It seems he’s at least TRYING to be more personable, but, well…

It seems that Amelia is still working on that sound-motif she’s always had, which is pretty neat! She mentions a ‘pulse’, so I presume it’s sent out from the engine, and when it scans an ‘anomaly’ (AKA anything with corrupted code, including stuff and denizens from the unfinished cars) they’re ejected… Given Amelia mentioning having to quarantine Hazel soon, I imagine this pulse heads out every now and then? Shouldn’t one pulse alone have done the trick, or is there a certain range to them and Amelia has to travel through the cars and activate the pulse from her location, to allow maximum effect?

Anyhow, Amelia! You know, I mused that Episode 7 of this season would introduce the Book 4 protagonist, given how our previous Episode 7’s worked… Each one established the general idea/setting for our protagonist, as well as a formal introduction! The Chrome Car told us about Lake and her deal with wanting to be her own person, escaping the Flecs… The Mall Car established the Apex and properly introduced us to Simon and Grace…

So… maybe The Canyon of the Golden Winged Snakes Car re-introduces us to Amelia, while establishing the conflict of the next Book; Fixing the corrupted cars! This is just speculation on my part, of course…

Back to Amelia, I guess I shouldn’t be all-too surprised that she’s still kind of a jerk, what with the way she just… steamrolls over what Hazel has to say to ‘correct’ her with the proper facts, and whatnot! I’m a little glad, because it doesn’t completely forget that she still has a bigger number than Simon or Grace by FAR… But also upset, because c’mon Amelia, Hazel is a freaking kid! I know you’re trying to erase multiple decades’ of past sins and mistakes, but she doesn’t know!

I also like seeing her just trash-talk Simon and calling him a child, especially since we know that he and Grace are only eighteen thanks to the Reddit AMA by Owen Dennis… Even if Simon were physically older, mentally he really isn’t! Granted I guess I can’t blame him for THAT, though I can blame him for Tuba’s death…

I remember when the writers discussed juggling multiple characters, so after seeing Tuba die, I was wondering what was really the point… But I see now! It’s because they ALSO have to handle Amelia as well! And dang, she’s still remarkably callous… She doesn’t remember Grace at all and doesn’t even seem remotely interested… And upon hearing that a cult was started in her honor, she just does NOT care! It really shows that Amelia still has a LOT to work on, that just fixing the broken cars isn’t enough for her…

It was a bit weird to have our main trio just pass by this obvious, fellow passenger, and just totally ignore them… But given Grace’s rule about ‘not trusting adult passengers’, I guess I’m not surprised? I have to wonder when it was made, and how young she was when it was established; If Grace was a kid and that was part of her apprehension towards adults, and/or they were actually trying to get their numbers down, so she saw them as ‘deceitful’ or whatever! Coupled with adults being less likely to fall for the Apex’s propaganda, and it makes sense…

What’s really fascinating is that One-One doesn’t even know about the Apex, according to Amelia! Which, given the implied length of the Infinity Train, it really says a lot about how much stuff could’ve happened, completely independent from one another! It almost seems like fate that Simon and Grace encountered so many kids and brought them together… Whereas Tulip didn’t encounter ANY passengers, sans Amelia, on her journey!

(Well, there was that ONE dude in the next car over who immediately got sent back home. And she was only there for five months, but still!)

I feel this low-key ties back to what I discussed earlier, about One-One being an ‘ends justifies the means’ sort of person; That the situation with the denizens is less a matter of them dying, and more about what that says about the Apex passengers as people! Of course, he doesn’t even KNOW about them, which honestly blows my mind… He really IS disconnected, huh? I guess Tulip helped make a dent in his metal head, but there’s still a lot of work to go… You know, Amelia’s criticism of One-One seeing passengers as just ‘numbers’ reminds me of what some other fans brought up, on the idea of if whether or not issues can actually be quantified like that!

Given what Owen said about the train also being wrong sometimes, and I have to wonder if this will be resolved by the end of Book 3… or perhaps Book 4, assuming we get it! Yeah, most of the team has been laid off and the viewings are low, so SERIOUSLY- WATCH on HBO Max, spend actual money on this thing if you want it around because you’re LITERALLY paying for Book 4’s production by this point people! And spread the word!

Anyhow, looks like other fans were right- Hazel IS a failed creation of Amelia, in this case her attempt to recreate Alrick… Although she implies that Hazel is more than just a ‘clone’ of him, is this referring to Hazel being a little girl, or something else entirely? Is the implication that Hazel would’ve been her and Alrick’s child, because uh… Amelia and Alrick are white. She also mentions a ‘handkerchief’, so what’s THAT about…?! Did she just toss one aside and it glitched into Hazel…?

Hazel is taking this about as well as you’d expect a child, and I’m wondering if Grace suddenly turning around and calling her ‘null’, only to ask to stay overnight… Means that she has a plan to ditch Simon and hang out with Hazel and Amelia, for the rest of her life? Either way, Simon is apparently taking her ‘betrayal’ to heart… That, or he’s expressing genuine remorse at seeing what he did to Hazel, but probably not. Honestly, the way his character is going it seems like he may go off the deep end…

OR, maybe not! Because we get some more development on him and THE CAT… Samantha! That’s right, an actual name! I guess I’m not shocked that ‘Samantha’ managed to smuggle some tiny One-Ones out of the Tape Car, and even a miniature player as well! I have to wonder how she finds her stuff, honestly… Considering how vast the Infinity Train is, it’s not out of the question for people to go entire months without encountering others! It’s actually kind of a miracle of fate that The Cat has encountered so many passengers, over and over, across this show…! Given the possibility aired by Mace about some characters being ‘destined’ by the Infinity Train, and I’ve got to wonder…

It’s interesting that even when Simon is taking his rage out physically, he NEVER goes for The Cat… and she knows this, no less! Not once is she ever scared for her life, instead she’s more concerned for what this has to say about Simon! It’s complicated, all right, and apparently all we know for now is that The Cat accidentally left Simon behind, and ultimately stuck with her choice to prioritize herself! It’s interesting, the idea that even if Simon and The Cat have a better understanding as to why the other did what they did, they won’t ever really ‘forgive’ one another, or reconcile- Just go their separate paths, for now and likely eternity…

Simon is of course getting mad at Grace for not talking to him and is confused by her changing her mind! A confrontation between the two is inevitable in our last two episodes, and given how we haven’t seen Grace’s number at all… It’s probably low. I can see the two reuniting with the Apex at the end, only for Simon to invoke his larger number to turn them on Grace… Or try to head back to the Apex to do exactly that!

Still, given how the show is still making the point to delve into his perspective and trauma, and how he STILL won’t harm The Cat… I have to wonder if the season really will end with Grace leaving the Infinity Train, and Simon staying behind to fix his own issues? Of course, what about Hazel… We know she’s a denizen for sure so she can’t leave, right? Unless her fake number can fool One-One… Speaking of which, was Amelia’s number at 337 when she first arrived? Because that seems a bit small for someone who had otherwise hijacked the Infinity Train by then and was making unfinished worlds…

Back to Amelia, if Simon doesn’t help… I wonder if Book 3 will end with HER taking lead of the Apex and leading them down a new path? It’d be ironic given how she mentioned about not being great with kids, and tie back to her penance… Or, maybe Grace will continue to live with the Apex and help! Maybe Simon will join Amelia… Who knows? Personally I’m fixated on the fact that Amelia just UTTERLY outclasses Simon… I expressed previous appreciation at Tuba being able to defend herself, until you know what…

But given how Amelia is a lot more savvy, jaded, and cynical about this sort of situation; I think she’s probably safe for now! It’d feel a bit unresolved for Simon to get HER killed off too…

Overall, a fascinating turn of events, and I can get a good sense of why the episodes were clustered the way they were together, to be released separately! Each does its own little arc… The first one establishing the mood and having Tuba, only for her to die! Then the next one involving Amelia and the fall-out of the Hazel revelation… And the last two episodes will be THE finale, just like it’s traditionally been in the past! I can’t wait to see what happens next…

#infinity train #infinity train spoilers #spoilers #infinity train book 3 spoilers #infinity train season 3 #infinity train book 3 #infinity train grace #grace monroe #infinity train amelia #infinity train simon #simon laurent #infinity train hazel #analysis #speculation

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gmebackup · 3 years

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psychology 2 Electric boogaloo

So yesterday I posted about the psychological aspects of the entire stock craze.

Today I want to go a bit more in depth of how PSYOPS (psychological operations) normally work for military, but also how they apply to us today. if someone wants me to go in depth on how psyops is used on businesses feel free to let me know I'll do some research and post here

There is a certain order when it comes to PSYOPSIn order to create a successful PSYOP the following must be established:

1 clearly define the mission so that it aligns with national objectives 2 need a PSYOP estimate of the situation 3 prepare the plan 4 media selection 5 product development 6 pretesting - determines the probable impact of the PSYOP on the target audience 7 production and dissemination of PSYOP material 8 implementation 9 posttesting - evaluates audience responses 10 feedback

Before these steps can occur, intelligence analysts must profile potential targets in order to determine which ones it would be most beneficial to target. In order to figure this out, analysts must determine the vulnerabilities of these groups and what they would be susceptible to.

The analysts also determine the attitudes of the targets toward the current situation, their complaints, ethnic origin, frustrations, languages, problems, tensions, attitudes, motivations, and perceptions, and so on. Once the appropriate target(s) have been determined, the PSYOP can be created. this is the basic outline of how a PSYOPS work, now lets compare that to the entire GME situation

this is the basic outline of how a psyop works, now lets compare that to the entire GME situation

1 they need to find out what we think/feel and find our weakness.

this is the most simple one as we work in plain sight and let everyone see our DD

2 Can they pull this off? can they create FUD and divide our ranks?

Also easily yes

3 the plan:

Divide and conquer, make them doubt themselves and show their comrades are not as brotherly as they imagined.

4 the Media selection is also fairly easy to fill in

modern news media, meaning TV, newspapers, and reddit itself. We’ve all seen the people on tv saying we are idiots, we are dumb etc etc News article after news article stating that it’s over And here is the only one that may have actually shown to have some effect: other users Other users saying we missed the boat, other users showing their “gains” and using others to turn against each other. 5 Product development See how well it’s doing so far? 6 pretesting Can and will these things affect us? Yes and no, the media didn’t work as we could see the facts were skewed across the board, and they are still using short ladder attacks so… no Having other users spread doubt… Yes, this has worked for some people. 7 product and dissemination Normally this is where (if it was used by a military operation) it would be implemented, but due to time constraints I believe they started right after the “planning” phase in 3 8 Implementation Putting it to use, again I believe the implementation begon at point 3 9 posttesting Evaluation of the audiences response, do they react and how do they react 10 feedback If it works, at which points, if it doesn’t where and why? This last one is very easy, noticed how all mainstream news died off about the negativity towards GME BB AMC and NOK? But how the influx of new users on WSB become more prevalent? This is because they knew we didn’t give a fuck about the mainstream media, we cared about our brothers in arms.

Now with knowing some of the basics lets do a quick and dirty analysis of all of this, From end of 2020 to about 18-01-2021 the sentiment was positive. At this date we saw a wide range of implementation of the media. And everyone was saying we were stupid etc etc. Hell we even got a billionaire to cry on tv

This negative attention seemed to only bolster us in our conviction that we were and are correct in what our DD has lined out for us.

Ok so the main media networks don't work, What does?

Ok so the main media networks don't work, What does? Well lets use their main tools (reddit) against them. And what did we suddenly see since the 27th/28th? Suddenly the mod team changes, and this is very important because if you control the people who control the board you control the narrative, skewing it from positive to negative. (as we’ve seen a lot of people getting their positive posts deleted, their DD deleted etc etc) We also seen a massive influx of bots, negative posters, people showing their “gains” And this seemed to work so they stuck with it. Now look at these last paragraphs and compare them to a normal Psyops mission. Do you think they kind of align a lot? Good because this is what we have been using since as long as we can remember Some real world examples of things like this being implemented are for example: The Gleiwitz incident Hitler invaded Poland, took control of their radio tower and made it seem like Poland attacked Germany, this way he could “retaliate” without any repercussions at the time. As he was only defending his country.

Operation Bodyguard A plan to mislead the Germans during WW2 to make them think the time and place of the invasion (D-day) would take place at another time and date then it did. There are a lot of WW2 examples but I think it’s more prudent to focus on modern day as this was the beginning of modern psyops, but it has evolved a lot since then. To most people when you say “PSYOPS” they think of Vietnam, and rightly so as here we were starting to use more and more psychological methods. First off this is a very interesting read; http://www.psywarrior.com/VietnamCommanders.htmlAnd for the people who think PSYOPS are no longer used, they are and they’re still recruiting; https://www.goarmy.com/careers-and-jobs/special-operations/psyop/psyop-history.html

Vietnam;

The Phoenix program; The program was designed to identify and destroy the Viet Cong via infiltration, torture, capture, counter-terrorism, interrogation, and assassination. The CIA described it as "a set of programs that sought to attack and destroy the political infrastructure of the Viet Cong". The Phoenix Program was premised on the idea that infiltration had required local support from non-combat civilian populations, which were referred to as the "political branch" that had purportedly coordinated the insurgency.

Operation Wandering soul; Now this one is actually one that is pretty fucked up in my book, this was an OP that screwed with their heads on such a level this one should be criminal.

The VC believed at the time that the dead should be buried at home or else the soul was stuck wandering the earth aimlessly, sounds fairly normal if you believe in those things. But then the US was like “they aren’t at home right? What if we play distorted human sounds and zombie like sounds to fuck with them”. This is the gist of what happened

Check this site out for more on OP Wandering soul: http://www.psywarrior.com/wanderingsoul.html

Now to keep this a bit shorter I will give you a couple of operation names here which you can research if you want, they are important in this grander thing but or else this post would turn into another thesis on PSYOPS. Operation CHIEU HOI Operation MOCKINGBIRD (highly unclear of the scope but it does reflect a lot of what we see today in the ways of media manipulation) Operation FIELD GOAL (leaflet drop mission, much like the recent “GAINS” posts as it has the same effect, either you get convinced the squeeze is squoze or you lose morale)

Modern day(desert storm to now)

Gulf war Banknotes; This one is a very good one, as they used banknotes which had some added text to it, sounds innocent enough right?Nope this one was one of the more effective ones they used in desert storm/shield.http://www.psywarrior.com/GulfWarBanknotes.html

Give it a read because it’s too good to just give a small synopsis here.

Command Radio Solo over Iraq Because Iraq was still a technologically lagging country back then they used radio to give out propaganda, again using mainstream media to push their idiology.http://www.psywarrior.com/CommandoSoloIraqScripts.htmlThis page has everything on it, including the scripts they have used at the time.

Some other golf war things to look into:

http://www.psywarrior.com/Iraqleaflinks.html

Compare those to the disinformation we are receiving when it comes to gains and why we should sell.

Operation OBSERVANT COMPASS 2003 initially an op to get Joseph Kony and to end the “lord's resistance army in central afrika.

Toppling of Saddam Hussein statue Arguably the most visible image of the 2003 invasion of Iraq was the toppling of a statue of Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square in central Baghdad. Allegations that the event was staged have been published.

It is claimed it was actually an idea hatched by an Army psychological operations team. Allegations surfaced that not only were the cheering group of people surrounding the statue in fact smaller than they were made out to be, in media depictions, but that also the group were not local to the area and were instead brought in by the military for the specific purpose of watching and lending credence to the pre-planned toppling.

Use of music in interrogation of prisoners. Again this one is one we all know about, using heavy metal on Iraqi prisoners, as they’ve never heard heavy metal this fucks them up beyond belief. this is a more hands on PSYWAR but it's morale based

Pentagon analysts and the mainstream media In 2008, The New York Times exposed how analysts portrayed in the U.S. news media as independent and objective were in fact under the tutelage of the Pentagon.

According to the NYT:

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance

CNN and NPR interns incident In 2000, it came to light that soldiers from the 4th Psychological Operations Group had been interning at the American news networks Cable News Network (CNN) and National Public Radio (NPR) during the late 1990s. The program was an attempt to provide its PSYOP personnel with the expertise developed by the private sector under its "Training with Industry" program.

The program caused concern about the influence these soldiers might have on American news and the programs were terminated.

National Public Radio reported on April 10, 2000:

The U.S. Army's Psychological Operations unit placed interns at CNN and NPR in 1998 and 1999. The placements at CNN were reported in the European press in February of this year and the program was terminated. The NPR placements will be reported this week in TV Guide.

Conclusion:

Am I saying the army or government is involved? No What I am saying is that most of the information regarding PSYOPS is publicly available, and anyone with a decent understanding of sociology and psychology can use this to their advantage. And I’m sure that not everyone who was in PSYOPS at one point or another, would stay there forever. These people usually branch out and use their acquired skillset and use it on the open market to get some big bucks. And while there are laws forbidding the U.S. government to use misinformation/PSYOPS on their own people, there are none for corporations, so they can still implement this. What you can see here is a fairly simple pattern and Modus Operandi. Just translate it to modern times.

-TV and Radio have been used to spread doubt about “is this over or not”.-They use twitter as an outlet showing “experts” who say we are stupid bad or nihilists, this is bait don't take it ok?

-Leaflets have been updated for the modern day, “LOOK AT MAH GAINS” “LOOK IVE SOLD SO SHOULD YOU AT AN ALL TIME LOW”, pictures are all we need instead of leaflets now. Why sell for losses? If you believed in the stock then believe in it now, even Mark Cuban said “if you can afford to hold, hold. That’s what I would do.”

Infiltration and seed Fear Uncertainty and Doubt. Make people lose faith in the cause they are in.We have seen this with bots, and real people who are suddenly in the WSB group and other groups, but it’s funny how it’s mostly concentrated on WSB no ?We have seen other members talking to people on Webull asking if they’re getting paid and they flat out said yes 20 bucks for every post with minimally 3 interactions.When those naysayers get caught on reddit and pointed out suddenly they do an account wipe (seen this at least 5 times myself and seen others post about this).

Control the narrative

This is the most important one can do, if you control the narrative you control the way people think interact etc Since a week or so WSB has become very negative about something they were rallying behind for months, like on the flip of a dime.

New mods instated, old ones removed

And suddenly all the positive things about GME are suddenly gone. u/zjz has been removed out of the blue while being one of the better mods on there.

Right now they are controlling the narrative and spreading “fake news” I fucking hate Donny but I’m ashamed to admit that he might have been right about the entire fake news idea. Because look at the news media; Gme craziness they will crash the market GME craze over now silver Silver now Uranium They all went broke etc etc. EVERYTHING BACK TO NORMAL PLZ DONT LOOK

But if you look at multiple sources…. The shorts are not covered at all The Short ladder attacks (which we can just call ladder attacks at this point) keep going day in day out because we are not selling and they keep shorting it.

Take the facts that you can check yourself. Cross check over and over and over, you will see automatically which ones are correct (if a 100 say the outcome is 120 and 20 say they’re at 50 look at the credibility of those people giving the information).Do your DD, cross check with the DD of other members (this is most likely why WSB removed these)As this is the most powerful one, who is on board who does what why do they do it etc etc.

Normally the announcement that Cohen,fils-aime, Francis, Durkin AND Kruger would impact the stock in a very positive manor, yet the stock went down 20% that day

Compare your findings with the Median of when something like that happens normally the stock shoots up, you can find what’s actually happening and what is being pushed on you.

Like: people have already sold out their shares (while the data shows otherwise https://www.reddit.com/r/GME/comments/lejf39/good_news_apes_are_holding_numbers_are_out_apes/ )My conclusion is that there are a lot of things happening behind the scenes to keep us infighting and divided, as long as we all keep positive we can actually come out on top of this.

Make no mistake gentlemen we are at war. And half the war is a war of hearts and minds

Capture their minds and their hearts and souls will follow

#gme

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fairie-gothmother · 4 years

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In The Shadow of Starlight, Part 1: The Fall

A convoy of technical vehicles sped through the desert towards a recently sighted pillar of fire. Octavia looked out the vehicle’s backseat window as they raced toward a rising plume of smoke in the distance. The sun hovered just above the horizon. Orange light cast long shadows that stretched over the dust dunes. Pandora was beautiful when everything on it wasn’t trying to kill you.

It had only been four days since the Calypso Twins had stolen the powers of the legendary Firehawk. Four days! And the Crimson Raiders were responding to distress calls nonstop. Octavia had barely kicked her feet up after returning from the last one before she received the message to rejoin the convoy. Reports poured in from all across the planet. With their limited manpower, it was a struggle to keep up.

So much had changed recently between the warring factions. Octavia recapped the events in her head to keep things straight.

The Calypso Twins were self-proclaimed gods leading a cult called the Children of the Vault. Tryeen Calypso- one of six powerfully magical beings called sirens- could leech the life force from any living thing, draining them until nothing remained but a hollow husk. She managed to absorb the powers belonging to the commander of the Crimson Raiders, another siren named Lilith, famously known as the Firehawk.

Tyreen was having fun with her newly acquired powers by teleporting her brainwashed cultists around everywhere in a telltale pillar of fire, spreading their influence by broadcasting videos of their raids on the Echo net.

Troy Calypso was the propaganda mastermind who operated mostly behind the scenes, editing videos of murderous raids and turning them into slapstick jokes, air horns and all. His weapon of choice was an enormous sword wielded in a cybernetic arm. Although he spent most of his time out of the spotlight, Troy proved to be equally as brutal as his sister.

In short, the Calypsos were powerful monsters with hordes of mindless followers at their disposal, hell-bent on becoming the brightest stars in the sky while watching the universe burn at their feet.

The Crimson Raiders were doing everything they could to keep that from happening. That included Octavia. She fidgeted with the long sleeves of her shirt. Her anxiety sat heavy in her stomach like a chunk of eridium. She held up her arm to check the device attached to her wrist for what must have been the twelfth time. Straps secure, poison darts loaded, compression mechanism functional, safety off. Oops. She flicked the safety switch on and pulled her sleeve back over it. The last thing she needed was to accidentally shoot a poison dart at anyone.

She always hated being asked to come along on these calls. She wasn’t much of a fighter. Ah, who was she kidding? She was damn near useless. Octavia set her medical bag onto her lap to remind herself why they needed her there. The Crimson Raiders fought the bad guys, and Octavia patched up the good guys. She didn’t claim to be a doctor, nor was she legally allowed to. She was an herbalist. Ever since Dr. Zed went missing, Octavia stepped in as the primary medic. What she wouldn’t give to be back in her greenhouse right now.

Lilith looked back from the driver’s seat. “I know that look. Are you psyching yourself out?”

“As always. Is it that obvious?” Octavia thought she was holding herself together better than last time. Of course, Lilith always picked up on little things like that. Not much gets past the commander of the Crimson Raiders. Maybe intuition comes with the job.

Lilith smiled. “Don’t worry, it’ll be fine. We’ll clean up this mess and be back up in Sanctuary in no time.” Her golden eyes glinted as she drove, fiery red hair slightly muted with dust that settled everywhere on this planet. It was still strange to see uniformly fair skin on her arm which was once wrapped in blue glowing siren marks. No one called Lilith the Firehawk anymore, avoiding what that implied. Even though she was no longer a siren, she continued to live up to her legendary status.

The technical’s radio crackled. “We’re almost there,” said a female voice. “Let’s stop here outside the entrance.”

There already? Octavia looked out the window at the camp before them. Its high scrap metal fence made it impossible to see inside. The Children of the Vault were probably tearing the place apart shouting the Twin Gods’ praises.

Lilith picked up the radio’s microphone and responded, “Copy that, Maya.” The technical came to a stop. Lilith grabbed an SMG from the passenger’s seat. Turning once again to Octavia, she asked, “You ready?”

Octavia squeaked, “As ready as I’ll ever be.” She gulped in an attempt to force her heart down from her throat and opened the door.

Before them stood a rundown camp that looked abandoned. Smoke billowed from inside. It was relatively quiet. No bandits screaming, no gun fire, no explosions; just a distant metallic screech. Crimson Raider soldiers filed out of the technicals parked beside them.

Lieutenant Cramer stood at the ready. He was an older man that exuded pure military discipline. If you got out of line, he was the one to whip you back into shape. And he enjoyed doing it.

Maya’s electric blue hair and siren marks made her stand out like an orchid the desert. A hood was pulled over her head, coat flowing behind her in the breeze as she walked swiftly over to Lilith.

“Strange, it’s never this calm,” said Maya.

“Stay on your toes. By now, we should know better than to underestimate them,” Lilith warned.

Once the whole group gathered around, Lilith gave everyone their instructions. “Maya, you and I will stay outside with teams Beta and Charley. Octavia, wait in the technical, and be on standby. Lieutenant Cramer, take team Alpha through the front gate. Stay alert and keep an eye out for survivors. I wanna see everyone back in Sanctuary at the end of the day. Let’s do this.” The soldiers spread out. Lilith gave a nod to Lieutenant Cramer. The battle scarred veteran nodded in acknowledgement. He began giving orders to his team and used hand gestures that Octavia wasn’t familiar with.

Octavia climbed into the front seat of the technical as instructed. She took a deep breath steadying her nerves. She was definitely going to her greenhouse for some kragweed after this. The view from the windshield gave a better vantage point of the area. She gripped her dart gun concealed on her wrist, praying she wouldn’t have to use it.

Team Alpha was about to make their move when Cramer held up his fist signaling to halt. The screeching sound had grown so loud it made Octavia want to grind her teeth together. Maya held her hand in front of her, fingertips sparking and siren marks flaring to life. All eyes and guns were on the entrance prepared to meet what was about to emerge. Showtime. The gates swung open.

The hunched figure of a man limped out dragging a heap of machinery behind him. Wires sparked from the twisted metal as it scraped along the ground. Upon first glance, it was easy to miss that the machinery was actually attached to the man; a cybernetic arm that threatened to tear itself from the shoulder. Blood stained the dirt behind him in a dotted trail as he hobbled forward. The screeching stopped when the figure paused and looked up. Oh, shit.

Lilith’s eyes widened in horror. “What the hell,” she whispered under her breath.

Troy Calypso.

The once mighty God King himself stood before them in a mangled mess. He’d been stripped of his ornate coat and oversized sword. His ribs slid feebly beneath tanned skin as his breath rattled inside his bare chest. The iconic side-swooped hairstyle had fallen; his black hair soaked in blood and stuck to the side of his face. One side of his modified jaw slacked as if hanging from a broken hinge.

Octavia had briefly seen Troy in the cult’s live streams. Countless people died at this man’s hands as he laughed and broadcast their deaths. That same man now stood in front of them broken and bleeding, and Octavia was paralyzed with shock.

She jumped as Lilith broke the silence. Lilith called out to him, “What happened?”

Troy lifted his gaze. His icy blue eyes scanned across the teams of Raiders, passing over Octavia making her blood run cold. After focusing on Lilith, he cocked his head to the side and started to laugh which quickly turned into a wet cough. He gasped for air, then spat onto the ground. Gold capped canines glinted through a bloody smirk. “What, this?” He glanced down to his mechanical arm as it popped sending a shower of sparks bursting from it. “Ah, y’know. Got denounced, excommunicated, and left for dead in the middle of nowhere. How was your day?”

Lilith was stunned. She seemed to be at a loss for words at his flippant response. The expression on her face was more confusion than fear. Octavia wished she could say to same for herself.

Maya pressed further, “Excommunicated? Are you saying you got thrown out of the Children of the Vault?”

“Yeah, well. Guess I overstepped my boundaries with the God Queen. She labeled me a heretic, and our followers turned on me. Not really much I could do to fight back. Must be nice,” Troy pointed to Maya with his remaining human arm covered in unmistakable red glowing marks, “to be a functional siren.”

No, it couldn’t be. Troy Calypso was a siren? Octavia was far from being an expert, but it was common knowledge that sirens were always female. This would make the first male siren known in history. Male sirens were unheard of, thought to be impossible.

Maya lowered her voice to Lilith, speaking just loud enough for Octavia to overhear. “This doesn’t feel right. It could be a trap. What do we do?” They didn’t seem to be surprised at this revelation. Did they already know?

“I’m not sure. He’s in pretty bad shape. Do you think Tyreen would do this to her own brother to pull one over on us?” Lilith concluded.

‘Pretty bad shape’ was a drastic understatement. No one would willingly do this to themselves, especially someone as egocentric as Troy. Something was definitely off here. He must have done something pretty bad to get disowned and banished by his twin sister. Octavia shuddered at the thought.

Octavia jumped from the vehicle. Lilith and Maya turned to her after hearing her feet hit the dirt. “If he doesn’t get medical attention soon, he’s going to die,” Octavia interjected. “The COV is unpredictable, but I don’t think they’d go so far as to beat one of their Gods within an inch of his life just to trick us.” After receiving questioning looks, she added, “Th-that’s just my opinion.”

Lilith was quiet for a moment, deep in thought before reaching a decision. “Bring him in for questioning.”

“Are you kidding me?!” Maya’s voice echoed. After being shushed by Lilith, she continued in a strained whisper, “This guy is dangerous. There’s no way we can take him to Sanctuary. He could be lying.”

“Then we keep a close eye on him.” Lilith returned her attention to Troy. He hadn’t moved, standing in a growing pool of blood and oil. He simply waited for the Crimson Raiders to decide his fate as if he lacked the strength to do anything else. “Octavia, can you keep him from bleeding out?”

“Of course,” she responded. That was her job, and she was damn good at it. Although- “I don’t know much about cybernetics.”

“We should talk to Ellie. Luckily, she’s stationed at an outpost nearby. We’ll take Troy there until we can decide how to move forward,” said Lilith. “Hey, don’t look at me like that. We’ll figure it out.”

Maya stopped glaring as if she didn’t realize she was doing it. “Sorry,” she said and directed the glare at Troy instead.

What the hell were they getting into?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hello, Tumblr! I hope you enjoyed part 1 of my new ‘In The Shadow Of Starlight’ series. Shout out to @border-spam for the Calypso Twins Prompts. ‘Heretic’ was such a huge inspiration that it influenced me to create an entire story of my own. (All the shorts can also be found on their AO3.) I will post a few more chapters regardless, but if enough of you like the series, I’ll keep it going.

Thanks for reading my garbage!

#troy calypso #borderlands3 #redemption #fanfic #fanfiction #Troy #calypso #au #in the shadow of starlight

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prettywordsyouleft · 5 years

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Fly Away With Me // AIRFORCE7

Summary: After falling from the skies in an active war zone, Jinyoung hadn’t expected to be healed by your laughter and love.

Pairing: Park Jinyoung x reader (ft. GOT7 in AIRFORCE7)

Genre: pilot au / 1940s era / romance

Warnings: Due to the era it’s set in, this will contain minor war conflict in some of the stories. I will not be making the war-zone my main focus in this series however.

A/N: Here’s the next instalment in this series. It’s going to be the only one in the series based in active war, but I promise it’s not that dark. Please note: I just edited this fiction before posting and if there are any errors, I will edit them out in the next couple of days :)

Word count: 5333

This series will continue every Thursday until completed at 10am NZST.

Nothing had prepared Jinyoung for the war. He hadn’t been foolish to think he would be invincible; he had kept up with news and casualties overseas for some time before the fight reached him. And with all the missions he had done so far with his squadron, Jinyoung had believed it would be hard.

But not nearly as hard as this.

Days blended into night and there was barely any time in between the moon rising and the sun shining again to rest within. He didn’t even know what day it was, and vaguely could remember the month now. He spent more time within his plane than anywhere else, and the soundtrack of his day kept him awake at night, unsure if the guns firing were simply flashbacks from earlier in the skies, or an actual raid was happening above his place of rest.

Some of those who he flew out with didn’t come back home and his attitude was no longer motivated, now bleak. The only thing that was keeping him going was knowing the rest of his team not only felt the same, and was flying out beside him. Yet when that changed, Jinyoung stumbled for the first time during his service in the Air Force.

“Sir, you can’t separate our team up, we work best together,” he argued the orders handed to him and his Lieutenant, Jinyoung glancing at his best friend and at how tight Jaebum’s jaw was now. Jinyoung stepped forward towards the Corporal, seeking answers.

The official looked just as exhausted as the rest of them did, and dragged a hand down over his face at Jinyoung’s statement. He then looked at him, his eyes sad yet firm. “Son, I need you up in them skies protecting us down below. I don’t care what formation you fly in, who you fly with, so long as you take out those bastards that keep coming for us, and make it home as safe as you can. We can’t keep losing pilots as we have been. I need you spread out, fighting from all angles and keeping those who aren’t as good as you in the cockpit safe, you hear me?”

“Understood, sir,” Jaebum replied, saluting before heading out of the office. Jinyoung glanced between the two, saluting the Corporal as well, and then ran after Jaebum.

“You know very well that if we split up, we lose our power.”

“We’re losing as it is. The government talked up a big game. Our nation would win the war. And we will, but at what cost?” Jaebum shook his head, scoffing loudly at the mere thought. Jinyoung agreed, the hope propaganda had never been something he believed in, but in the very least, it kept the air force united and strong. He glanced around at the faces of those who remained, looking haggard compared to newcomers.

“She can’t train them fast enough either,” Jaebum continued, his gaze out in the field to where his wife and the AIRFORCE7’s Captain stood. Jinyoung knew Jaebum held more burdens on his shoulders now; the ring upon his finger was put there just before the war broke out here. A simple promise that their love wouldn’t part no matter where in the world they were. It made Jinyoung’s argument weaken. He had nothing but his youth to keep fighting for.

“So we’ll get up there and give Cap time then.”

Jaebum glanced at Jinyoung, a ghost of a smile playing on his lips. “Thought you were against splitting up?”

“Oh, I am,” Jinyoung retorted, sighing heavily as he saw a new cadet struggle to land his plane fast enough. “But if we’re what the skies need right now, who am I to argue with that?”

Jaebum smiled and clapped him on the back. “Know that flying away from you will be one of the hardest missions I take on, Park.”

“Just one request,” he started as they headed back to the office, Jaebum’s eyes crinkling up with amusement before Jinyoung could finish his sentence. Even though he knew they were on the same wave-length, Jinyoung grinned before continuing. “Just don’t leave me with BamBam. I don’t need to protect his ass when he has a meltdown too.”

When the teams were assigned, Jinyoung hadn’t gotten much luckier with not landing BamBam. It wasn’t that he didn’t like Jackson, when not up in their planes, he got along with his comrade well. Yet, much like the name of his metal stead, Jackson was too bold, and some would even use the term crazy. It made him resilient in the face of enemies, though he was pig-headed too.

“Back off for now, Wang, we need to get back to the base.”

“There’s only four of these suckers left. Orders were to take out the enemy. We haven’t finished that yet.”

Jinyoung cursed at the reply, knowing all too well that turning his back on the pilot had been too risky. He saw Jackson’s Crazy Horse speeding towards the west, where enemy planes were just picked up on.

“Turn back you idiot! The rest of our squad is going back and it’s not time to play the hero. We need refuelling and rest.”

“I see one! I’m going to take it down!” Jackson radioed back through and Jinyoung cursed again, propelling himself back into the action. He couldn’t let Jackson do this alone, and maybe his friend was right. If they took out four more enemies, then their team would be the one with the highest tally for the month. Somewhere along the way, how many planes you could take down became the game to keep the soldiers entertained. Jinyoung tried to remember there were people within the enemy cockpits, yet there were far too many faces and crimes of the war that he wasn’t ready to put weight upon.

“There’s one on your flank, I’ll take him out,” Jinyoung told Jackson before targeting the enemy, shooting until it fell away from his side. Jackson had already taken two of the four planes down himself, and Jinyoung scanned the area for the remaining fighter plane. He couldn’t see it anywhere. “Wang, what you seeing?”

“Nothing, I’m seeing nothing.”

“He was here a moment ago,” Jinyoung radioed back, feeling uneasy all of a sudden.

“Maybe we got him in the crossfire, let’s head back.”

Jinyoung was about to agree when he finally spotted the lone fighter, hitting the throttle to try and get to Jackson fast enough. The pilot fired at them both, Jackson using his nimble flying skills to his advantage to roll out of the way. And this left Jinyoung in the prime spot to become a target. He saw the pilot up close, his face just as weary, just as angry with this endless war. And that was the last thing Jinyoung saw within the clouds, the sudden blast spiralling all control out of his hands.

He had prided himself on being one of the best pilots, who never put himself in the wrong place. However, the only one Jinyoung could blame for this mistake was himself.

When his senses returned to him, he couldn’t hear gunfire. And he was certain he was no longer falling, instead, he was laying on something far more comfortable than the seat of the cockpit that he last remembered ejecting from. Was he laying on a soft bed of grass? Jinyoung took a tentative sniff, and wasn’t met with earthy smells.

“Why am I in a hospital?” he groaned, his throat feeling too dry to have said so many words all at once. Before his eyes opened, he heard the low chatter stop in the corner, feet rushing towards him. Finally, he blinked back the heaviness of his eyelids, groaning again when the lights above him made his blurry vision suffer further. He tried to sit up, or at least turn away from the blinding light, but his body was soon held down and someone thankfully blocked out the harsh brightness above. Jinyoung instantly relaxed against the bed again. “Water.”

“Of course,” your voice mentioned and soon you were guiding a straw into his slightly parted lips, the effort of swallowing a small sip hurting just as much as that first sentence had. It felt cool going down his throat, however, and Jinyoung bared the pain as he sipped more of the liquid down, quenching some of his thirst.

And then he finally got a proper look at you. He blinked again, your white outfit with the light illuminating above you made him smile lazily. “Did I die?”

“No, soldier, you’re very much so alive.”

“You look like an angel,” he told you and you smirked.

“And you’re still feeling the effects of those heavy drugs. I sure am no angel.”

“What happened?”

Your humour left you as you stood up, and he immediately clamped his eyes shut again until he had managed to turn his head. His gaze followed you as you reached to fluff his pillows. “What else? You were shot down, found by a farmer by the wreckage of your plane. You know you got very lucky. Had the part of the wing gone any higher, you might have been grounded for good.”

“Grounded?” Jinyoung looked around himself for answers, stopping when he saw his right leg propped up on pillows and the ankle held up in a leg sling. He let his head fall back onto his pillow, defeated.

“Now there’s no need to be that dramatic. You’ll need some weeks for the initial healing stage, and a bit of stabilising when you go to walk until it’s stronger, but you’ll walk again, soldier, don’t you worry.”

“How long until I can leave here?”

You frowned, throwing your hands up a little. “Didn’t you just hear me? You have some weeks.”

“You don’t understand,” Jinyoung complained, and then sat up with a start, a hiss leaving him as his body reacted to being jerked around like that. You scolded him immediately, but he craned his neck all around, looking for another familiar face. He then glanced back at you. “Wasn’t there another soldier?”

“Afraid not, there was just you. Now would you lay back down and rest? You’ve only just woken up and you can afford to take some time to let your body heal. You’ve done enough for our country as it is, I’m sure.”

The next day passed by doing just that, sleeping in and out. He would listen to the conversations you and the nurses held sometimes, and others he was just thankful to sleep undisturbed. He hadn’t rested like this in months, and although he needed to get word out that he was okay and find out if Jackson was as well, there was a small positive in sleeping without worry of the next air raid siren going off.

When he had his fill of slumber, Jinyoung propped himself up, smiling as you busied yourself with another patient. The ward he was in wasn’t very large, and as he looked around the equipment, he realised he must be in a countryside hospital.

“You look to have some questions today,” you mused as you came over to check the IV bag beside him and the line that was attached to his arm. “But I have one for you. Your dog tags were missing, soldier. Now I’ve done all the best I can without a name, but if you could do me a favour and remember it, that would make our interactions a lot better, don’t you think?”

“Jinyoung,” he uttered, and you smiled. “Park Jinyoung.”

“Well, Jinyoung, that was easy enough. Now, how would you like some proper food instead of the liquid diet?”

He nodded happily, and with a melodic laugh, you patted his arm and left the room. Five minutes later, you returned with a tray of food, shrugging lightly as you placed it down. “You slept through breakfast and lunch, so I hope you don’t mind my catering skills. A sandwich should be fine enough to swallow now. Tonight, you can enjoy dinner from the local cook.”

“Thank you.”

“The pleasure is all mine. So, those questions?”

“How do I get word out from here? Where am I?”

You smiled again. “In the middle of nowhere. Frankly speaking, the war hasn’t been all that busy around here, though it has made our phone lines unreliable. Mail is the best we’ve got, but the roads are damaged so it’s taking its time. Do you need me to write for you?”

“I need to message my team to let them know I’m alive. They’ve probably reported me MIA by now.” Jinyoung stopped to think of Jackson, the queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach making the sandwich he was eating stick to the back of this throat. He choked a little and you handed him a cup of water, which he silently thanked you for. “I need to know if my friend is okay.”

“Is it easy to have a friend in the war?” you asked, sitting down on the side of his bed. Jinyoung frowned as you sighed. “I hear more men fall out of the skies than stay up in them these days. Can you afford to have friends?”

“It’s what keeps us going on,” he admitted and you nodded softly. “I have lost a lot of friends though, so the ones I have left are more precious than before.”

“I’ll help you with that letter as soon as I’m done with my rounds then. Which won’t take too long, given this hospital is rather small,” you mentioned, cheering up the mood again and standing back to your feet. “We’ll make sure everyone knows you’re still alive, Jinyoung.”

Once the letter was sent, his mood lightened. He spent the next week talking with everyone he came into contact with, craving a sense of the outside world. He was sick of lying here day in and out, and the leg he had momentarily thanked for giving him a well-needed break, was now the bane of his existence.

“Now, what do you think you’re doing?” you asked as you found him loosening off the sling holding his injured leg up. Jinyoung froze for only a moment before he continued what he was doing.

“I need to get up before my leg becomes too weak.”

“You already know the leg is weak and cannot handle bearing any weight, Jinyoung.”

He nodded and gestured to the wooden crutches across from him. “Lend me those.”

“Now why would I do that?” you questioned, folding your arms across your chest.

“Because I need to ensure circulation is still flowing the entirety of my leg. Moving it for short bursts during the day will ensure I have a faster recovery rate.”

Your annoyance lessened and you tilted your head. “Are you trained in medicine?”

“I might as well be. My father is a doctor, my mother a nurse. And I even was working towards becoming an army medic before the war broke out.”

You sighed heavily, though you played with a smile on your lips. “I knew you would be trouble for me.”

“Well, I’ll be far worse if you don’t assist in handing those crutches over. I’ll just get them myself, and there could be a serious risk of me falling on the ground trying.”

“A little humility goes a long way,” you retorted and Jinyoung flushed with colour, shaking his head firmly.

“Isn’t it enough with all the bedpans? I fear you’ve seen too much of me and there’s not enough there for you to like.”

It was your turn to blush and Jinyoung liked the colour you turned. He smirked; it was always you who seemed to hold the control over him. You cleared your throat and jarringly walked over to the crutches. “There may be plenty there to like, and yet I feel as if that might be trouble in itself. I’m taking these, and I’m going to ask the doctor before both of us do something stupid.”

Jinyoung grinned after your hasty retreat; your words healing him in ways he thought wouldn’t ever be possible during this time in his life. When you returned, you were more composed and still held the crutches. You watched him carefully. “Any sign of instability and we go back to bed, understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

He managed five minutes on the first attempt. And the next day, it accomplished ten. He was thankful for his military training and working out on his upper body a lot before the war. He had never thought he would need upper body strength like this, and admittedly, he liked the way that you would sometimes look towards his arms as he hopped along the hallway. He was glad about that too.

By the time two weeks had passed, Jinyoung had almost forgotten how he had come to this small township or his worries about anything. He was lost in a world of recovery and laughter, your own giggles brightening his days further the longer he was in your company. He was certain you had healed him more than the drugs and rest had by now.

“And so, BamBam came running out of the room, stark naked and screaming at the top of his lungs,” Jinyoung managed to say in between fits of laughter, and the three nurses surrounding him were equally as helpless.

“This man sounds ridiculous.”

Sarah giggled. “I don’t know, I think I find him rather charming. Is that what all soldiers are like, Jinyoung?”

“Have you seen him parading around here naked yet?” you asked the girls, who all gasped and giggled some more. You then shot Jinyoung a hard look. “I saw your hands just now, keep it on or I’ll find you a sedative to calm you down.”

“It’s getting late, we should head home,” Amanda mentioned with a pout, standing up and smoothing down her skirt. “Y/N, will you be alright doing the night shift?”

You nodded. “Of course, thankfully I only have Jinyoung and two others here at the moment. I’ll be fine.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll keep her company,” Jinyoung assured and the girls giggled again.

“Don’t tell any more stories until we’re back!”

“My lips are sealed,” he promised with a chuckle and watched as you followed the girls out to lock the front door. When you returned, you did so with two mugs within your grasp.

“I thought you might like some tea. The other patients are already asleep.”

“If you want to sleep too, I can lay down and try as well,” he offered but you merely shook your head, curling back up into the chair you had dragged over.

“What’s it like?”

“What’s what like?”

You stared into the mug you held, your eyes richer in colour when you looked up. “Flying.”

“Well, it can be a little scary at first, because you go faster than you could ever do so on the ground. But it’s freeing too. You get to see the world up close and then from far away. I like that.”

“I always wanted to fly, at least once. To know what it’s like to escape the world you have around you. Growing up here, everyone knows everyone. There are no real opportunities for surprise, to feel excited.” You sighed, looking back at your drink. “I thought becoming a nurse, especially with the war, would get me transferred to a city, someplace that would need my assistance. The war wasn’t ever going to come this way so they said, and I didn’t really sign up to nurse the few patients this township would have. Yet, here I am. Born and bred here, working here, stuck here.”

“You want to fly away?” he asked and you nodded before shaking your head.

“Not now, if I fly away, I might end up like you.”

He chuckled, taking a sip of the drink and then stared back at you. “I’ll take you flying one day.”

“You need to walk before you fly, Jinyoung.”

“You told me I’d walk again too,” he reminded and you couldn’t help but widen your smile then. “I’ll help you escape here if you want to.”

“You know, ever since you came here, I’ve felt excited again.”

“I do that to you?” he murmured, edging closer to you. “Excite you?”

“Because you’re someone new, we don’t get that often.”

“Liar.”

You placed down your tea and took his from his grasp as well, before pushing him gently back into his bed. Jinyoung’s arms wound around your waist and pulled you along with him, you both staring at one another for an immeasurable moment. Your gaze then darted to the door, knowing the other two patients were sound asleep in the female ward.

“Y/N, are you going to do something about this excitement we’re both feeling?”

You turned back to him, easing yourself into a comfortable position within his grip. “You said those lips were sealed.”

“I won’t tell a soul if you don’t.”

Jinyoung had relaxed too much here. With every step he took, it was towards you, and your smiles only enticed him further to reach for your lips and hold you close. The romance he had anticipated after his service to the country ended had arrived early and he wanted to hold on to it for as long as he could. He had been here for a month, and although he only knew of this hospital and the grounds it was kept upon, he finally understood the way Jaebum stared at his Captain all those years.

As selfish as it was, he wanted to hide here forever, until the war was over and then run away with you to wherever you wanted to go. He craved setting up his new life with you.

Instead, he got a different answer. You hovered by his bed as he read the letter, bouncing around agitatedly. “Well, what does it say?”

“Let me read it first,” he urged, his eyes scanning the handwritten message from his Lieutenant. He let out a shaky breath as his emotions rose to his eyes. “Jackson is alright. I was the only one shot down.”

“That is great news!”

Jinyoung glanced up at you. “They want me back as soon as I’m fit enough to travel.”

“Oh.” Your smile erased just as easily as it had appeared. “So soon.”

“Come with me.”

“I don’t have much savings, and you’re living in an air base, where will I stay?”

“Those friends of mine you ask of, they have partners, they have people in their lives too. You could stay with them. Or we could get a house together. I have some money saved up, we could do that.”

“You want to do all that with me?” you wondered and Jinyoung nodded, pulling you into his arms.

“Fly away with me.”

“We can really fly together?” you asked again and Jinyoung kissed you, uncaring that anyone could walk through that door any moment now.

Instead, the doors began to rock on their hinges and your kiss broke apart as you were jostled around. Your eyes widened. “What was that?”

“Get down!” Jinyoung cried, diving off the bed and covering you as the all too familiar sounds of guns and planes flew above the hospital. The windows shattered and he could hear screaming from the other rooms. The birds that had been chirping through the window just previously were now silent; much like everything was after the moment passed. And then he heard the indefinite sounds of screaming all around.

With a hastened limp, he followed you around the hospital, everyone shaken and unable to focus on the situation. Even Doctor Hong was crying. Jinyoung looked around himself and cleared his throat. “Sarah, get all the patients away from the windows. Move everyone into the middle of the building. Amanda, ready the supplies, people will be coming here quickly for aid. Y/N, we need to set up camps for the injured, and rank them by severity. Everyone needs to focus on the task at hand.”

“I’m scared!” Amanda cried and you grabbed her in your arms, comforting her briefly before repeating Jinyoung’s instructions.

“Even in the middle of nowhere, the war has hit us.”

As predicted, the doors soon opened, and the noise was deafening. Some were only coming because they were scared and stressed from the attack, whilst their neighbours were bleeding or dying in the middle of the entrance. It was chaotic, with every abled person in the hospital trying to work through the aftermath. What had become normal for him to witness as a pilot, was frightening to the staff who were used to treating the common cold and old Daisy’s Alzheimer’s. Jinyoung constantly stopped to help refocus the nurses, Sarah crying as she poured a solution onto an open wound to help with the bleeding.

Jinyoung couldn’t just keep moving people around to their zones, he needed to help further and when a middle-aged woman dropped at his feet, Jinyoung lifted her up and placed her up on the first surface he could find, screaming out for appropriate tools and drugs. The woman glanced at his attire and started shaking her head. “I don’t want to die! Get me a doctor!”

“You’ll die if I don’t treat you right now!”

“You’re a patient.”

“As are you right now and you need to calm down,” he replied sternly, the woman fighting him off with what little energy she had left.

“A doctor!”

“He is a doctor, Beth, he’s a doctor who was hurt. He’s part of the army, just let him help you,” you told her rapidly, handing him the tools he called for and looking at Jinyoung determinedly. He nodded and set to work, treating the woman efficiently and stabilising her before moving onto the next person he could save.

“Do you think they’ll come back again?” Sarah asked into the small hours of the night, her voice feeble. The screaming had mostly stopped, yet the air was still brimming with terror. You moved to hold her within your arms, Amanda was already asleep from exhaustion in the chair beside Jinyoung.

“I don’t know,” he told her honestly, and tears slipped down her cheeks. “I don’t think we were a target initially, I believe those pilots had too many rounds left and not enough of us up there to spend them on.”

“You saved six people today,” Doctor Hong mentioned and Jinyoung nodded slowly. “When this war is over, you should continue with your training. You’ll make a fine doctor.”

“I just don’t know when it’s going to end.”

“And they’ll need you to continue with bringing a stop to all of this,” you whispered, your own emotions slipping down your cheeks. “Maybe it’s time for you to fly back to where you came from, soldier.”

It was different now. Jinyoung had lost some of his drive as he flew up in his new Mustang. It wasn’t his first plane change over the war, and he wondered if it would be his last. All the same, he couldn’t ease back into the role of being an elite pilot. Of course, he was thrilled to see the faces of his comrades, the hug Jackson gave him as he sobbed all over his shoulder had eased some of Jinyoung’ pain leaving you behind. But he missed you more than he missed flying. For the first time in his air force career, he would quite happily have his wings clipped if it meant he could be with you forever.

Jinyoung knew though, to keep you safe he had to do his job well.

The allies were growing in strength, and one after the other, the countries battling against them surrendered. The war was won by them after all, just like Jaebum had said.

“Where are you off too so quickly?” Yugyeom, a member on his team enquired as soon as the medal ceremony was over. Jinyoung grinned as he packed his bag, picking up the photo he had of you and placed it on top of his things.

“Lover boy is off to bring back his girl,” Jaebum mentioned and slung an arm over the youngest member of their team. “The war is over; it’s time for us to move on.”

“We’re still assigned to our team, what are you talking about?” Mark mentioned, gesturing to everyone in the room. “Airforce-Seven hasn’t disbanded yet.”

“Well, it’s about to become Airforce-Six for the meantime,” Jinyoung announced, ignoring the jeers from BamBam laying on his bunker.

“Airforce-Five actually,” another voice corrected and everyone glanced at Youngjae sitting beside BamBam. “I’m going home for a while.”

“So that’s it for us?” Jackson whined and Jinyoung shook his head.

“I’ll be back, once I have Y/N with me.”

“We won the war, but the need for us will still be there,” Jaebum agreed, moving to slap Jinyoung on the back again. “Go get your girl. We’ll be here waiting.”

The trip to get to you was longer than Jinyoung would’ve liked. The air force wouldn’t very well lend him a plane of his own to pick you up in, and the train seemed to stop far too often for his liking. Eventually, Jinyoung was ambling up the gravel driveway to the building he knew all too well. It was a sunny afternoon and despite his rush to see you again, he took his time, looking at all the parts of the property he had memories with you in. It was comforting to be back, but he had bigger plans than this township could handle with you.

Eventually, he opened the front door and waited in the lobby, wondering who would greet him first. He grinned when Amanda appeared, a squeal emitted from her mouth before she dashed off again. He could hear the ruckus she was causing without so much as saying truly what was happening. Jinyoung chuckled, dropping his bag to the ground at his feet and watched the ward door in anticipation.

“I don’t know what you’re trying to say, Amanda. Breathe!”

“If she stops, at least we’re in a hospital and can resuscitate her,” Jinyoung told you as soon as you stepped out, smiling widely and cocking his head to the side as he opened his arms. He had hoped you would run into them, but you surprised him, walking over slowly, but that smile he loved of yours was prominent on your face the whole way over.

You stopped before him. “Is it finally over?”

“I believe so.”

“You’re really here?” you wondered, taking another step towards him. Jinyoung closed the distance, wrapping his arms around you and pulling you to his body. He held you tightly as he felt your tears soak through his shirt. “I had only hoped you would come back for me.”

“I made a promise to help you fly away, remember? I couldn’t not fulfil it now, could I? I’m pretty sure you would have found a way to bring me back to life if I died before coming back for you.”

You thumped him on the chest in your embrace and Jinyoung chuckled heartily. “Don’t talk about it like that!”

“So you are glad to see me again.” You pulled your head away from him to glance at him, pouting slightly. “I got on the first train I could, you know.”

“I think you were more excited to see me again,” you teased and Jinyoung nodded.

“Are you ready to fly away with me now?”

“You don’t want to stay here again and let me change your bedpans for you?” Jinyoung rolled his eyes as you laughed and then he stopped, smiling at the sound. “What?”

“I’ve missed your laughter.”

“I’ve missed you.”

“So I did offer you more than enough, huh?”

You nodded sincerely. “I’m hoping you’ve got a whole lot more for me in store too.”

_________________

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fernwehbookworm · 5 years

Text

Woke The F*ck Up- Chapter 11

November 30th, 2017

Of course, it couldn’t last. Cadmus seemed to be everywhere. Now it wasn’t just drugs and guns. They were now spreading propaganda. Hate speech against anything and everything. Immigrants to minority citizens to the LGBT community. The city was being whipped into a fury. Protesters took to the streets as elected officials debated equal housing rights which lead to a riot as the right-winged conservatives started throwing bottles and rotting food at the rainbow-colored crowd sitting in the park across the street from city hall with colorful signs held up to display their thoughts.

Shootings were occurring more frequently in the Hispanic neighborhoods, bullets being traced to high-end weapons that were similar to weapons Kara had turned over to the police from various busted Cadmus warehouses. Cadmus was the embodiment of the ‘Ideal Conservative American’ to the point where Kara was sure they were killing and driving away anyone who didn’t fit into their mold. As a bisexual woman, and James as a black man, Team Superfriends was starting to take this personally. Kara even had Winn sew a pride flag onto her sleeve. When someone got a picture of that during a daytime bank robbery, Power Girl was plastered on protest signs and became the main target of hate speech. Kara felt like she was living in a war zone, trying to find terrorists who want to build a wall and keep everyone out. Kara was growing more and more frustrated at the stupidity of people. They were no longer debating laws, they were debating whether humans should be treated like humans. It made Kara sick. She had to stop Cadmus, it wouldn’t solve everything but it would stop the fan from stoking the fire.

Kara was so busy that she had to hire contractors to do most the renovating when she had planned on doing some of it herself. Winn did manage to install a secret door from the first floor to the basement where their operations were held. He kept the men from even thinking of looking down there.

Days ticked by as Kara spent more and more time in the city, helping the police contain the violence as well as trying to find the source of everything Cadmus. She even skipped on going back to Midvale for Thanksgiving with Eliza and Alex, Eliza still not knowing how Kara really spent her time. Kara just told her foster mother that the gym was taking up a lot more time than she thought. Alex was furious. Her and Eliza had had a strained relationship ever since Kara was adopted. They moved past most of it but the Jeremiah died and Alex fell into drinking, which caused new issues to open old wounds. Kara always acted as a buffer. Alex made sure Kara knew of every awkward detail. Kara was too focused to care too much. She still couldn’t figure out who was in charge of the seemingly ever-expanding group. Only that it was a woman. One that no one ever saw up close. A woman who had an extensive chain of command and rarely got her hands dirty. Always a woman, never a name.

Lena’s tour had four weeks left and Kara’s heart ached to see her. Phone calls and video chatting didn’t help. Kara wanted to hold Lena again. She wanted to paint her. Well, Kara was painting her, and sketching her, and doodling her, any chance she could. Sometimes Kara didn’t even realize it was happening, she would be talking to Winn about something and all of the sudden Lena’s likeness would be on the paper below her pencil. Kara had it bad. She thinks she may love Lena but something was stopping her. That’s a lie. She knows what it is. Kara is a vigilante, who risks her life and jail time daily, and is still keeping it a secret. No, Lena knows she is going to tell her in just a matter of weeks. It's not really a secret then.

Despite Kara’s aching heart, she still missed phone calls and flights, every time she seemed to be caught up in one mission or another, or helping to stop riots before escaping with Guardian from the police. The cops weren't really trying to arrest the two people making a difference but the police chief was determined to bring down all criminals. Lena seemed to be understanding but even Kara was growing frustrated with not seeing her girlfriend and she was surrounded by friends. Kara texted Jess daily to really know what was happening with Lena, she was lonely. When not performing, Lena locked herself away to work on her music. She almost had a whole album recorded, ahead of schedule.

“Damn it, Kara. Again? How hard is it to be on time to the airport?”

“I am so sorry Lena. National City is in an uproar. Whole streets are closed to contain the protests and riots. James wanted an extra set of hands to take pictures and I got caught in the middle of it.” A couple of beats of silence.

“James… You are spending a lot of time with him lately.” It took a second for Kara to comprehend the jealousy underlining Lena’s neutral tone.

“No Lena, god, no. James is just a friend. Even less, he is my cousin’s friend and I do stuff like this for him and he will help with advertising for the gym.”

“Okay.”

“Lena, please believe me. I know you, I know you are thinking that of course, you won't be good enough. Damn it, I hate that’s the first place your thoughts go. But it isn’t true. Lena, I am so sorry this is my fault for not planning ahead. I miss you so much. I hate breaking promises but I am trying...”

“Kara-”

“I was looking forward to seeing you and meeting Sam and Ruby because you always sound so excited when you talk about dinner with them or teaching Ruby to play the piano and-”

“Kara! Shut up! All I said was okay. Yes, I feel a little insecure because this is the fifth flight you missed but also I know I ask a lot of you to put your life on hold there. Just try and make the next one. Now, I have to go tell a preteen that her new idol won’t be joining us tonight.”

“New idol? What do you mean?” Lena laughs

“Ever since she found out I was dating you, she has found every little bit of information on you. Including pirated videos of most of your fights. You should have seen Sam when Ruby told her she wanted to start taking boxing lessons. She literally had no words. It was quite hilarious.”

“And now I feel even worse for missing my flight. I hope she isn’t too disappointed. But please, have fun with them. When I meet Ruby, I will give her a few lessons, with her mother’s permission, of course.” Lena laughs through the line.

“I will let Sam know. And Kara? Please, stay safe. It sounds dangerous there and I worry about you being in the middle of all that.” Guilt washes over Kara. She swallows past the lump in her throat.

“I will. Goodbye, Lena.”

“Bye Kara,” Lena says softly. The line goes dead and Kara sighs as she returns to gazing over the crowd below in the park. She was perched on top of city halls roof. James stood next to her as they watched for signs of trouble.

“Still haven't told her, huh?”

“It's none of your business.” Kara snaps at the man in metal armor.

“I think it is when you go galavanting to another country every other weekend and take phone calls on the job. You are distracted and it's going to get you hurt.”

“Don’t act like some wise sage James. I have been doing this much longer. Hell, the only reason you are here with me is so you wouldn’t die trying to do this yourself. So don’t talk down to me James. Don’t forget, I never wanted you here. You forced your way into this. I was fine with just Winn and I. So stay out of my relationship.” Kara can see James’ eyes tighten in anger behind his helmet.

“Fine. Just, I think there may be a real reason you haven't told her, more than she would be mad. I’m going to the other side of the park. We should probably spread out anyway, there are a lot of people here and that threat wasn’t very specific.” He leaves without another word. Kara keeps her eyes below.

Lena hangs up and sighs. Kara knew her too well. That was exactly where her thoughts went. And still were. Her brain knew that Kara wouldn’t lie to her about this. Kara liked her and would be faithful. But missing flight after flight and then it took three phone calls just to get a hold of Kara today alone. It was chipping away at Lena’s barely pieced together heart. She hadn’t told Jess or Sam yet, but she lost her momentum in her music. Her worry no longer allowed the happier music she had been writing to flow out. Each chord felt like a dead end. She walked back into the studio and found Sam at the soundboard. The tall woman spun in her seat to face Lena, her smile faded quickly at the frown on Lena’s face.

“Kara missed her flight. It's just the three of us for dinner.” Lena plops down next to her friend/ producer. Sam scowls.

“Look, I know you like her, but I like her less and less every time this happens. Are you sure she is worth it.”

“She really is Sam. I know how this looks since you never met her.”

“It looks like a pretty girl weaseled her way into your life, received free trips around the world and the fame of dating Lena Luthor and now she is ghosting you because she is over it and got what she wanted.”

Tears prick Lena’s eyes. That is exactly her worst fear with Kara. Sam picked it right up and said it out loud. Lena tried to blink the offending liquid back but it just made it worse. The hot tears escaped. Sam looked over and noticed. She pulled Lena in for a hug.

“Oh geez Lena, I am so sorry. I don’t know why I said that. I mean I do but I know you like her I should have kept it to myself.”

“I-it’s just t-that that is exactly wh-what I have been th-thinking this whole time. I mean, it was so small at first but now, now it feels like it’s shouting in my h-head and I-I don’t know what to do. God, everything was s-so great until she left in Munich.” Lena is actually sobbing. She hasn’t felt like this since college. She feels ridiculous, but Sam is soothingly rubbing her back and she feels safe. After a while, Lena manages to catch her breath again and pulls away, but Sam firmly holds on to her hand still.

“I’m sorry, I haven't cried in… years. I don’t know where that came from.”

“Lena, this is completely normal. Crying is good because it helps you process emotions. If this is a fear you have then you definitely need to talk to Kara about it.” Sam says seriously. Lena barks a watery laugh.

“And if it's true, do you think she would just come out and say it? And if it's not true I’ll just hurt her with my doubt.”

“I just hate seeing you like this. I didn’t really know you before Kara but this Lena Luthor has been great and happy and Ruby loves you. By the way, she asked if she could start calling you Aunt Lena.”

“Really? God, I am going to cry again. Tell her yes I would love that. God, what is happening to me? I used to not have feelings.”

“It’s called being human, Lena. And having a family. Sometimes feelings suck, sometimes they are the best thing in the world.”

“I hate feelings.” Lena mopes. Sam laughs.

“Well too bad. Now, let's get back to work.”

December 5th, 2017

They finally had what they needed. The Cadmus Leader would be in National City organizing their next plan. Kara learned this from a scared new recruit as she transported him to police custody in a less than ideal manner. Winn was busy figuring out which warehouse she was actually going to be in while James and Kara suited up. And then they were on the move, Winn directing them through the still bustling nightlife of National City.

Warehouse was a loose term. It looked to be converted into a compound. High fencing with barbed wire. Shipping containers stacked high to serve as watchtowers. Armed men patrolling around the building. Everything was brightly lit and made it hard to find a dark corner to slip in. Winn's newest toy hovered silently by Kara's head. A small drone capable of x-raying through walls and tracing heat signatures. It would relay those back to Winn so he could better direct the vigilantes. With the extra eye in the sky, Kara and James carefully circumvented each prowling, trigger-happy, guard and made it to the roof of the warehouse. Skylights peppered the roof to let in light during the day. Now they shone brightly as the occupants worked to spread terror to the outside world. Kara crouched over one near the center and peered through.

Down below was everything. Tables of what Kara assumed were kidnapped women in their underwear as they bagged drugs for distribution. More men circled them along with the rest of the warehouse. Weapons caches were well guarded. Men and women were training in hand to hand combat and on a shooting range. There were even tables set up to act like an eating area and bunks in rows in a darker corner. In the middle, separated with fencing, and heavily guarded, was a bomb.

“Winn, are you seeing this?” Kara whispers.

“Oh yeah. Scanning now. Give me a second.”

Kara waits and takes deep steadying breaths while James shifts beside her. Part of her wishes she had left the man behind But also she knows she could never handle this alone. Whatever becomes of this she is glad to have back up, even if it is as inexperienced as James. The pair on the roof watches the work below in silence.

“Yup, that’s a bomb. When that is complete it can level at least ten city blocks.”

“Well shit.”

“Kara, if that goes off where it is, most of the surrounding community is Latino or African American. It will kill most of those populations in National City.”

Kara pauses. Thinking. Cadmus was bringing everything to a head. Hate was spreading like a virus and this was literally going to blow it into a nationwide problem.

“Winn, you said when this is complete. So it's not right now.”

“Correct. If it blows right now it should just take down the warehouse. But it will kill almost everyone inside.”

Kara watches the rounds of men. She watches the women working and a man entering the fencing around the bomb. He sets to work. Kara sighs.

“Winn, call Alex. We are in over our heads. Patch her through.” A pause then a beep.

“Kara? This better be good. Do you know what hour it is?”

“Alex, I need you. Actually the whole FBI. Cadmus has officially turned terrorist and I am in over my head.” Rustling through the line indicates Alex probably getting out of bed and dressing.

“What the hell am I supposed to do with that. How am I supposed to get a unit out because my sister the gym trainer told me to.”

“I don’t know Alex! Say it was an anonymous tip or something. Alex, They are building a bomb. One to level several blocks of National City. Men are heavily armed. Captured women are sorting drugs. This is it. Winn, send Alex the address. Get here.” Kara tapes her earpiece and ends the call.

“So, we are just going to wait?” James asks, voice oddly echoey in the helmet.

“Yup. Might as well get comfy.”

After a few minutes, something begins to happen below. Almost everything seems to halt. Doors Kara previously missed, opens. Out of the darkness and into the center of the warehouse, walks Lillian Luthor. Kara recognizes her from an old photo Lena had shown her. The woman is tall and proud. Commanding a room without speaking. A leader. It sends chills through Kara. Lillian says something and then listens to the response from the man working on the bomb. She nods approvingly, then strides towards the front of the warehouse, flanked by much more seasoned looking men. Men who do this for a living, for a life. Kara hears engines approaching and she knows in her gut that it isn't Alex. Lillian is going to escape.

Kara stands suddenly, starling James who had reclined against the slightly sloped roof.

“We can’t let her get away.”

“Let who?”

“Lillian Luthor, the Leader of Cadmus.”

James looks through the window.

“Kara, we can’t take them on our own.”

“We just have to stall until they get here.”

Kara crouches to keep her center of gravity low and strides towards the front of the building. There will definitely be too many guards out front to deal with if she doesn't take a few out before Lillian gets there. A glance in the next window shows that Lillian has stopped to talk to someone else.

At the edge of the roof, just out of the flood of light, Kara peers down. She unholsters the Night-Night gun and aims for the closets man perched on shipping containers. She silently prays the hours Alex spent drilling her on various weapons pays off. Once Alex joined the FBI she wanted to make sure Kara could protect herself, then it became a way for them to bond and spend time together. It slowly escalated over the years to more advanced weapons and targets. Kara had put it on hold though when she started her vigilantism. She takes a deep breath, slowly releases it, and pulls the trigger. A small clicking sound and a small flash of blue in the darkness, the silhouette drops to the ground.

“Way to go, Winn,” Kara whispers.

“Thank you.” He says cheekily. Kara just rolls her eyes and aims for her next target. She empties the clip, making one guard drop after another, before popping in another. Soon no one remains outside the front and not a sound has risen to raise the suspicion of those inside.

Until of course the front doors open and Lillian Luthor begins to make her way to the front entrance and where three heavily armored transport vehicles wait for her. She pauses a few feet out the front door when she sees a man slumped against the wall. The men flanking her draw their weapons. Kara drops behind them and knocks the knee out from one. The other turns and fires but Kara has already rolled away. Shouts from inside. Lillian holds a hand to stop the man from firing again. James drops next to her and holds up his shield.

“Oh good, both of my favorite vigilantes. This will make getting rid of you two so much easier. You have made my life more than difficult.”

“You have been causing panic through the city,” Kara says, the voice modulator changing her voice.

“Oh my dear, we have been restoring order to the city. And soon the country.”

“Order never follows bombs. They just cause death and destruction.”

“It will be a new beginning. A fresh start to build on.”

“You are insane.”

“I am right.” Lillian Looks to the door behind the heroes.

“Kill them.”

The woman turns away and Kara’s attention is diverted to the mass of men. All were armed and armored. Kara and James stand back to back.

“There is too many.” He says through there comms.”

“We just have to stall. Alex will be here.”

A man breaks the standoff and the first punch is thrown. They are too tightly packed for weapons or risk shooting each other. At first, everything goes well. James uses his shield to protect most of his body while smashing the others. Kara drops man after man. But soon their overwhelming numbers separate the pair. Kara is being attacked from all sides, slowly being forced from her partner. One punch hits, then another. A kick throws her off balance. Someone throws her over.r third shoulder and she is outside the ring of bodies. From the ground, she can see Lillian's retreating form. She pushes from the ground to chase the woman down. Mere feet from her, Kara is stopped by a grip of iron pulling her back to the ground. The man stands over her, he looks vaguely familiar but it escapes her how. Kara's vision is blurry from her head hitting the ground.

“You can't stop this Power Girl. Actually, how pretentious is that? What do you say I know who you really are?” Lillian appears over Kara, Kara tries to sit up but a heavy boot is planted in her chest. Lillian reaches down to pull back the hood and remove the mask. She frowns, almost like she ate something distasteful.

“Why if it isn't the little blonde who has been running around with my daughter. Another way for her to disappoint me. I wonder, does she know about your evening activities?”

“She isn't your fucking daughter. And she is not a disappointment.”

Lillian looks amused.

“Oh, so she doesn't know. How wonderful. Kill her, make it hurt.” The last part directed to the man above Kara.

Sirens in the distance cause Lillian to hurry away but Kara can no longer worry about that. The boot over her is gone, just long enough to swing back and hit her ribs. Kara has no advantage. She can't get her feet, can't get away. Kick after kick lands to her sides and stomach. A high kick brings the man's hell down and she hears the snap of her collarbone breaking. He straddles her and brings his hands to her neck. She tries to throw him off but he just headbutts her eye and slams her head back down. Everything is going dark, whether from head trauma or lack of oxygen, Kara isn't sure. Gunfire. Shouting. The night from her chest is gone, but the darkness is still coming.

“...ara!” A muffled yell. It's familiar.

“Kara, please…” it begs.

“Kara you are going to be fine you big idiot.” It's Alex standing over her, but her mouth isn't working. Then there is nothing as Alex’s tear-stained face fades away.

December 9th, 2017

An annoying beeping invades the darkness. It becomes insistent, begging to be noticed. Kara tries to open her eyes and winces. She tries to rub at then but her hand is trapped by something, a desperate grip. Kara blinks and looks down. Alex is asleep in a chair with her head on the bed, fingers tightly gripping Alex’s. Her other arm is in a sling. Kara's movements must have roused her because Alex is sitting up a blinking sleep away.

“Kara!” She exclaims.

“Hey…” Kara's voice is hoarse and gravely.

“I ought to kill you but I'm too happy that you are okay.” Alex stands and kisses Kara's forehead. Kara leans into the affection from her sister.

“What happened?” Kara manages to get out. Her sister reaches for the pitcher of water and hands Kara a cup with a straw.

“You were almost killed, that's what happened.”

“Lillian… Did you catch her?”

“No,” Alex says solemnly.

“James is he…?”

“He's fine. That armor took the brunt of it. Although he isn't too happy with you I don't think.”

“So, I guess this means my identity is blown.”

“Yes, and no.”

Kara looks at her sister curiously.

“Kara, I don't work for the FBI. I work for a secret government organization inside the government looking to take down local terrorist groups and our main focus has been Cadmus. They haven't done enough to be classified for our intervention until you called with the bomb information. But since we were keeping tabs on Cadmus, we were also keeping tabs on you. I did not tell anyone, but someone else found out who you were. My director has made the decision to let you do what you are doing because of how you do it. You are now in one of our facilities and are getting the best care possible. So yes your identity is out, but only to those who already knew.”

Kara goes quiet and stares straight ahead while she processes. That was a lot of information to take in.

“Kara, say something. Please.” And Kara opens her mouth to do so when the television Alex must have been watching before falling asleep catches her attention. Lex Luthor arrested for conspiring with terrorists. Kara grabs the discarded remote off her bed and turns it up.

“Yesterday, with the aid of one Mr. Clark Kent. Another Luthor was put behind bars. Kent's investigation into the Luthor family in conjunction with the police and FBI…”

Yesterday he was arrested.

“Alex, how long have I been asleep?”

Alex winces.

“You had considerable head injuries and several broken bones and your lung even collapsed due to a broken rib…”

“Alex. How long?” Kara asks sternly.

“Four days.” Kara swallows hard, forcing back the continually rising panic.

“Where is my phone?” Kara says forceing calm in her voice.

“I brought it with a change of clothes that Winn packed for me.” Alex gets up and digs in the backpack sat in a table against the wall. She hands the phone to Kara.

Kara turns it on and waits. Two missed calls from Cat. Three from Eliza. A string of texts from Winn. A missed call from Clark. One last ding. A voicemail from Lena. Kara should have left to see her last night. With a shaking thumb, she hits play on the voice mail.

December 8th, 2017

Not even an apology this time from Kara. Lena just returned to the hotel from a fruitless trip to the airport when the news broke. Lex had been arrested. Jess was striding around her hotel room fielding calls from reporters as Lena stared out the window. Crowds were forming below in the street. Clark Kent had enough evidence to put away her brother and accuse her mother who had magically disappeared. Lena was the last Luthor standing. She was isolated at the top of her tower and sharks were circling below. She was alone. Lena remembers Kara mentioning that Clark was her cousin. Did Kara know this was coming? Is that why she didn't come? Is that why she began to pull away? The crushing weight of this spiral pressed down on her chest with each passing minute that she didn't hear from Kara.

Why was this so hard? It wasn't this hard when her father blew himself up. She got drunk, got high, fucked a girl, and moved on. Now her walls were gone and she felt each hard word thrown at her like a knife. Each Twitter comment chaffed like she had newborn skin. With her walls gone, her heart was unprotected because the person who protected it was half a world away and hadn't been heard from in three days. It was too much. Lena quickly crossed to the bed where she threw her phone. Jess gives her an odd look while still yelling at whoever is on the other end of her phone call. Lena waits with bated breath as the phone rings. And rings. And rings. Then Kara's sweet voice asking to her leave a message. That almost breaks Lena but then it beeps so she powers through.

“Kara, I just can't do this anymore. I can't have this hope. I needed you here and you weren't. You haven't been here and you won’t tell me the truth because I know you are lying. This was the last time I go to an Airport to pick up only find out you never boarded. I can't need anyone like this. As long as you give me hope then I won't be the person I need to be. I'm sorry to do this like this, but I am glad I got your voicemail because if I heard your voice I know you could convince me otherwise. But we can't Kara. I can't. This is over. Don’t try and come here, don’t try and change my mind. We are just too different, this never would have worked. Goodbye.” Lena hung up the phone in tears.

This whole thing was a mistake. From the moment she let Kara sit down at her cafe table. Kara had torn down all the walls Lena built up to protect herself and now with her brother in jail and her mother wanted, she had nothing to keep the pain out. Then Kara missed her flight again, off doing something with James probably. It was too hard. James was someone Kara should be with, someone good and who was making a difference in the world. Lena had let Kara build her up, love her, and rip her defenses down. Then Kara all but disappeared, leaving Lena raw and exposed. Lena needed to build back up her walls and she couldn’t do that with still having a possibility of Kara. Lena’s next phone call was to Sam.

“Do I need to get a babysitter?” She doesn't even say ‘hi.’ Damn that mother’s intuition. She already knew.

“Yes. I need a fucking drink. And I can’t go alone.”

“Okay, I’ll find someone for Ruby. Then I’ll pick you up and you can tell me everything.”

One good thing came out of this half of the tour, Sam. And a night at a Sinclair Club conveniently down the street from Lena’s hotel.

Sam quickly took up residence at the bar to keep her eye on Lena while letting her do what she needed to do. Lena lost herself in the crowd after two quick shots and a kiss on Sam's cheek. Quickly she is surrounded by hot bodies all looking for someone to dance with. A man saddles up behind her and with a quick glance, Lena decides to allow the attractive man to press to her back. Especially when an attractive blonde presses herself to Lena's front. Both are moving Lena in sync and Lena is suspicious of their intentions because there is no way this was an accident but then the blonde is playing with her hair and Lena doesn't care. It feels good to let go. To let someone make her feel wanted because she hadn't felt that way over the past few weeks. After the song, the guy offers to buy them both a drink and Lena allows the girl to lead her over to the bar. Flirtaive touching happens while they wait. After two more shots, Lena is significantly buzzed. Then more dancing. Another shot.

“Lena Luthor. What a surprise to see you here.” Veronica's silken voice comes from behind Lena. She turns to the woman.

“Well, sometimes you need a drink when your brother gets arrested for terrorism. And after you break up with your girlfriend.” Lena adds as an afterthought. A gleam lights Ronnie's eye and she flicks her gaze to the couple standing behind Lena. They were, in fact, a couple, trying to woo Lena into their bed. Lena had decided to break her rule about threesomes because she needed this.

“You two can go.” They start to protest Veronica’s dismissal but Lena waves them off.

“You know I don't like foreplay.” Veronica states.

“Meet me out front. My hotel is just down the street.”

Lena goes to find Sam and tells her she's leaving. Sam eyes Veronica making her way to the door.

“Your sure you want to do this? With her?”

“I'm sure the sooner I move on, the better.”

“The mom in me is screaming that this is a mistake and I should stop you. But I won't.” Sam looks at her conflicted.

“I'll call you in the morning. Thank you for coming with me. For being my friend.”

“Always,” Sam says. She hugs Lena and lets her go while she pays for her drink and heads home to her daughter.

December 9th, 2017

Silence fills the hospital room after Kara plays the message. It was left just hours before. Kara glances at the clock. It would only be seven right now in London. Alex had heard the whole thing.

“Kara, I'm so sorry.” Kara's head snaps up.

“Don't. This isn't over. How fast can you get me to London?”

“Me?”

“You and whatever organization you work for.”

“Kara we can’t…”

“You will. This is the biggest break you have had against Cadmus, you said so yourself. If you don't get me to London then I will have Winn broadcast my suits body camera footage all over the media. Yes, that's right. A camera. That I'm sure you didn't remove until after I was inside this secret government operation or before you said things you shouldn't over an unconscious vigilante.” Alex's eyes widen.

“Are you threatening the United States government.”

“Yes,” Kara says matter of factly. Alex sighs and stands. She leaves but Kara knows she has won. A jet is soon fueled up to fly her to her chosen destination and Winn turns over the video files of the fight and subsequent care afterward. It's faster than trying to fly on her own. But it still leaves too much time to think.

December 10th, 2017

Kara knocks on the door. Tears sting her good eye and makes the one swollen shut throb. Her body ached. But she had to come. Had to tell Lena everything. This wasn't what she had planned, nothing was as she had planned. Lena’s heartbroken message still rung in her ears. This wasn't how they were going to end, because they weren't going to. Kara was determined. If Lena knew the whole truth it would be fine. She was just scared and thought Kara didn't care enough. But once Kara showed her the suit in the duffle that was digging into her bruised shoulder, Lena would know that she does. That Kara cares too much.

Movement on the other side of the door pulls Kara from her thoughts and she fumbles in her bag to prepare to pull out her suit. She had rehearsed what she was going to say the whole red-eye flight. Then how she would beg for forgiveness because she lied to the woman she loved. All that dies in her throat as she sees a fading smile on Lena’s face. Her body wrapped in a hotel sheet and her hair a mess. It was obvious what had been happening behind the door and Kara feels a punch worse than the beating she received days before. Fear floods Lena’s eyes and she clutches her sheet closer.

“Kara,” she says softly, as if not meaning to at all.

“Lena, darling, who is that at this hour?” Kara recognizes the silky smooth voice without seeing her face. Veronica Sinclair. And it hurts all the more. Kara shoves the red and blue jacket in her bag and turns back down the hotel hallway.

“Kara!” Lena calls louder, but it doesn't stop her. Kara just turns the corner and finds the elevator still on the floor due to the late hour. She hears a door slam closed and hurried footsteps but the elevator is already closing. Tears stream down Kara’s cheeks and she hurries back down to hopefully catch the first flight back to anywhere in the United States and away from here.

Kara collapses on her couch numbly. She hasn't slept, really slept, in at least four days. Being unconscious doesn't count. She cried the whole flight back and numbly sat through a taxi ride from the airport. A quick text to Alex saying she home and didn't want to talk about it. She closes her eyes and falls quickly to sleep after being so emotionally drained.

Kara wakes to her sister shaking her shoulder and a concerned look.

“Hey,” Alex says softly.

“Hey.” Kara sits up and Alex sits next to her rubbing shoulders and pulling Kara's hand into her lap. Kara rests her head on her sister's shoulder.

“Want to talk about it?” Alex asks Kara shakes her head.

“No. I just… no. Can you tell me something good? Like you captured Lillian and stopped Cadmus.”

“Sorry no.”

“Okay, well then at least you and Maggie are completely happy?”

Alex stiffens and Kara feels her stop breathing. She looks at her sister.

“Can't tell you that either. We broke up.”

“Oh, Alex no. Why?”

“Umm… well, we started talking about what we want in the future. You know, like where we want to live, and family and stuff. Well, Maggie doesn't want kids. At all. And you know me, I've always wanted to be a mom. So, here we are.”

“When did this happen?” Kara says, putting an arm around Alex’s shoulders.

“The night you called me. We had a long conversation. This was a deal-breaker for both of us. So…” Alex shrugs. Kara squeezes her shoulder.

“How are you handling it?”

“Not well. But I'm glad we had this conversation before we got too serious. I mean, can you imagine the hell it would be if we didn't talk about it before we moved in together, or hell, got engaged. I love her, so this is going to take some time and a lot of tears but I think it was for the best, for both of us.”

“Guess it's time for a sister night then. You pick a movie, I'm ordering take out.”

“No superhero-ing tonight?” Alex teases.

“I couldn't even save my relationship, let alone anyone else.”

When Kara comes back Alex has picked some action movie and Kara plops the bottle of whiskey in front of her sister. Alex's eyebrows shoot up.

“Kara Danvers has alcohol?” Alex peers closer at the label.

“Expensive Alcohol.”

“I bought it for… her. It's her favorite. I was just going to pour it down the drain but I figured now was as good as time as any.”

“For what?” Alex thinks she knows but she wants Kara to say it.

“To get drunk with my sister because we both need this right now.” Alex smiles and pips it open. Kara fetches two glasses.

“Kara you may want a mixer of some kind. Straight whiskey is hard to handle sober.” Kara fetches some sodas before joining her sister.

By the time the food arrives Kara is at least three shots of whiskey in and feeling buzzed, Alex is still fine and pays for it. Kara doesn't even try to follow the plot of the movie, all she knows is that it is loud with lots of explosions and her and Alex can laugh at the cheesy fakeness of it all. This felt good. She hadn’t spent much time with Alex lately, both of them were at fault for it but right now that didn’t matter. Right now she was with her sister, and right now she was very drunk. Her mind was foggy and a warmness was settling over her. No that wasn’t right. She shouldn’t feel warm. Kara felt like she should still be upset. Upset about what? Sluggishly, memories rose to the surface. Lena wrapped up in a sheet, but not because of Kara. Veronica. She was there. Then Kara had left Lena, or Lena had left Kara. One thing was clear, they were over. Kara bursts into tears so suddenly her sister jumped. Alex quickly recovered and pulled Kara into a hug, then Alex pulled Kara on top of her as she eased them both into laying position on the couch. Eventually, Kara cried herself to sleep, cradled in her sister's protective arms Alex sang to her. Kara always wished Alex would sing more. She had a beautiful voice but maybe that's why it made it all the more special. The special lullaby about a red robin fades as the alcohol does its job of pulling Kara into unconsciousness.

#supergirl #supercorp #kara danvers #lena luthor #singer #Vigilante #au #WTFU #fanfiction

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kcwcommentary · 5 years

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VLD3x04 – “Hole in the Sky”

3x04 – “Hole in the Sky”

I really want to like this episode, and there are a couple of small things that I do, but it hurts me how badly Allura is written.

The episode starts with the Castle Ship picking up some signal that’s spooking Allura and Coran. Coran says it’s a signal like Alfor’s ships used back in the day. Allura reacts, saying, “Could it be: Are we not the last Alteans alive?” Has she already forgotten that at the end of last season she found out that Haggar was Altean? So even if this signal ended up having nothing to do with any Alteans, she already knows she and Coran are not the only living Alteans. There hasn’t been anything shown so far to suggest that Allura has even told anyone, including Coran, that Haggar is Altean. One would think information that significant would be shared with the team.

They wormhole to find a ship that Allura says looks like one of Alfor’s deep space exploration vessels. (Given that the Galra Empire spans the entire universe, and given how easily the Castle Ship can wormhole easily across the universe, is there any such thing as “deep space” remaining unexplored?) Coran specifically identifies the commander of the ship, confirming the ship is Altean. The ship is stuck in some kind of special distortion, which is “radiating quintessence.” Quintessence is supposed to be some kind of life energy, so what’s generating that quintessence in significant enough quantities that this distortion can radiate it? The episode brings up the presence of this quintessence, but then does nothing with it. I know that the quintessence in the, for lack of a better word, space between realities is a thing in later episodes, but the presence of quintessence here in this episode is meaningless. They could have just held off on that detail until it became narratively relevant.

Voltron forms and heads to the ship. Voltron is “completely unaffected by the stress of the distortion” as it moves through the light to the other side, where they find the front of the ship. The Paladins board the ship. I’m surprised they just went fully into the rift as their first action. I would have thought they would have first boarded the ship from the main-reality side of the rift and explored there first. It’s like the plot skipped a step.

They float around on the ship, so there’s no gravity. Lights and artificial gravity turn on when Allura touches a control panel. They find a decayed corpse, which then prompts Allura to pull up some recording of the Altean who’s now a corpse. (Why is his corpse the only one on the ship?) He says they located “the second comet based on King Alfor’s information.” We eventually find out that it’s the same kind of “comet” that Voltron was made from. As I said back for 2x07 “Space Mall,” this is not a comet, despite the show calling it one. We know enough about comets to know they’re made of ice, not metal. It annoys me that the show ignores such basic, known science.

Two people jump out of an air duct, surprising the Paladins. One looks a lot like Shiro but with a different hairstyle. The other, looking and sounding a lot like Slav, says he will not let the “comet” fall into Altean hands. Keith pleads to the Shiro-looking guy, but he says, with quite an accent, that his name isn’t Shiro. Slav denies Lance’s claim that they rescued him from prison. Slav and Pidge simultaneously realize that each group is from a different reality.

Slav freaks out when his sensors detect more incoming Alteans. Slav and Sven flee. Slav’s use of Sven’s name is so quick, you could miss it. The Alteans enter the room, one of whom identifies Allura as “Empress.” In this reality, Allura defeated the Galra and established an Altean Empire 10,000 years ago.

Meanwhile, Lotor has been apparently observing Voltron’s actions regarding the rift. He’s hoping they’ll bring back the “comet” so that he can take it from them.

The alternate-Alteans keep mentioning the Altean Empire “spreading peace and stability throughout the universe.” It’s interesting that Allura buys into that propaganda so easily. Clearly, Allura does not have a problem with the governmental structure that is an Empire, since she knows these alternate-Alteans describe their government proudly as being an Empire. That Allura does not reject the idea of imperial domination here makes the idea that there could easily be an Allura who embraces the same form of dictatorial rule that Zarkon has employed seem possible. It even suggests that main-Allura could easily find herself in a situation where she’d willingly become such a ruler. She hasn’t once balked at hearing Altea and Empire put together.

Slav and Sven are outside the ship working on some plan.

Hunk, Pidge, Lance, and the male Altean discuss the state of their universe. The Altean points to the technology implanted in the brain of some large, muscular alien standing beside him. He says that the technology “saps the fighting force from our enemies, their will, you might say.” Finally, the Paladins start to realize that a universe-dominating Altean Empire might not be a good thing. Hunk identifies those who are subject to this technology as slaves. The Altean objects, saying, “They’re not slaves because they don’t have will. Slaves are always trying to escape or revolt. The Noncogs are content doing what they’re told.”

Keith, Allura, and the other alternate-Altean are also talking. Keith says, “But you’re taking away their free will.” Until he said this, I thought that the two groups of people were having different conversations. But with Keith saying this, I guess we’re supposed to assume that the female Altean has been telling Allura and Keith the same thing that the male Altean has been telling Hunk, Pidge, and Lance? If the female Altean has been telling Allura and Keith about their will-suppressing technology, why has Allura been standing there looking all happy until Keith makes his comment.

Even after, she continues to listen to the alternate-Altean as if the Altean Empire’s slavery doesn’t violate her character’s established morality. I guess we’re supposed to think that Allura is so overwhelmed by there being other Alteans in an alternate reality out of her grief of having lost her reality’s Alteans that her morality is temporarily up to debate? Allura has demonstrated a rigidity to how her morality manifests itself in her behavior before, so it’s hard for me to see her even slightly thinking there’s validity to the Altean Empire’s slavery.

Lance, Hunk, and Pidge are alone in a corridor. “Is anyone getting a strange vibe from these guys?” Lance says. “There’s definitely something off about these Alteans. Is it me, or did they pretty much scramble the big dude’s brain?” Hunk replies. Are you kidding me? I can’t believe they wrote this exchange. Lance and Hunk, though they are discussing the situation, are so casual about it. They’re acting like something is only slightly off about the Alteans, like these Alteans are mostly like regular Alteans but just slightly different. These Alteans have literally just told them that they have a universe-wide empire and that they use technology to take away people’s willpower. If that is slightly different than the main-Alteans, then main-Alteans are as frightening as the Galra Empire. I can’t believe this show wrote Lance and Hunk to be reacting this calmly and casually to having literally just had someone tell them they take away the willpower of anyone who stands in their way.

Sven and Slav pop in. Pidge says they need to keep the Alteans from getting the “comet,” so at least it seems Pidge doesn’t need to debate like Hunk and Lance had been doing about whether these Alteans are good people. Unfortunately, the Alteans come through the door, guns drawn. The Altean guy identifies Sven and Slav as members of Guns of Gamara, clearly an analog to the Blades of Marmora.

“Allura, this might not be the Altea you remember,” Keith says. You think? The show has already established that these Alteans are a universe-wide, slavery-using empire. That the tone of how the Paladins still are talking about these Alteans does not match what they’ve been told about them. The Paladins’ reactions feel subdued at best, almost unreal. The female Altean says that they are different because they defeated the Galra and that they’ll help Allura defeat the Galra in her reality too. Allura smiles at the idea. Even knowing the Alteans enslave people, she’s still entertaining the idea that they’re good?

Keith tries to convince Allura that, since they’ve learned that not all Galra are bad, things might not be so “black and white as [the alternate-Altean] is making them out to be.”

Allura responds, “Keith, these are my people.” Uh, no they’re not. They are from another reality and have proudly described their Empire as dominating their universe and that they take away the willpower of anyone who opposes them. Allura identifies them as strong allies for her war against the Galra in her reality. I am not okay with how this episode has written Allura. It doesn’t seem like she’s even wrestling with her morality over this. It’s like her morality is nonexistent. She is undergoing literally no struggle in siding with the Altean Empire.

So, Allura powers the ship and pulls it through the rift so that the Alteans can get the “comet.” Coran watches as the ship moves through the rift and the rift closes. He reacts with a unexpectedly calm, “Not good.” I would think he would have freaked out a lot more strongly than that!

The male Altean brings Pidge, Hunk, Lance, Sven, and Slav, hands bound, to present their capture. Allura finally reacts when she hears Slav use the word “slaves.” “Slaves? Is this true?” she says. Did she miss Keith earlier saying to the female Altean, “But you’re taking away their free will?” Again, in order for Keith to have made that comment, the Altean had to have been describing the technology that they use to take away people’s willpower, which even Hunk identified initially as a form of slavery.

Keith pleads with Allura that they “can’t let this happen,” and Allura turns to the female Altean, saying that they “both want the same thing.” I don’t know how Allura has not been paying attention, but it’s clear that they have very different goals. Possibly the most generous assessment of Allura in this episode is that she, despite what character growth she had in season two with Keith being half-Galra and working with the Galra in the Blades of Marmora, that she is still so prejudiced against the Galra that she is willingly blind here. Again, these Alteans have proudly described their universe-wide empire and how they take away the free will of anyone who opposes them. This isn’t some secret side of these Alteans that they’ve kept hidden. They’ve been very open about it.

The female Altean makes clear their plans to use the “comet” to “bring our peace to every reality.” Of course they want to spread their domination: They’re an empire, that’s what empires do. This shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone. The Altean rejects Allura: “You’re no empress of mine.” Duh. Did she miss the fact that Allura is from another reality? Of course she’s not the Empress.

Allura finally reacts the way she should have been reacting for most of the episode, finally realizing that these Alteans are not the same kind of people that her Alteans were.

I do love Slav confidently laughing, telling Lance, “This is the reality where everything works out fine.” The bomb he planted earlier detonates. Everyone fights. The Paladins and the Guns try to flee.

An Altean sentry shoots at Lance, but Sven jumps in the way, taking the hit. Slav jumps to action and blows the sentries out into space. He says he’ll take care of Sven and for the Paladins to get to the Lions.

Allura realizes this is all her fault. Slav says they can still get the “comet” from the Alteans. They form Voltron, grab the “comet” and fly away. Slav has messed with the Altean’s ship’s thrusters so that they can’t pursue Voltron, but they still shoot at them. Pidge finds the supposedly exact spot in space where the “comet” had been before Allura pulled it through, so they can punch through reality and return to their own.

As soon as they make it through, Lotor’s forces grab the “comet.” He reveals that the initial distress signal to which they had responded was sent by him. The Paladins are unconscious, except for Allura, and Voltron is in no condition to fight/pursue Lotor.

Later, Keith tries to reassure Allura that they couldn’t have known about Lotor’s part in all this. That’s not because they couldn’t have potentially found out. Allura was so eager at the idea of more Alteans that she just charged in blindly, then acted severely out of character by not recognizing an empire telling here that they’re an empire means that they’re an empire. The show ends with the ominous portent that Lotor could use the “comet” to make “a weapon as powerful as Voltron.”

As I said at the beginning, I really want to like this episode. I think alternate reality stories can be so much fun. I really love Sven and Slav. I just can’t buy that the Paladins are so ridiculously gullible in this episode. The Alteans never once even slightly try to hide anything about who they are, and yet the Paladins, especially Allura, seem to ignore what they’re told.

The writing of the episode seems to think its being subtle and/or nuanced, but it’s not even close to subtle. That’s what makes Allura’s obliviousness so unbelievable.

Even though they’re alternate versions, Sven and Slav’s openness about how they’re trying to protect the “comet” from the Alteans makes me instantly wary of the Alteans. It puts me on alert regarding the Alteans from the moment they first show up. This script does not lull me as a viewer into a false security alongside Allura and the other Paladins to make it a surprise that the Alteans are bad. It makes Allura’s reactions to the alternate Alteans absurd.

#voltron legendary defender #voltron #vld #voltron criticism #vld criticism #voltron critical #vld critical #vld season 3 #vld 3x04 #commentary

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gearsofbellona · 6 years

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aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyy i got my transformers prime oc redesigned

Name: Jolt Drive nicknames: Jolt, J.D, stardust, princess, kid. kiddo, Jojo (don't call her that, she hates it), faction: neutral (Tibetan mastiff) age: late teens aprox. gender: femme alt. mode: 2017 Corvette Z06 C7 family: Linear range (younger brother), Timewarp (carrier/mother), Wrecktrain (sire/father), Mirage/dino (second cousin) theme song: "Ring of Fire" - Krewella

personality: everyone who meets her, for some reason, says Jolt Drive reminds them of an anime girl, particularity one from the "Maho Shojo" genre. She's cheerful and has an optic for detail. She is know to have Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD or Autism) which in some ways does affect her behavior. she can't pick up on metaphors straight away or if there is a social rule she doesn't know of involved in something. when she gets excited, she 'stims' by fanning her servos close to her face and bouncing. loud unexpected noises are her biggest issue. she cowers and covers her audio sensors when she hears a noise that overwhelms her. music at a certain volume, car revving and jet engines are completely fine. but sirens and chatter are a no. she's clever and intelligent and can pick up on certain patterns (like how a building might be structured). she's also a very good puzzle solver. she can't make decisions quickly so she often needs time to think. she always puts other needs before her own, which has lead her into trouble in the past. sometimes she puts on a childish demeanor to see if she can trust someone. she's also super fidgety. she's very creative. she loves drawing and designing and music. to break up her creative subjects in her education, she took chemistry which allows her to solve more issues. she can make links to other things but sometimes she makes mistakes. she is also very difficult to alterations in a routine that she always has to stick to and has issues concertinaing more that what should be required. overall, she's someone who just want others to be happy, even if it means she'll be in danger herself. stats: Strength:6 Intelligence:9 Speed:3 Endurance:8 Rank:6 Courage:3 Firepower:5 Skill:4 Armor:1 weapons: -the 'Bellona' a light machete which she can use in close combat or for throwing when needed. it's a very old sort of thing, but she treasures it dearly as it was the first weapons she designed ntirly. she even decorated it herself. she named it after the roman goddess of the chaos of war. the blade is lilac purple hard light and the handle is purple metal with magenta decals. - the 'Mars' a small dagger for emergencies. it's more like an army knife in how it retracts into the handle, so she uses it for when she needs to escape from something. she named it after the roman god of war. the blade is silver metal and the handle is purple metal with magenta decals - the 'Chataan' named after the deadliest disater of Chuuk, Typhoon Chataan, this is her blaster which transformers from her right arm. she uses it occasionally since she prefers the 'Bellona', but she has it around. of course she locks it away unless it's absolutly nessesary. it only fires two bullets at the same time in the barell. - the 'Halong' a wepon she's very rarley used. the blaster transforms from her left arm and can fire 6 bullets in the barrel. it's named after the typhoon that came one week after Chataan. it's heavy for her arm and too much firee power for her. thus she doesn't use it unless she needs to. - intelligence be very careful around jolt drive. her mid is as deadly as her weapons. she can recognize facial expressions and body language which can tell her if someone is lying. - her pigtails if jolt swings her pigtails hard enough, they can hit someone. backstory: Jolt drive was forged/born into a normal cybertronain family. she had a loving sire and carrier and younger brother. her extended family loved her too. they supported her a lot in her younger years. as time grew on she found out about her diagnosis of autism and how people also on the spectrum were being treated. She wanted that discrimination to end so she decided to take up a career that would make her famous to stop this stigma. Balancing her studies, she took up music and became an Iacon sensation. She was also a great student at the Iacon academy of arts. She studied design courses, taking up chemistry to balance out her creative studies. She was going well until an arson attack during a meeting she was attending would stop her in her tracks. She got caught under rubble which knocked her unconscious. she was saved from the incident by a bot named Mirage, who carried her outside and handed her over to the medics. the medics who arrived on scene where ratchet and his young apprentice, airborne. airborne saved jolt's life and befriended her. jolt also befriended mirage, wanting to know the person who saved her from the rubble. jolt and airborne, with mirage's assistance decided to create a safe place for bots with disabilities or who were looked down upon by society, since airborne also has autism. from there they ran into clawmark, a predacon wolf femme who hated hiding with her clan and wanted to break free. clawmark was also born very premature and is scared of what others might think. then from there they met sharpend, a talented artist who is struggling with people constantly bombarding her with request which doesn't make her feel safe, electric shock, another autistic femme and charge up, a femme who needs hearing aid due to her partial deafness. the group called themselves the Tibetan mastiffs and formed the core mastiffs, the leaders, when new members started to come forward. jolt drive continued her musician career when she was all healed. that was short lived though. soon the war came and Iacon put a ban on entertainment in fears of propaganda spreading. without having a source of income to help keep stuff running in the mastiffs and energon on the planet running low, they had no choice but to flee. the mastiffs, and jolt drive, fled cybertron to a different planet occupied by other neutrals. there, they settled and jolt started up her career again, until fate started to march back in. they were going to be discovered by undercover Iacon agents when the planet they were on was going to collide with a larger one. jolt flea to her ship but a malfunction occurred in which it locked early and no one else could get on board. trying to figure out how to get the locks to open again, she accidentally set a course for earth, stranding her friends. the distance put her in stasis before she crashed onto earth. she was discovered by autobots months after her crash. she had woken up and learned how to survive by herself on the supplies she had. the autobots offed her a second place to stay, aside from her ship and she agreed to an alliance to that team. on the condition she share her energon and doesn't give away their base to the decepticons. she agreed, mainly because she wanted some company. mirage was involved in that team and had renamed himself 'Dino' due to his fascination with Italy upon arriving to earth as well as to hide himself from a decepticon he once exposed who may be after him. jolt immediately recognized Dino and was thrilled to e her old friend again. through the CNA tests as standard procedure, to make sure she was clear of anything, a discovery was made that Dino and jolt were second cousins to each other. this actually made jolt feel more comfortable with the autobots since she had a relative around if something were to happen to her. she explained that she lost all communication with her team because of how damaged the communications got upon impact. upon finding out that the mastiffs suffered the same when they tried to leave the planet, jolt made a promise to restart the mastiffs and honor it in the legacy of her (what she assumed to be) fallen friends. now, with her second cousin, Dino and the help of the autobots, she's surviving the war and trying to create a safe heaven for the oppressed and disabled. but little does she know, her friends are alive and well and are looking for her. until she does, she's only got Dino and the autobots. as long as they're nice to her and respect her, she feels safe. extra: - she is a cancer (zodiac) - her 'birthday' in human time is 20th of July - her birthstone is a ruby - she refuses to talk to abelists - she loves magical girl animes and wants to become a magical girl - her favorite musicians are Krewella, Mitchie m and Livetune

#transformers oc #maccadam #maccadams #ahhhhhhhhhh #tfp oc #Transformers prime oc #my baby #jolt drive #my art #my artwork

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taco-night-frenzy · 4 years

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Stuff I wanna write

I’m pretty tuckered after writing so much, but I want to blab about other ideas that have been floating around for months and months that I still wanna do some day maybe.

Obviously lots of F/F and short Trails in the Sky fics (maybe one medium sized one) and then one big Luigi and maybe a few Sonics. Anyway here’s the list because I just... I want to write down ideas and put stuff out there. It’s what I like doing. Support me and tell me I’m great if you want, I love that, but don’t feel you have to. I'm full of myself and love compliments and nice words like “Wow that sounds cool, you should do this idea!!” Or maybe like “I also like that pairing, here’s what I’ve always thought about that too!” And just you know, nice interactions are cool.

Estelle/Dorothy. Wanna do another NSFW one that takes place in Zeiss. Would technically be right after Estelle/Josette fic but I wouldn’t tell you that really shh. Estelle gets a “quest” from a mysterious sender, turns out to be Dorothy because Dorothy spelt her name completely wrong. Dorothy wants to take pictures of Estelle, and Estelle’s like FINE SINCE I’M HERE. Anyways, Dorothy makes Estelle feel really good about her body and takes great pictures and ... you get the rest.

Another Estelle/Anelace (Possibly just Estelle & Anelace). SFW this time. I have much less worked out on this one, but I want Estelle and Anelace to go on a mystery together and solve a murder or something. Not super romantic, but a few light touches here and there and some fun plot. I’ve not nailed it down well..

Schera/Aina. Maybe spicy? Maybe NSFW? Who knows. I want to write something with them. Maybe about the time they’re on the run from that weird Mafia that actually happened and they had to spend the night in an abandoned home together. Lots of talking and developing feelings... or maybe another idea completely but with a similar preface. Estelle/Female!Joshua genderswap I GOTTA do Estelle/Joshua!! They’re a good ship! I just wanna make Joshua a girl for my own needs. Been struggling with a plot on this one. Maybe Joshua finds out he likes dressing up like a girl more than he realized (I always loved that Estelle called him beautiful and seemed genuinely attracted to him when he crossdressed.) Maybe while he’s been out on his own exploring ancient ruins something turns him into a girl and its a weird experience and he’s feeling vulnerable and strange and calls to Estelle to help him work it out and then you get some nice romantic hurt/comfort... And last but certainly not least... Detective Luigi 2: Hotel Wario

I have already written like 10k+ of this one and written down the basic plot and all that. It can be a real struggle writing such a long thing again, though, but for the most part this one takes place a year later from the last mystery. Daisy and Luigi are invited to Wario’s brand new hotel with a bunch of other fancy rich or famous people like Bowser, King Boo, E. Gadd, Prince Peasly, Lord Crump disguised as someone else... and Booster and Valentina and... A lot of others. Have plans for Goombella and Toadette to return and help and also Vivian now too. Basically general plot is someone steals Wario’s ancient relic, and Dr. Crygor’s automatic defense system locks EVERYONE in until they can find who did it. A locked box kind of mystery with a lot of Mario RPG characters and decent Wario world/ware theme.

I wrote it actually before Luigi’s Mansion 3, but it’s been good inspiration. It continues where it left off where Luigi is learning to be his own person, learned how to say no to when people ask him for things. But there’s more to life than just saying no all the time and Luigi still has to struggle finding a good balance.

There’s a lot going on and a lot of people have different motivations and feelings that have stayed the same or changed over the past year. I think I’ll just post what I got on Tumblr sometime later if I can get myself to working really hard on another long fic.

And I do have one idea that I’ll probably never do but have always sort of daydreamed about...

Chaotix Mysteries starring Vector and Knuckles. I really don’t think I’ll do this one but who knows. Station Square city and Team Chaotix already lend themselves really well to doing mystery AUs. Wanted it to mostly be Vector as the main detective and his partner Knuckles with occaaaassional Espio and Charmy help. Been a lot of gem thefts in the city and a lot of trouble in general, and it’s definitely not Rouge because that would be really obvious and boring, but they’d be asking around with Rouge and Shadow first thing and.... well again it’ll be YEARS if I ever ever ever get to this one...

I have a lot of Sonic Mania stories I started and never finished too.

Knuckles first person journal as he explores Mirage Saloon. I actually wrote some of this too years ago. Knuckles keeps a journal around and gets lost in a desert and finds himself in a crazy weird saloon with Fang/Knack and tries to get to the bottom of it by like punching stuff. Also Knuckles tries to write down rap lyrics a lot because he thinks they’re cool. (They’re not.)

Another one I started with Sonic Tails and Knuckles at flying battery... Sonic has to fight Mecha Sonic and tries his best to keep it away from Tails and Knuckles. It doesn’t work well and he’s losing a lot and he learns (probably doesn’t) that it’s okay to rely on Tails and Knuckles a little sometimes. Remember, this is Classic Sonic, so he’s still young and kind of rude and thinks he’s all that. I started this one too like a year back. It was mostly Sonic getting beat up and Knuckles shittalking to Tails how Sonic’s a jerk, and Tails is just like trying to live his life and find Sonic. About halfway through, Mecha Sonic goes Super and Knuckles has to fight him again. Mecha Sonic is way stupider than Metal Sonic and way more basic, so Sonic has trouble with that. Knuckles is better at fighting against brain dead idiots. Sonic’s able to keep up with Metal Sonic since Metal is more advanced and has Sonic’s thoughts and feelings kind of programmed in there.

Then one at Titanic Monarch... I also barely started this one... Just wanted it to be Sonic running off ONCE AGAIN on his own to fight Eggman. The illusions are strong, it has like every last boss all at once. Metal Sonic, Mecha Sonic, Big Arm, al lthat... Tails and Knuckles show up and are like GOD you IDIOT let us fucking HELP and Sonic’s like o, sorry.

Another Sonic Mania one with Studiopolis where Amy’s just watching TV at her apartment and its mostly from her perspective. Eggman hacks the TVs and turns the world into weird illusions and makes everyone watch his broadcasts as he spreads propaganda about how Sonic’s evil and bad, and Amy’s like NO!!! He’s NOT BAD!! Anyways, you only see what Eggman shows you, and Eggman like kidnaps news anchors and forces him to say how great and good he is and Sonic is bad, but then Sonic saves the day anyway and Amy’s watching the whole thing like SEE I TOLD YOU and just screaming and being a maniac.

ANYWAYS THAT’S ALL MY IDEAS I’VE GOT PROBABLY. I want to write them all some day, but it’s tiring...

#personal #fic ideas #long post #Trails in the Sky #Mario #Luigi #Sonic #maybe one day I'll come back to this post and look through some of my ideas and pick them out to do again #Hoping at least a few of these get done...#fanfiction #my stuff #I just wanna BLAB you know #I wanna blab and blab and blab forever

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mastcomm · 4 years

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As Afghan Soldier Kills 2 Americans, Peace Talks Forge Ahead

NANGARHAR, Afghanistan — President Trump stood in a misty drizzle at Dover Air Force Base as the remains of America’s latest two casualties in the long war in Afghanistan arrived home.

The somber silence was shattered by anguished cries from the young widow of Sgt. First Class Javier J. Gutierrez, who sprinted toward the plane as the metal cases holding her husband’s body and that of Sgt. First Class Antonio R. Rodriguez were being pulled out. “No!” she screamed, calling out his name over and over.

Just hours before that brief ceremony on Feb. 10, President Trump had made a momentous decision, giving his diplomats a green light for a peace deal with the Taliban that would lead to an American troop withdrawal and, possibly, the beginning of the end of the United States’ longest war.

This was once called “the good war,” “the war of necessity.” When American soldiers invaded Afghanistan in 2001 — driven by the Sept. 11 Qaeda attacks on American soil — and toppled the Taliban’s oppressive government, they were welcomed by large parts of Afghan society.

But since then, the war has become a bleeding stalemate in which even some Afghan soldiers turn their guns on American service members, viewing them as invaders instead of partners. The American sergeants mourned at Dover Air Force Base were killed by an Afghan soldier whose uniform, salary and M249 light machine gun were paid for by the United States.

Of the roughly 3,500 total American and NATO deaths in this war, American officials say, more than 150 have been killed in such “green-on-blue” attacks — assaults so destructive to the American mission that they have their own terminology to describe them. The problem has been so pervasive that soldiers are assigned to guard their American comrades who mix with Afghan forces. They have a special name, too: Guardian Angels.

When the war began, in the autumn of 2001, Sergeant Gutierrez and Sergeant Rodriguez were just boys. Sergeant Jawed, the Afghan Army soldier with a single name who would become their killer, was a toddler. By the time their paths crossed nearly two decades later in a dusty, eastern Afghan village, all three men had become old hands at war.

The army’s Seventh Special Forces Group that the two sergeants belonged to had been in Afghanistan just a few weeks. But Sergeant Gutierrez, of San Antonio, Texas, and Sergeant Rodriguez, of Las Cruces, New Mexico, had joined in 2009. Sergeant Gutierrez, a father of four, deployed to Iraq as an infantryman before heading to Afghanistan as a Green Beret. Sergeant Rodriguez had completed 10 tours in Afghanistan, first as an Army Ranger and later with the Special Forces.

Their Special Forces team was back in Afghanistan just as peace talks were reaching a peak again, along with efforts to hold the line against the Taliban in the field and pressure them to stay at the negotiating table.

In Shirzad district, in the eastern province of Nangarhar, the Afghan Army had pushed back the Taliban. But the operations were stuck. So on Feb. 8, a group of Afghan commandos accompanied by the Green Berets arrived early in the morning in helicopters to see if they could help, according to interviews with more than a dozen Afghan and American officials.

The Afghan Army battalion had taken up as their base a two-story building that resembled office space more than military barracks. It was struck by a double car-bombing last year, so the belts of security around it had expanded. American soldiers climbed the towers around the base right away, keeping guard the whole time they were there.

Among the battalion’s soldiers was Sergeant Jawed, a six-year veteran of the Afghan Army and the oldest son of a brick layer. He left school in 10th grade, faked an ID that bumped his age by two years, and joined the security forces like several other of his relatives. For $200 a month, the army sent him to fight the Taliban.

An undated photo of the shooter, Sergeant Jawed.

He got married, and he and his wife had their first child, a boy, three months ago. Sergeant Jawed had managed a transfer just an hour’s drive from home but, busy with the fighting in Shirzad, had not been able to go home to meet him yet.

By dusk that day, the work of the Afghan commandos and their American Special Forces partners was over. They had met the leaders, gone over operation plans. They walked out of the building, into the compound yard, waiting for their helicopters to take them away. The sun had just gone down.

Sergeant Jawed, his weapon in hand, emerged from the side entrance of the building just after 6 p.m., took a dozen steps toward an Afghan Army vehicle where several other Afghan soldiers were. He aimed the machine gun at the Americans and the Afghan commandos huddled on the other side of a gravel path and began spraying.

The shooting didn’t last more than a few seconds. But an M249 can tear through a 200-round ammunition belt in less than a third of a minute. There were at least 43 bullet holes on the cement wall behind the Americans, most of them at chest height, and eight more on a taller empty oil tanker truck behind the wall.

A guard from one of the towers, unclear whether Afghan or American, fired back, killing Sergeant Jawed and leaving the wall behind him riddled with holes, too. But the confusion and suspicion continued for around 10 hours, until the U.S. Special Forces — with two of them dead and six wounded — could be evacuated. At least one other Afghan soldier was killed, and three wounded.

The first scramble was to find out whether they were facing just one shooter or many. One of the first steps the Special Forces took was to disarm everyone at the base, except for the Afghan commandos accompanying them, and ask them to file out one by one. At first the orders were shouted. Then they were announced over loudspeakers. One Afghan Army soldier who resisted being disarmed was badly beaten and had knife wounds, several officials said.

“I told someone next to me this Trump guy is super serious, what if he tells the planes to bomb us?” said one Afghan security force member holed up inside, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly. “We put down our weapons and came out. But the whole time, helicopters were flying overhead and we were nervous that they would be striking any moment.”

The Taliban relentlessly pressure Afghan soldiers and police to turn and fight the Americans as invaders. And the insurgents bully the soldiers’ families to force them to switch sides or quit the fight altogether.

At the same time, as U.S. forces have shrunk their presence and interaction with regular Afghan soldiers, American airstrikes have reached record numbers, often pounding areas close to where the soldiers come from and sometimes killing civilians. In an age of social media and Taliban propaganda, the news of those attacks spread quickly, and outrage against the American presence rises.

In the days that followed, Afghan and American officials struggled to establish whether Sergeant Jawed had turned and joined the Taliban. In past insider attacks, the picture often became clear right away: the Taliban would claim responsibility, and the soldier’s phone records and movements would tell the rest of the story.

But no group claimed this attack. Sergeant Jawed’s background check was clean, a security official aware of the developments said. Afghan officials said he did not fit the profile of a Taliban infiltrator, though others have questioned that assumption.

Gula Jan, 70, Sergeant Jawed’s grandfather, disputed claims that anyone in his family had ties to the Taliban, noting the group had once raided his house because several of his relatives were in the Afghan forces. They even detained him once after he could not pay the fine the insurgents demanded of him because several of his relatives served in the Army.

“If my sons had been with the Taliban, then why would the Taliban open fire on my gate, why would they hold me for three months?” Mr. Jan said.

Mr. Jan spoke at his home just after his grandson’s burial. The military had refused to hand over the body for six days. A couple hundred people, many calling him a martyr, showed up at the burial. A large Afghan flag was planted near the headstone.

The silence from the Taliban about Sergeant Jawed’s attack was matched less than a week later by a muted American response to an airstrike that struck a pickup and killed at least eight Afghan civilians who were going to a picnic, local officials said. There was no statement from the U.S. military, which Afghan officials said had carried out the strikes.

The shooting and the airstrike couldn’t have come at a more delicate time — the peace deal with the Taliban had reached Mr. Trump’s desk.

In September, the two sides had nearly reached a deal. But Mr. Trump called off the talks, citing a bombing that killed an American and a NATO soldier.

This time, with progress in the talks seeming so close — a Taliban spokesman confirmed Monday that the insurgents had agreed to the terms and that the signing would happen by month’s end — few are talking much about the violence that is still happening, perhaps unwilling to risk any deal that carried a hope of ending it.

The remains of Sergeants Gutierrez and Rodriguez arrived in the rain late on a Monday night, their coffins met by a somber president and distraught families.

“It was very emotional,” said Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, who watched the ceremony at Dover. “I don’t know how you could go through that and be in favor of or blasé about war.”

Mujib Mashal and Zabihullah Ghazi reported from Nangarhar, Afghanistan; Katie Rogers from Dover, Del.; and Thomas Gibbons-Neff from Washington.

from WordPress https://mastcomm.com/event/as-afghan-soldier-kills-2-americans-peace-talks-forge-ahead/

#Event

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countingdesaparecidos · 6 years

Text

Scene 1

[rough, first iteration... not a complete work...]

4 JULY :: 2130

At six-foot-seven, the broad-shouldered Mestizo instinctively ducked to clear the garage doorframe. On the other side, boxing gloves thudded against swaying heavy bags; competitors threw each other onto worn padded mats using well-practiced techniques. The mats' resounding smack preceded transitions through grappling and wrestling drills, scrambling for top position, chokes and joint locks.

"Sinclaire." Arms heavily tattooed with Native tribal designs spread wide to greet the visitor whose black leather jacket hid similar body art. "Where you been, brother? Word is a couple of detectives ID'd you on a test drive before experts at Chuy's Speed Shop could clean up your new ride."

Surrounded by walls of posters and plaques, the two exchanged an Area-323 racers' handshake. Every horizontal surface of the room was strewn with spare parts, tools and vintage auto memorabilia. "You heard right, Chuy. A certain charitable organization posted my bail. Unless I win tonight, they'll pledge one of my kidneys to an impatient rich kid in North Korea. I don't even get to choose which one."

"The kid or the kidney?" "Neither."

They laughed and stepped back into boxing stance. "Lo siento pero we all got bills to pay, homie. Nothing free in this world."

Chuy threw a light body shot to the mid-lower back, blocked by Sinclaire's elbow in a crouching sidestep followed by quick left jabs. At six-foot one, Sinclaire was smaller, but also more agile; the two evenly matched skill for skill in a round of spontaneous sparring.

---

Sinclaire turned and jogged across the garage, weaving between biodiesel injection tanks stood along the floor and partially disassembled engines slung from chains attached to the ceiling. Chuy followed the improvised path to a hydraulic lift at the garage's far side, lit by overhead LED lamps and covered in a beige drop cloth.

The lift descended to floor-level; headlights beamed forward as Sinclaire pulled the drop cloth with a toreador's flourish. The vehicle rose four inches from the floor, hovering with a quiet hum of electromagnetic superconduction.

"Karma HOV6. Electrodynamic suspension, Hayabusa electric-linear quad motors, Versa integrated lift system." Chuy squatted to assess the electromagnets' balance on the car's four corners. "Trying to be the black James Dean tonight?"

Sinclaire daubed grease-stained hands with the clean spot on a rag streaked by motor oil and engine assembly grease. "Best I could find on such short notice, Chu. As long as it makes my daily bread tonight... and Dean got t-boned by a station wagon on the freeway. Not in a street race."

---

High-heeled lace-up boots stepped gingerly down from the hovercar, accompanied by neo-perreo basslines that ceased with a cellphone screen-tap. "Suprise! Hola, Chucho!"

Chuy stood. "Que onda, Leni?" "Asi asi, como siempre." The heels clicked in dance-walk rhythm and the two embraced. "Isn't this a beautiful ride? I helped Mark boost it. Love these colors..."

Valentina ran fingertips along the freshly washed and waxed hood. Silver nanoparticles evinced a fish-scale shimmer as swirling pools of blue, gold and purple responded to the overhead light; in deepest shadow, the painted surface seemed to disappear.

Sinclaire headed to the workstation console a few metres away. "Valentina's a natural. Nobody can resist her." "I'm the best diversion ever made. You're luckier than you know, baby." Valentina joined Sinclaire to retrieve a telematics dongle from the workstation desktop as Chuy moved to the driver's side of the car, sliding in behind the wheel.

"The takeover's in an hour. You need more than a pretty paint job if you want to win tonight." Chuy plugged the dongle into the car's OBD-VII dataport below the steering wheel.

On the workstation's screen, an AltSocial private social media page contained only one post created earlier in the day: "@Yungsta213: Meet on Tuesday night. PM for location." The inbox showed sixty-three unread private messages. Sinclaire clicked a black-cat silhouette taskbar icon to raise the Freematics Hub server software window, then entered the car's newly updated password. They switched places, Sinclaire behind the wheel and Chuy standing at the workstation.

---

Chuy read the telematics configuration data onscreen. "Induction response on the rear left generator is a few milliseconds off. No surprise the HOV6 is hard to steer at high speeds."

Sinclaire resumed diagnostic checks and calibrations using a laptop connected directly to electric steering, battery array and power output management interfaces. "I've been thinking, Chu: our first-generation HVs drove through Pyongyang to circumvent landmines. You have any idea how hovercars became a thing for civilians with the stability profile of a helicopter in a typhoon?"

"Same reason people used to eat pig flesh and chopped-up cow, but acted like dog meat was some kind of barbarism: marketing."

Early fireworks went off outisde, not far from the garage. "Like Americans on July fourth, blowing up explosives as if world war is a soldier's holiday. Propaganda."

An M-80 explosion rattled the windows in the garage's upper floor; Chuy opened a phone app to check the surveillance cameras.

"Better to hear engines all night than see memories of squadmates on foot patrol split in half by IEDs, dead or dying one by one from enemy sniper fire..." Eyes closed, Sinclaire listened to the report of fireworks popping, crackling and booming.

Valentina kissed Sinclaire on the cheek. "Come back..."

Sinclaire's eyes opened, looking straight at the screen, checking the rear airbrakes on the HOV6.

Valentina stood from the car, walked over and sat on an old leather couch nearby, rearranging the phone's playlist. Soon the thumping basslines of neo-perreo became the background atmosphere, partially obscuring the sound of the fireworks.

---

Chuy frowned at the telematics simulation. "Slick ground at the takeover spot tonight. Oil and rain in the conduction grooves could give some loose brake readings, especially in a HOV6."

Sinclaire flipped the Maglev|Air switch. The electromagnetic hum became a whoosh of ten high-RPM electric propellers engaged along the car's undercarriage. Billows of dust and metal shavings swept into the air as the HOV6 wobbled slightly, re-centering its gravitational balance. Dashboard gauges oscillated wildly, then settled into neutral. "Manual stabilization. Vector, acceleration, altitude. Nothing I can't handle."

The switch flipped to "Off" and all fans went silent. The car snapped back to magnetic equilibrium in alignment with the etched ferroconcrete below. Fish-scale nanopaint glimmered an oceanic tide along the car's carbon-fibre panels amidst the workshop's dusty grit.

---

Chuy's voice echoed over the music. "You're ex-mil, though. Mechanical skills, too. Why not use the G.I. bill and go live the straight life -- engineering, university degrees and all that?"

"G.I. bill? I'll be lucky if I don't get merc'ed out here, Chuy. Army brass and I didn't exactly part on speaking terms." Valentina sat on the passenger's side, playing with a pair of pink fuzzy dice dangling from the rearview camera screen as Sinclair revved the engine. "Guys from my unit opened domestic security and enforcement firms, operations you don't hear about on the news; same homicidal maniacs running renditions and black ops across Africa and Southeast Asia. Nowadays there's just as much profit at home as overseas. Even Commerce City SWAT team is privatised."

Valentina gently squeezed pressure-sensitive hair filaments between thumb and forefinger, cosmetic gene modulation gradually changing diffraction gratings at the root of every strand. Decora fingernails raked through thick curly hair, hues spiraling from black to fire-engine red and settling on hot pink that matched the dice. The update was complete with a tousle of eye-level bangs under critical appraisal befitting a professional hairdresser. "Chuy, I've been telling Mark we should escape to Canada, but he won't listen. One of my girlfriends does passports, papers and everything."

Sinclaire involuntarily glanced up to the garage's windows a split-second after blinding flashes of light erupted into phoshporous-white sprinkles that drizzled down to Earth. "Try to cross the border with the wrong name, sexuality, gender or political orientation and get shipped out to indefinite detention in a corporate-run lockup."

Chuy nodded. "No due process. Desaparecido."

---

"Diablo... here we go again..." Valentina pressed the Sunroof button on the car's centre console and the fibreglass ceiling panel began to retract.

Chuy glanced at the security camera feeds on the cellphone app. "Those chinga puta madre ICE agents got half our families deported, remember, Leni? Now it's not just Chicanos -- Jewish, Polish, gays, refugees -- even Irish and Italian immigrants fresh off the boat."

Valentina unlaced and kicked off the high heels, then stood on the passenger's seat, popping up through the open sunroof. "Dear pastor Chuy." Valentina counted on the fingers of one hand. "Mark is half-Sicilian, my grandfather is German, and I'm darker than both of you. My stepdad was Muslim, and so am I." Valentina fanned out the five fingers toward Chuy. "Is that not political enough for you? Is the target on our backs not big enough? So can we skip the sermon for once?"

Chuy’s fury quickly deflated to voluble grumbling. "Guess who gets stopped four times more than any 'pure' white boy in Southern California...."

Sinclaire leaned out of the open driver-side door. "Hate to break it to you, but -- we steal cars for a living, Chu. You run a speed shop and unlicensed fight club for street kids like us. But there is a slim chance if you change the name to Latter-Day Church of Saint Chucho Santana, you might get a decent tax deduction. You should think about it."

Sinclaire and Valentina laughed; Chuy couldn't help but crack a smile. "Chingada," Chuy groused, immersed in the telematics readings while stretching out a stiff right shoulder. "Nice hair, Leni."

Valentina grinned. "Si, claro. It's good luck for tonight. Now we can't lose!"

---

4 JULY :: 2145

Valentina's idle hands traced a faint scar at the side of Sinclaire's closely shaved head. "Laying low is my only option, Val, at least for the next few years. This place is a prison without walls. Some people just choose not to face it." Sinclaire set the laptop to Sleep mode and closed the lid.

Valentina slipped arm-in-arm, cheek pressed against Sinclaire's shoulder. "So if you're wanted by mercs, known to ICE agents, and the outlaw scene is all you've got, you must really be as bad as they say, huh, baby? Guilty until proven innocent..."

Valentina stroked Sinclaire's chest, outlining three dog tags strung along a necklace of miniature ballbearings resting beneath a tight black t-shirt.

"Watch out, chica." Sinclaire growled, nose buried into the side of Valentina's neck, teeth gnashing and taking a playful nip of the soft perfumed skin. Pretending to scream, Valentina melted into giggles. "Maybe one day I'll tell you the whole story. Tonight is about winning this race."

Valentina's eyes shut tight as Sinclaire revved the engine near maximum, testing the power output. "I can feel it..." Valentina wirelessly re-coupled the phone to the car sound system, turning up the music to party volume while Chuy and Sinclaire completed last-minute adjustments on the HOV6.

The rolling thunder and lightning of Fourth of July fireworks sparkled and boomed outside.

#science fiction #sci-fi #scifi #wwIII #post-apocalypse #post-apocalyptic #cyberpunk

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fragments-of-this · 7 years

Text

Responsibility to the Team - “When a wanted fugitive is your only hope for a fighting chance, it’s not a good situation.”

Since coming to Paris four years ago, Ruby has taken residence with the Moreaus, renting the empty flat above their pastry shop. In her adolescent vagrancy, they took her in--a stray girl who had no family or friends but was happy to help make the macaroons. In return for their good samaritan-ism, customers began to flock to the patisserie. Perhaps the girl was a good luck charm, perhaps it was karma, perhaps it was just a coincidence, but after her arrival their business took off and Ruby quickly became something of a daughter to them.

When she was seventeen, someone came from America that needed Ruby’s help--of course they were sad to see her go, but their Petite assured that she would be back eventually. And a year and a half later, she knocked on their door again, greeting her Granmeré with tears and a hug. They never asked what happened in America--just as they never asked what happened before they found her.

At eighteen, Granpapa insisted that a young woman should have her own space--they cleaned up the old apartment above their bakery and soon had her settled. Despite their protestations, Ruby even managed to pay them a monthly fee for her lodging. After a couple years, habit began to set in. Ruby traveled a lot, but when she wasn’t galavanting around Eurasia, she was working in the pastry shop, prowling around Shakespeare and Co., or writing in her flat.

Like so many other things, it became custom to update her journal every week. Ruby used her Book of Shadows to track everything--the mundane, the researched, and the developing. As she scrawled an entry on the effects of obsidian in correspondence to her powers, she listened to the sounds of the shop below her. The Moreaus always closed on Sunday, but she could hear Mimi preparing for the coming week, and could sense her soul through the floorboards. Unusually, the bell tined to indicate a customer entering. Ruby stiffened--she could sense a presence, but not a soul.

That could only mean one thing.

She had a visitor.

Sure enough, Mimi, her light footsteps and swishy skirts heard on the stairway, knocked on Ruby’s door. “Bonjour ma petite, cette fille dit qu'elle est votre amie?” Her thin face was deeply lined and smiling. Behind her a young woman with red hair and freckles smiled patiently. Ruby felt her stomach turn to ice. She spoke quickly, arranging her face into a bright grin. “Oui, oui, Megan. Merci, Madame Moreau!” Mimi nodded and left the two women alone.

Megan--M’gann--stepped into the small flat. There wasn’t much to it, but it was clean and well lit. Ruby closed the door with a snap, and before M’gann was even seated at the kitchen table she posed a careful question. “Why are you here?”

M’gann did not react. The smile was gone, and her face--and soul--was unreadable. “You know that she knows something is wrong, right?”

“Whom?”

“Madam Moreau. She is worried, because you addressed her as Madam, instead of Mimi. She thinks that we are not friends, nor were you expecting me. Correct on both accounts, I assume.”

Ruby focused on mentally reciting John Donne, whose words she knew by rote, over and over again--an old trick she learned from Isa, to screen her thoughts from a mind reader. M’gann was not supposed to be here, in Paris, and certainly not in the company of Ruby Whit. So what happened to force her presence? “Not necessarily. Our friendship is circumstantial, and I always expected the League to hunt me down one day.” Ruby took a seat opposite her guest, back straight, hands folded. “So you will have to inform me...is this a social call, or should I prepare to flee the country?”

M’gann did nothing but search her face. “Despite what you may think, I haven’t come here to threaten you, Ruby.” She leaned forward, eyes averted, elbows on the table. “We need your help.” Ruby's eyes narrowed, but she did not interrupt.

“You know of the Team.” Of course Ruby knew of the Team--the JLA’s covert ops force that doubled as overflow management. Ruby had had her own Team as well, before The Mission and consequential disbandment of her section.

“Obviously.” M’gann’s mouth tightened at her petulance.

“Yes. The force is comprised primarily of young adults, who don’t yet know themselves. While significant forces of crimefighting, justice, and peace, they are wide open to attack. As growing individuals, they are easily influenced, and easily riled.” M’gann paused to look again at Ruby's face. “This is where you come in. Your power.”

“What about it?”

“The ability to make visible a soul--to understand the self.” M’gann took a manilla folder from her bag, and slid it across the table to Ruby. As she flicked through it, M’gann continued to speak. “As the Reach’s technology is incorporated into the black market, propaganda weaponry begins to form. The next wave of villains seem to be turning more and more to manipulation of the mind--attacks on the psyche. Subverting values, creating impossible moral situations, et cetera.” “And you want me to counter this?” It made sense--most people hardly know themselves. That’s why they’re so easy for Ruby to manipulate; if you’re not a psychic, constantly probing the minds of yourself and others, it is unlikely you actually understand what makes up your soul.

“Yes. It would be an intensive and individualized practice; you would take a month period to teach two members of the team, both mental training and combat training. The trainees rotate monthly. There is a JLA base already built to house the operation, should you choose to accept.”

Ruby cocked an eyebrow. “Should I choose? You mean the Justice League is giving me an actual, honest to God choice about my fate?”

“Well,” M’gann scowled, “they are titled the Justice League.”

Ruby barked a laugh. “Hell if that means anything. In case you forgot, M’gann, I’m a wanted felon. I’m charged with murder, arson, attempted robbery, aggravated assault, and a slew of other awful crimes that I didn’t commit because the pristine Justice League needed a scapegoat to take the heat of a mission gone terribly wrong.” She stood, hands on the table, fire in her eyes. “I’m sorry if I don’t entirely trust the validity of my choice. Nor am I entirely unsure I’ll be able to remain a free woman once inside the United States borders. I still have six years to wait until I can’t be tried for my crimes.” The anger in Ruby’s voice drilled into M’gann’s composure. Ruby saw her soul seeping through the cracks of her armor, roiling with emotion--anger, pride, shame. But M’gann was good; she clamped down on the escaping tendrils and ripped them back to her, mending the holes in breastplate and becoming, once again, unreadable.

“The JLA is working to expunge you.”

“The JLA is the reason I’m convicted in the first place.”

“And that means nothing when you're up against a threat like this!” M’gann was on her feet so quickly that the chair beneath her clattered to the floor. “Do you understand the stakes of this operation? The Team is doomed, if you don’t help us. We will be exterminated if we cannot defend ourselves.”

Ruby scoffed. “Yeah, sounds like a real choice. When the fate of humanity rests squarely on your shoulders, you hardly have a choice but to be Atlas.” She made no mention of John Galt. Despite it all, Ruby did understand the gravity of an ultimatum, and the gravity of this meeting.

With a cold glare, M’gann pulled out another file. “Here is all the information on the operation. It includes location of the base, living conditions, training goals, trainee schedule, and your instruction partner. They have already accepted the post, so this operation is entirely contingent on your decision.” Ruby accepted it. “I plan to leave Paris in forty-eight hours. Make a decision by then."

Ruby listened, feeling the Martian’s soul float further and further away. When she was finally out of range, exhaled a deep breath. This was serious, and not at all what she was jockeying for in this new stage of life.

The research, when she glanced through the debriefing, was incontrovertible--psychic attacks were becoming more and more prevalent in crime syndicates and the traditional superhero is magnificently ill-equipped to handle them, particularly in a covert setting, particularly when the mission requires absolute trust in yourself and your teammates. Ruby felt the adrenaline in her system and tried to focus her energy. She saw her soul, indigo and glowing, around her. It was flickering like candle flames in her agitation, tiny, bruise colored lights whipping in a nonexistent wind.

Deep. Breath. in. Our Father... Out. Thou art in Heaven... In. Hallow’d be Thy name... Out.

The flames smoothed into metal, encasing her body like armor, and melted away. Now calmer, Ruby took a seat on the couch, file in one hand and her Book in the other, and she began to read about her new assignment. She had already made up her mind to accept; after all, it wasn’t a question, but a plea. The League was scared--and so they should be. It was her responsibility to help her Team, even though they abandoned her--especially because they abandoned her. But, responsibility or not, this wasn’t going to be easy. She had a feeling in her gut--she wasn't doing this training alone. M’gann mentioned a partner, but to have a counterpart in this endeavor requires an absolute trust and understanding. Ruby only knew of one person who fit that description, and he was a person she never planned on seeing again.

Before she went further on the file, she retrieved her tarot from the coffee table. Shuffling quickly, she spread them out in front of her, and selected a single card.

The Knight of Wands. She scoffed, and rolled her eyes at her increased heartbeat. She was probably just being paranoid. She drew another card.

The Five of Wands. Ok, less funny. She drew a final card.

The Three of Swords. Oh Hell.

Ruby snatched the file from its place on the couch beside her and flicked through the pages until she came to the section entitled INSTRUCTORS. Ignoring her own credentials she scanned the page until she came to her partner.

OLIVER LAFLAIR, aka VELOCITY.

She glared at her cards.

She was right. It certainly was going to be an impossible task, with an impossible rival.

“Well,” Ruby mumbled to herself, “it’s never stopped me before.”

#mine #superheroes and powers #ruby whit #m'gann m'orzz #the team #oliver laflair #series #this has been in my brain for forever #tarot #long post yay!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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decorous-biohazart · 7 years

Text

Log #2: Offer

Time: Four hours after Decorous’ initial arrival in Phoenix Nest.

Location: Debriefing chamber, Phoenix Nest

Key Terms:

N.O.V.A: New Outlook Virus Agency, corporation responsible for releasing the virus after Decorous’ last mission where the virus was mistakenly released after a mishap in the labs where it was created.

Phantom Virus: The virus released by N.O.V.A after it fell from a building and released on the city of Haven where Decorous was infected soon after. An undetectable gas that spreads to hosts, taking over the motor cortex of the brain, shutting down all other systems of the body, then massively increasing the amounts of ghrelin (the hormone responsible for hunger) adrenaline and noradrenaline (hormones responsible for aggression) in the brain. This causes the host to become very violent and feed on the living, animals, and even each other. The virus was intended to have an inhibitor that after a period of time would cause those infected to go dormant and allow for easy elimination, preventing any allied casualties. However, due to the incident involving Decorous that began the outbreak, the inhibitor was never added and the virus spread uncontrollably. Ways to identify those infected: Red eyes (caused by the triggering of the gene linked to albinism) and grey skin (caused by removal of pigment in the skin.)

The room was dark and cold where Decorous stood. His back was to the door, staring blankly into a mirror that he assumed stood as a one way window. His grey cloak was dusted with dirt and ashes, the left blue eye reticle of his mask still cracked from his fall so long ago. It felt as if it were yesterday, but according to Itzel it had been much longer. He was the face of who N.O.V.A claimed was responsible for covering their actions now, it was a burden he’d no choice but to carry. However, now that he was granted his first moments of silence since being liberated the magnitude of the situation began to become more apparent.

Had it really been three years? Three years locked away in a cryo-stasis as the world crumbled in result of his own actions. Decorous almost bit his tongue at the thought in a manor of scolding himself. N.O.V.As propaganda was almost so pungent he was beginning to believe it himself, but he had to hold onto the knowledge of his innocence; it was all he had left. Pushing the thoughts away Decorous turned his attention back to the room.

The air was cold from the stone walls and tile floor, surfaces sucking the warmth out of the room and off of the stainless steel metal table and chairs behind Decorous where he stood in front of the mirror. No windows, not even on the door, and nothing to hint at life outside the room other than the security camera nestled in the upper corner; its red eye blinking every few seconds as a constant reminder that it was always watching.

The door clicked open a few moments later, the hinges ominously silent as the door clicked shut again with almost no sound. In the reflection of the mirror the newcomer was revealed. A woman wearing a grey suit with locks of red hair spilling around her features and down over her shoulders. She was well kept, however, with filed nails and smooth skin with just the bare twinges of lines that betrayed her age.

She walked tall and confident, Decorous equated it at first to the fact he was unarmed. When he turned around, however, the full essence of the woman’s demeanor was revealed.

She was a flurry of features that all molded together to a demeanor that demanded respect but also promised safety. Something comforting yet intimidating about the way her forest green eyes were fixed firmly on Decorous. Not in the sense of a tight grip, but more of a secure hold on him with her gaze that was akin to someone holding your hand as you dangled over a ledge. The one hope you have from falling, but with just as much authority to let you go. A nature that made who she looked upon feel inferior like a child but was just as promising of protection and care as a mother. It was an immeasurably refreshing experience for Decorous, but he dare not let his guard down.

The woman set down a manila folder on the metal table before scooting the chair outward, the legs squeaking quietly against the tile flooring. She took the seat elegantly, opening the file with petite hands and spreading a few papers out with her palm before clearing her throat as if she were giving an interview.

“Decorous, may I call you that?” Her voice had the same elegance as her movement but an underlying harsh power to it, the type one would hear from someone adept at giving inspirational speeches. Yet despite her authoritative nature, she took the immediate path of courtesy in asking permission.

Stunned, Decorous could only respond with a flat, “Yes.”

“Excellent.” The woman responded with a wiry smile across her rosy lips, a small streak of pink sticking out prominently against the hue of her red locks.

“I apologize that we had to meet in such... Minimal accommodations but to avoid unrest in the camp I had no choice. I would have preferred to meet you in my office over tea.” the woman explained with a twinge to her voice that was almost humorous.

Decorous began to change his first impression of the woman that she did not feel threatened by his lack of weaponry, but more out of an unspoken trust because of a knowledge she was withholding that she was confident Decorous would want to hear. Turning his head over his shoulder the woman’s smile grew wider, clearly noticing that she had his attention. In an attempt to keep the momentum of the conversation, she stood up and extended a hand.

“My name is Christen Rheddstone; Administrator of Affairs here in Phoenix Nest and ruthless ruler of my subjects.”

She introduced herself in a way that was almost familiar, as if the two had known each other for years and it was a mock introduction. When Decorous did not move, however, she spoke again.

“That was a joke, and this is the part where you shake my hand.” Christen added, her voice more insistent this time.

Decorous could not help but feel compelled by the woman’s tone as he turned, his boots patting against the floor urgently as he reached out and took the woman’s hand. Even with his gloves on Decorous could feel her grip was firm, and he appreciated that. By handshake alone she expressed her mutual respect of the man she was speaking to.

“Christen-” Decorous began,

“Please,” she stopped him, holding her hand up, palm outward “call me Christi.” she requested.

Decorous stood silent for a moment as he lowered his hand, unable to get a read on the woman. “Christi... It is a pleasure to meet you, and thank you for the kind words.”

“The pleasure is all mine; you are a hero, Decorous.” she responded.

The cloaked man felt his blood go cold, his heart jumping up in his throat.

“E-excuse me.” he stuttered, warranting a smile from Christi as she set back down in her chair.

“Well, at least to me, I have already been fully briefed on your record. Leading a rebellion against N.O.V.A even with them being your prior superiors and knowing the risk of tarnishing your own name.” She complimented, gesturing for Decorous to take a seat and he did so.

“That takes courage. Courage that not many can say they have.” the red head continued, lacing her hands together in front of herself on the table as her tone went more somber.

“Especially to give your life for it. I did not have the pleasure to meet your prior team and I apologize for your loss.” she said as Decorous placed his hands in his lap.

Even in full gear he looked so lost, he could tell by how the woman looked at him. As if he were a stray dog that was just scooped up by a higher-income family unfamiliar with the struggles of poverty. But something was different about Christi. Somehow, in a strange way, it was like she actually could understand his position.

“You’ve nothing to apologize for, their blood is not on your hands.” Decorous responded, nonetheless grateful for her compassion.

Normally he would be wary of approaches attempting to appeal to his emotions, but the reality was he was simply too exhausted to be suspicious. If they wanted him dead or under guard they would have done so, but the Administrator of the camp had taken the initiative to speak to him personally and that spoke volumes.

“I understand, and will not prod further.” Christi assured as she picked up a few papers, licking her thumb as she separated one from the other.

“Former codename ‘Blade’ I see, what prompted you to change your name?” Christi questioned, raising an eyebrow as she looked up from the papers.

“N.O.V.A was never the most creative in their naming conventions, and I had no desire to hold onto such a cliché alias.” Decorous answered, placing his hands in his lap.

“I see, well that is logic I cannot argue with.” Christi affirmed, seeming almost pleased with his answer. “Served as a field agent and security personnel until the Fall.” The last word warranted a confused raise of the head from Decorous, Christi’s eyes raised from the papers to meet his gaze.

“Apologies, the Fall is the name we gave for the release of the virus. Only seemed appropriate.” she explained, clearing her throat again as she set the paper down.

“I’ll skip the formalities, you’ve been through enough for that. I brought you here because I was given a debrief from Itzel on your actions and statements between the retrieval of you from the facility and your arrival here in Phoenix and I have full confidence in your resolve. N.O.V.A stripped you of everything; your health, your team, and your reputation. Now you may not be one for caring about your record but the former two you cannot get back.”

It was as if she were reading his mind.

“But that does not mean you are without chance to even the score. Your abilities are unquestionably superior to any allied combatant we have on this base. You understand N.O.V.As inner workings and their stratagem to war. You may as well be holding their playbook, and if you are willing to share that with us I would ask that you accept my offer.”

“Offer?” Decorous echoed, he was beginning to feel the welling of distrust in his chest at the word. None of what he was hearing was adding up logically.

Christi nodded sternly.

“Offer.” she repeated, “If you will accept, I would like to elect you leader of Military Affairs in Resistance camp Phoenix Nest.”

Decorous was silent, turning over the variables and possibilities in his head. What would possess this woman, after just a short questioning, to give him such an influential position among their ranks?

“I... I don’t understand.” Decorous said, lost for words. “How could you ask such a thing of me? You’ve nothing to go off of but one of your unit’s testimony from a strike mission that resulted in my accidental recovery-”

“Now you see, you’re jumping to conclusions.” Christi interrupted, holding up a finger, “I’d say I’m almost offended that you would question my intelligence.” the Administrator added as she stood from her seat, fastening the center button on her grey overcoat as her flat dress shoes clacked against the floor as she paced behind the other individual in the room.

“I never said I was reliant on only her testimony, nor did anyone ever state your recovery was an accident.” Christi explained, her smile giving off an unusual message. It was not as if it were taunting nor confident, it was almost as if she were eager about something. But what?

In answer to Decorous’ internal question Christi tapped two fingers against the mirror behind him. A few moments later the door clicked open again, light spilling in from the outside hallways and illuminating a silhouette.

It was a woman. Not very tall, lean, and with short cut hair falling just passed her jaw line. As Decorous’ eyes adjusted he felt his head alarm him to the feeling that the figure was somehow familiar. It only became more prominent as he saw a pair of grey cargo pants falling over running shoes beneath a black tank top, half-gloved hands opening the door.

As Decorous stood to his feet, he felt as if his feet no longer rested on the ground. And then, she spoke two words in exasperation:

“You’re alive.”

#My Writing #Story Log #Decorous #Christi Rheddstone #Phoenix Nest

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