#this whole thing? is So Much More Complicated than you think it is. damien is going fucking through it | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs | Tumgik

#this whole thing? is So Much More Complicated than you think it is. damien is going fucking through it

jovenshires · 5 months

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so excited about jackie and shayne being together in iwks!! however also im absolutely crushed if the blushing from damien during the diner scene is cause he's pining for shayne😭😭😭 queen of angst here to kill me again /pos

MY BESTIES im gearing up to write more shackie content this year and this was my fun lil teaser

oh who damien????? crushing on SHAYNE??? haha noooooo........ would i do that to you........... never..............

👁️👄👁️

#congratulations on catching it bestie im sorry for the pain <3 but i will say this:#this whole thing? is So Much More Complicated than you think it is. damien is going fucking through it #iwks #fic #shipping #ask #asks #anon #anonymous

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cozy-autumn-moth · 3 months

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💀 Scary Girl Headcanons 💀

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Personality & Interest Headcanons

-She’s pansexual though she finds it difficult to express love in general because her way of showing love is physical pain and that's a turn off for most people, though she doesn’t discriminate for any gender, race, or type of person because death doesn’t discriminate either.

-She owns tons of really ugly plushies, some of which she ended up making herself by ripping them apart and then stitching them back together so they end up as this Frankenstein Esque abomination in plush form.

-Loves Halloween a lot and has made home made costumes every single year. They freak out lots and lots of people and have made tons of children cry.

-If you couldn’t tell I feel like she’s fantastic at sewing and anything in that ballpark. I like to imagine she made her own dress.

-Likes to draw and has made her own really weird world with her super freaky OC’s that she probably kept around since she was extremely little. The lore and story is overtly complicated and the only person who is capable of even understanding or finding appeal in this is Lauren herself.

-She was totally obsessed with things like creepypastas and FNaF when she was younger. I feel like nowadays she still is very much into them but it got toned down a lot more as time went on and she found more horror related stuff to be obsessed with.

Family Life Headcanons

-She doesn’t actually live in a funeral home like she says in S2Ep4, but her family does own a family run funeral home which acts like their family business.

-At home she basically only lives with her single mother with her dad being out of the equation for the most part. Though on occasion some members of her decently big extended family visit for a few days if it's a holiday or something but they mostly meet at the Funeral Home more often than not.

-At work she is usually the family embalmer, which means she disinfects and dresses the bodies before putting them in their caskets, and has been practicing it for years. She finds it very fun and has had interest in it since she was able to properly think and walk.

-Her family holds a sacred form of respect for the process of death as a part of life and they see a funeral as a celebration of how someone lived and not a mourning regarding how someone died. Lauren is the outlier as one who is almost obsessed with the ways people die and feel pain and has taken incredible special interest in it as a whole, though I like to imagine that she has one elder family member who acts very similar to her and they bond a lot.

-Lauren genuinely does love her mother and expresses this love really weirdly, basically she makes really weird and creepy gifts or says some super suspicious stuff. Her mom is fine with it because in her head it’s just how Lauren operates, though she is mildly freaked out.

-Anyone who is closer to Lauren's age or younger legit hates her so she more or less has become more comfortable talking to her mom, aunts, uncles, and grandparents rather than people her own age even though the adults in her family find her just as weird but they tolerate it thinking she’ll grow at if it despite acting like this since she was very young.

-Lauren used to be bullied and isolated a lot at her elementary school and because of it her mom never properly enrolled her into school after like the third grade and so she was just homeschooled for the rest of her life.

-Joined a circus at one point in time for some inexplicable reason to the point where her family thought she was missing and there were just people trying to search for her. Anyway she did lots of weird things there and ended up blowing up a clown which was completely by accident, also she got really good with athletics and acrobatics so that’s cool.

Total Drama Experience Headcanons

-Was always the first to wake up in her team's cabin and totally got close to peoples faces just to spook them when they woke up.

-Since Damien was the person to give her the name of Scary Girl, which she actually loves a lot, she took it as a form of friendship and only harasses him as much as she does as a sign of affection and respect. She totally believes Damien is her best friend.

-Knows a lot more about the contestants and their lives not out of them telling her but because she just stalked them.

-The skull she got in episode four is now just in her room and the major reason why she even thought about giving it a makeover was out of compulsion from being her family's embalmer for so long.

-Once she got home she totally made a tier list based on how fun the contestants were to hurt or how good their screams were. It’s also basically just a ranking of the contestants from favorite to least favorite.

-Respected and liked Emma for how enthusiastic she was in wanting to hurt Chase.. She got sad when they ended up getting back together and then was very happy when they broke up again. Would love to beat the shit out of Chase with Emma someday.

-Least favorite contestants were Ripper and Millie and that’s by an incredibly wide margin, her feelings for Millie became mixed after the whole slide incident with Damien.

-When Lauren came back after season one and her mom watched the first season she realized her daughter’s behavior in full and obviously needed to say something but is so overly scared to upset her that she basically is like, “Lauren, not that it’s my place to judge and you totally don’t need to take my advice but maybe just tone down your scariness a little bit, it’s not your fault but maybe it will help”.

-Lauren and her mom definitely went to the store to buy some “normal clothes”. Her mom found it fun but Lauren probably hated every last selection her mom gave her and only wore them because she loved her mom so much and desperately wanted to be normal so she could be liked.

-Since she got eliminated super early the second time around she did a lot of introspection and basically came to the conclusion that she wasn’t going to let people influence the way she acts because to her it just isn’t worth it if she can’t be who she is in her own life and people aren’t even going to like her for it. She also realized that she couldn’t stand most of the cast members and by the end most of the contestants just made their way into the bottom tiers.

-Was probably forced to get a therapist when the second season finished, it’s up to you to figure out how well that experience is going for her.

#total drama #total drama headcanons #Scary Girl #scary girl total drama #scary girl td #Scary Girl Headcanons #total drama spoilers

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milophiliac · 1 year

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A/N : Gasp! The long-awaited part 2 to my redacted actor au headcanons? More likely than you think!! Hope you guys enjoy, not as well written as the first one I'm afraid- Word count : 0.3k Warnings : None

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-> David is ironically one of the funniest and most expressive people on set

-> Caelum was 11 when he was cast and he was going through an emo phase at the time

-> Damien’s actor loves singing and can be found humming a tune around the set

-> Huxley is so clumsy. He trips on things all the time.

-> Vincent can play the harmonica. He played it on set once and Hux took a video and posted it, it went viral [as a meme template but we don’t talk about that].

-> Lovely auditioned for Angel’s role. They initially did get it, but then the directors recast and they ended up as Lovely.

-> Darlin’ claimed they could do stunts for their role, it was a bit too late when everyone realized they couldn’t, but luckily they got a stunt double.

-> Geordi thought the whole thing was just going to be a short film- He realized it was a series after getting cast.

-> Adam and Lovely still keep in touch, they’re close friends.

-> William and Vega are related. They’re brothers, William is younger than Vega. No, I will not be taking any questions at the moment.

-> Elliot is one of the calmest people on set, Blake is the exact opposite, but they get along well.

-> Quinn is constantly accused of being an actual vampire. People call him out all the time when he acts like one.

-> Sunshine is a lot like their character, they find it easy to fit into the role.

-> James and Marcus are dating. James hated filming the scene where Marcus cried, but Marcus was laughing once he finished filming.

-> Marcus thinks his character is interesting to play and even though he doesn’t condone his character’s actions he thinks it’s nice to get on the complicated villain side for once.

-> Gavin was a ballet dancer. He got into it as a kid since his mom taught ballet.

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© All content belongs to @milophiliac. Do not copy, translate, modify or repost any work. Reblogging however, is very much appreciated.

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captaindarkiplier · 2 months

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I am both confused and curious , depending on the endings ,do you see engineer and darkiplier become a couple sort of ? Or is it complicated ? Since engineer is either actor or the true engineer guy

That's a really good question. And I'm glad to answer it early on rather than later, because I've actually thought about Darkhenge being read that way ahaha, and it's not exactly my intention, but I'll get deeper into that because it's more nuanced

Short answer:

I'd be fine if people see it as anything, honestly. My AU isn't fleshed out to the point where it's entirely removed from the source, and the nature of the source is... you can project onto it! Canon Captain and Head Engineer are depicted as a friendship, but people can easily ship them if they want to. So that's how I feel about my AU as well- except it's much different in genre of ""romance"" or ""friendship"" LOL (due to Dark HATING Mark- But that's the catch- this isn't the "same" Mark!)

Long answer:

I'll get into exactly what I think Darkhenge to be. First, before getting into it: The AU name Darkhenge is structured as a ship name, but I don't really ship within the binary of romantic nor platonic, it is just a duo/pairing system to me pretty much. ISWM is a story that goes heavy on the platonic emotions, and tends to be unconventional/bizarre in ways, in the storytelling, characters, etc. Such bizarre things as killing your friend or having your friend try to kill you or seeing your friend as hundreds of different people. It's fun. I think I held onto that aspect more than a concept of a standard relationship. I guess I happen to be unconventional in my tastes.

Now, I will dig into Darkhenge as I conceptualize it. It's kind of making me nervous to finally put an official description of it out O__O" alongside my art of it! I've talked about it a lot privately but never spilled the beans on what it IS...? (a little excited)

Dark is put into a compromising situation, though not like he isn't used to that, and he has to fend to secure his position of power. So, it is fortunate that he's a Captain with Mark as a self-sacrificial subordinate. That's Dark's comfort zone, to have control. But, (to have (Actor) Mark as his friend,) it's not his normal. But for us, The Viewer, it is. So that creates a dichotomy internally that Darkiplier has to account for. ... Darkiplier doesn't typically share the emotions that The Viewer does, and if he did, I think he has a fair chance of it not getting in his way, since he's always repressing conflicting emotions anyways. But that depends. If Darkiplier "wins the game" like I explained in my previous post... He witnesses the story of ISWM. This might not influence him- as explained! Why would it? But there is some more weight to the experience for him, regardless. It's something he would think about for at least a moment, maybe yet another thing that weighs him down forever, even if it doesn't subtract from everything he has going on canonically. (The whole revenge and hate thing) ... So finally, the weight in question: Head Engineer, in my AU, is Actor Mark, but not exactly- his character is modified in this story specifically, just like how The Viewer/Darkiplier is modified to have fused for the duration of ISWM in my AU, and then would split after they finally resolve the paradox; so everything canonical still applies in the overarching universe & stories. Head Engineer is an Actor Mark who, unlike the other Marks, hasn't just deluded himself into "believing the story he acts out..." or wanting something in the House... -- he's literally a different Mark. That's how it was written canonically, and I'm reading it this way for fun: He's Actor Mark, but an AU version. I know Actor Mark transcends the AU logic like Warfstache, but before Mark was an Actor he was Mark- and that's the idea. Maybe you get it, maybe you don't... so here's a list:

Damien and Mark were good friends, until Mark was taken by his ego and the influence of the House.

The Viewer and Mark have a deep friendship.

The Captain and Head Engineer are on good grounds to have a close friendship as well, thanks to whatever circumstances of their respective characters preceded the story of ISWM.

Darkiplier hates Actor Mark, and his hate is hinged entirely upon what Actor Mark did in WKM, via influence of the House.

The Head Engineer is Actor Mark, except before he would do any of that in WKM.

The Head Engineer is Actor Mark before he became Actor Mark, so just Mark- except an AU version: he's evidently a space engineer instead, with a humbled ego and no awakened desire to act. Yes, Head Engineer does have a smaller ego than Mark had, I imagine Mark was a bit egotistical and theatric even as a kid. Head Engineer is Mark if he turned out different. "I could've been an engineer..." haha And this can be circumstantial or "genetic" - but I like to think it's mostly circumstantial, because I still see the other Marks' traits (including Actor) in Head Engineer's character, especially with how carried away Head Engineer can get about the warp core. It's the same phenomenon of the house. And I know that's just the House, but I like to think that there's a theme shared between Actor and Engie that they're both the type to get carried away with a creative vision or incentive of investigation and revenge... (Kind of like Abe and Dark, which is why I see that it can be just the House's global influence) ... It's a hc of mine that I find enriching to the AU Engie's character.

So, to Dark, other than any potential heartstrings it could tug on his very dead and perhaps nonexistent heart, this is a surprisingly uncomfortable situation. But The Viewer makes it more tolerable by eventually resolving the situation, regardless of how much Dark might have wanted to fight those routes, or how many mistakes each of them made to get bad endings. If the Captain and Head Engineer never made up, the story would likely never end- because, well, we tried every other route, and it didn't really end there... So, The Viewer is essential. Mending the friendship is essential. If Dark has any heartstrings pulled, it's probably Damien's... but I think this Dark is rather muddy in his "original" identity by now (plus the addition of the D/A as The Viewer... Damien isn't even getting the chance to talk to the D/A in headspace, I feel like ISWM feels super fast for them all, barely conscious), so it'd be vague and buried. I like the hc that Dark and Warfstache both forget, but Dark remembers a bit more, and he's sentimental, but very reserved about it and would only stop repressing it only around people he trusted. That's a complicated thing, and I think ISWM is not about resolving Dark, but is about resolving the story and nothing else. But you could argue otherwise if you wanted to. Maybe part of him could have been happy.

A silly analogy would be taking a criminal to a class meant for teaching toddlers to play nice, and not letting them argue with the teaching, just teaching them the lesson until they submit and actually succeed to be nice. Then the criminal is let free from the class to do whatever he wants, again. The memory of it might be uncomfortable... or maybe irrelevant, because it could be happening all the time! Maybe this isn't Darkiplier's first rodeo in the multiverse, nor the last. ... I like to think that he explores, since everyone technically can within the illusory world in the House/Mansion. Stuck but free all the same.

Ah... I like to think how ironic it would be if Darkiplier had to go to this universe & possess this body of all possibilities just to get the warp core... It's funny.

The most important aspects of the dynamic to me is the duality of comedy and horror/tragedy, and the anomalous third act is the profound sappiness in the original media that would not at all fit Actor and Dark's dynamic- it's the contrast and impossibility that I love about the situation.

If I had to romanticize them, I think it could be done nonromantically, for the record. I, myself, am not traditional with the genre of romance. I guess I fit into the grey area, and that influences how I think of Darkhenge, as well. I also think the word "romantic" doesn't necessarily have to mean dating, since you can romanticize pretty much anything in life. And I think this AU is a pretty good example of how I can romanticize things! A lot of fiction is a kind of romanticization, but the romanticization doesn't usually indicate what you would feel about it if it happened in real life. So yeah, I think I do a lot of that... A lot of media I read can have villains or dark themes that I will play around with conceptually, knowing that if they were real, I'd hate them. Lol.

I like love stories that go like this. I mentioned Madoka briefly before, and that's honestly my top inspiration to even my own surprise because it nails the nuance perfectly- it's commended as a great Yuri but it's not actually a Yuri, it's just written so well around those two characters that it can be commended as a great story with Yuri characters/undertones in it.

So yes, I like stories like this, and they tend to be best written as love stories... but they don't necessarily have to be love stories. They can just be tragedies... but I think love is an important element when writing about the bigness of life. Whatever form that love might take. So whether it's platonic, romantic, or neither, is none of my concern nor consideration, because it's about something more nuanced, bigger... Everything and nothing is taken into account at once, if that makes sense.

Even some of my Darkhenge art ideas (that haven't yet come to fruition) seem a bit romantic, it's just a grey area. I think I am in love with the AU itself, and that's why... I hope it makes sense why I am in love with it- if not, I'll just keep trying to show why...!!!! ( •̀ ᄇ• ́)ﻭ✧

Well, I think I have explained it properly...? Feel free to ask more questions, though. I'm a little sleepy while typing all of this, so I could have missed something.

For the record! If someone shipped my AU characters romantically, I would likely be fine with their headcanons/interpretation, but I encourage them to ask about boundaries if they plan to post about it.

Thank you so much for the question!!! I'm glad someone thought to ask it. :)

#asks #so hard to put the raw feelings into words!!#I'll probably yap about these same things numerous times until I get a good “angle” on what I mean #Drawing DH art is just as difficult with precision but sometimes expresses it more vividly #Multiple pictures- multiple facets- a gallery like a timeline of events or memories #I'm sure the same could be done in writing via poetry or fiction but I'm not experienced #darkhenge #text

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consul-valerius · 1 year

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Apprenticember Day 3: Donna and The Main Six (or.... my version of the main six LOL)

Give a short summary of their relationship to the other main characters!

This is going to get long because I can't shut up, thank you for bearing with me besties lmao

Nadia

Donna and Nadia are very close, with Donna acting as one of Nadia’s confidants prior to the game. They initially became close when Donna began working at the palace; Nadia instantly empathized with Donna’s culture shock of what life in the palace was like in Vesuvia, and she felt the need to be a source of comfort and support for them (which got physical pretty quickly lol). This blossomed into genuine feelings developing between the two that is hard to define strictly. In some continuities, Donna and Nadia (and Valerius lol) enter a full-fledged romantic relationship, and in others (such as Damien’s timeline), the lines are much blurrier and lean more platonic for them

Portia

BRAT TO BRAT, SWITCH TO SWITCH ENERGY BABY!! After the game's events, Portia is one of Donna’s closest friends. They both instantly related to one another’s needs to prove themselves, to be the heroes of their own stories, despite everyone doubting them. Honestly, it’s the lack of any prior history that makes Donna and Portia’s relationship so special. Portia has no grand idea of Donna that she is still holding onto: she’s been there since their new “beginning” and sees them for the person they are now.

Asra

Boy are these two complicated LMAO Asra and Donna adore one another, but after their death and revival, their relationship is permanently damaged. Prior to the game, the two were normally joined at the hip, and while there were some one-sided romantic feelings from Asra, he never let them interfere in their friendship, even when Donna dated guys Asra really didn’t approve of (cough cough, Sam and Valerius, cough cough). Things started to go downhill when Donna began working at the palace, and their relationship was effectively nuked when Donna died.

To put it plainly: Donna doesn’t know what to think of Asra after the events of the game. They love him dearly, but there will always be a sense of distrust and resentment over what he has done. They feel like they should be kinder to him and that they literally owe him their life, but there is a sense of violation over them having no say in their own death that they cannot quite verbalize to anyone. It feels like something was robbed from them, but they feel guilty for thinking that way at all.

Julian

Julian and Donna were close during the plague and used one another as sources of comfort while working with Valdemar. However, neither have very solid memories of this, but after the game’s events, simply remain very good friends who enjoy nerding out together lol Afternoons spent pouring over books together before getting black out at the Rowdy Raven are some of their favorite times together (and neither are very good wingmen for each other but man do they try lmao)

Muriel

Donna didn’t have a relationship with Muriel until after their revivial, and even then, they never remembered the times Muriel would take care of them when Asra was gone. After the game, however, they do begin to form a bond. Both Muriel and Donna have PTSD, and while more and more of Donna’s memories come back to them, they have a harder time managing it (even harder than before their death, as now they have a whole new layer of trauma to deal with lol). Muriel really begins to stand in as a figure who can not just relate to Donna but he was deeply realistic and blunt with them about it, which is exactly what they needed.

They didn’t want to hear about how there would be better days and that their feelings were valid: they wanted to hear “this sucks—let’s go eat because I know you haven’t.” Sometimes Donna can be a bit too much for Muriel, so while they don’t see one another as often prior to Damien being born, their interactions are always positive and deeply meaningful for Donna.

Valerius

I’M INCLUDING HIM BECAUSE HE’S THEIR LI AND I FUCKING CAN GDFIHGDIFHG but this is just another reminder that they’re gross and in love LMAO and Valerius is deeply appreciative of all the new connections he would have never made if Donna wasn’t in their life. They often are a bridge for him to let his true personality show to others, and they give him more confidence to be real and not always play noble mind games with others lol

#bottom draws #apprenticember #the arcana #nadia satrinava #portia devorak #asra alzanar #julian devorak #muriel kokhuri #consul valerius #fan apprentice donna #the arcana apprentice #i should have been tagging these as:#bottom ponders #since it's lore lol #oopsie!!!!

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rxttenfish · 6 months

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Damien x Liam

&

Zoe x Vera

Shipping meme.

oh, damien and liam is one of those classic monprom ships! i think the very first ship art i saw from monprom was damien and liam? it sounds right, though it has been over five years since i first joined, so that could just be my memory not serving me well. point goes is that it's a prominent one and gotta be one of the most popular of the RO x RO ships, and definitely one that's the most alluded to in canon.

the issue is just... i still don't like it very much. to be fair i like very few m/m ships, and i know this is such a popular dynamic that from the offset it just automatically felt the most like a ship that would get popular, but it's a popular dynamic that i hate a lot. i don't really care for the bully/nerd dynamic nor the things it sets up, and especially with things like it highlighting damien's toxic masculinity combining less than favorably with how much liam openly and directly talks about things like sexism within the game itself. it's just... unfortunate, i think.

it feels like everything just conspired to make me hate this ship. it's liam, one of my favorite characters, with damien, one of my least favorite characters. most of the events with these two involve damien beating liam up or beating him down, and while i would agree that the two are still friends from the events that are exceptions to this rule and how it just plays out when it does happen (liam is... very directly the masochistic type, so it doesn't necessarily strike me as out of character or even a badly thought out part of the dynamic if this is part of the selling point on a friendship with damien for liam), it always feels weird and off-putting to me. i think this probably works best, and i prefer it best, as them being occasional fuckbuddies on top of friends, less as a proper romantic relationship.

zoe and vera is another ship that i've seen before, and i can definitely see it more than liam and damien. though i'm notoriously known for not really caring all that much for zoe as a character, thinking of her as kinda weakly written in comparison to some of the others on top of including tropes i hate, which also makes this complicated for me.

i think vera's also always an odd one to ship with, because there's a duality between her constructed image and how she allows people to approach her, and what she actually wants and needs in a relationship for emotional fulfillment. she needs someone who can make her relax and slow down, provide a way to remove her from her whole constructed image to let her be a person again, but they cannot simply disregard that image and what it means, cannot wholly discard her interests and ambitions and all that she's put work into attaining. there's a careful dance that has to be done to disarm her suspicions and her harshness before she lets someone in, but once they're in they need to be loving and fond and safe in a simple way, an easy way that vera otherwise would deny herself.

it's not that i don't think zoe could do it, could be that person. rather, zoe isn't very careful at much of anything that she does, and she's so overt and sometimes even pushy that i worry more about all of it making vera freeze up, shut down, lock zoe out. vera in comparison is... harsh and blunt, yes, but her personality is multi-layered and multi-faceted where what you see is not always what you are going to get, and being able to navigate the complexities of her moods and emotions are needed. she can be quick to punish and quick to say the exact kind of nasty things upon the slightest infraction that could all too easily hurt zoe. being overtly affectionate and positive can work, as we've seen with her friendship with scott, but it also needs an ability to take the punishment she can dole out, either just not getting it or not taking offense in either manner. this can also certainly be done if the other character is person-smart enough to realize what's going on beneath the surface, like polly. this doesn't feel, to me, like something that zoe can do, rather being more the type to take the first time vera lashes out as deep personal offense and either not recovering from it or taking a much longer time to recover from it.

which, again, isn't to say this can't work! i think it certainly could work well, especially if you're fleshing out a timeline or plotting this out more thoroughly, and after this specific period i could see them being very good for each other, but it's also something that is enough to make me skeptical.

#all the care guide says is 'biomass'#asks #Anonymous #monster prom #basically vera is bitey #which is exactly the kind of character that i love #LOVE characters who are just. so tightly wound and have so many Issues #that they need someone to perform an intricate dance to disarm their defenses before coming in to love and support them #in the exact way that they need #experienced owners who know how to use a snakehook ONLY. others need not apply.#need someone to love me like caring for a hot snake #also yeah canon loooooooves damien x liam so much. just dropping it in everywhere.

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nightmaresinviolet · 2 years

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So GODDAMN part two was frickin good, huh? I love where the story went with what it laid down istg and the VINDICATION I got to my previous theory that I made when the trailer came out was so damn good

And I actually think part two tied up a lot of the loose ends compared to what a lot of people seem to think sooooo long post under read more about what I think happened so that I can come back and read this whenever I need to talk abt it with others lmao--

And I'd love to hear all of you guys' thoughts as well whether you agree or not! I'm just really hyped about this story and the genius storytelling that tied things up in a nice bow for us.

----------------------------------------------------

SO to start it off with I think our main core difference were the two timelines with "hold on" and "let go"

Hold on as we know by now leads to the best true ending and a direct segway into the AHWM series, as we know by the recommended video and that infamous Dark tease. (We waited all this time for a foot and a hand, lads, we really did)

But I think what's important for the iswm lore is the let go path and here's why I think that is:

I think the let go ending creates 'bottom of the wormhole' + OLD MAN MARK

And why I think those two Marks are connected is mostly speculation but hey we're just theory crafting here. But I think it's mostly because of what the wormhole Mark says, the 'I go and I come back I go and I come back!'

Trying to fix 'our' mistake over and over and over again but always ending up in this lost cold pit in some corner of the universe. We know the 'time jumps' the warp core led to is the infinite corrupted universes we saw at the description of the "UNIVERSE REBOOTING" promos. So all those infinite universes, let go!Mark tried to fix the mistake but it always leads to another time jump and another universe that ultimately sends him back to the pit to try again

Cuz if he is at the bottom of the wormhole as we know, I think time passes much slower there, much more stagnant

So he's there to see the creation and the destruction of those infinite universes trying to fix it again and again to no avail

until....He sees us again. Knowing that despite his futile attempts as long as we have the crystal there's a chance out in the universe to fix this

and I think this is the point he leads into the old man mark that ultimately ends up guiding us to tell him to stop using the warp core at the start of part two. Because he went back to the last universe and led to the true ending of part one. (Ps. We see him around in part one too so we know he's physically there trying to get the warp core functional again) And then realizing his mistake of using the warp core.

Now as we know in the Markiplier Cinematic Universe time doesn't make sense so he can very much be an old man by the time he does that and then sees us at the restaurant again. And as another thing I think his physical traits also connects us back to wormhole mark. The fact that his clothes were torn when we're at the pit, and then what does old man Mark have? A blue jumpsuit rather than his usual beige.

And the beard, he had it at the pit timeline too and also the long hair as well.

So that's that on why I think those two are the same and ultimately they are what happens to our "Let go" timeline Mark

And another character point I wanna mention before moving onto my thoughts about the timeline is Dorene.

it's basically confirmed now that she's Celine, isnt it? Her whole "Something my....an old friend used to say." Obviously reference to Damien.

And Dorene, she's the one who sends us back to the start. The literal start. Of part one.

It seems she doesn't *want* us to find the true ending. The thing that sets the course forwards for actor, onto projects like HEIST and everything else in between. Fueling the existence of Dark and even more new characters that complicate things even more.

But why was she on her own? Why isn't she with Dark anymore? We all thought she was asleep inside his conscious! Now that's a loose end I think that I didn't manage to tie up yet aside from thinking it has to do with her reflection of the "Let go" timeline...but it's still a nice confirmation that we got that she was Celine the whole time.

Now onto my speculation onto how the timeline works, well.

it doesn't. Time and time again we know time doesn't make sense in the Manor, where all of this is happening in the first place anyways. So what I think is the thing we can define as "time" in this place is simply....whatever 'project' we choose to watch this time around. Remember what mark said in the ending before our crucial choice? That these splits in timelines are more than the multiverse, they're different points of view.

And through our travels in the wormhole, we end up with so many egos and other 'projects' and stories that we KNOW happen at "different times". And yet we were there for it. For even some 'unplayed' ones like the 'Murder with Markiplier' or the Bomb thing or that whole 'Catching Mark Iplier' thing.

The Wilford and Yancy cameos are the best examples of this. The wilford scene literally happens in the backstage of wilford motherlovin' warfstache judging by the sparkly string things that were on the stage wilford was on in that video.

and the Yancy one is because it seems from the way he talks we have come to visit him multiple times as is. Even before our "space program".

How could that happen if Heist, and therefore Yancy, comes after this as we all know by now?

Well it's because the timeline has never been linear. Everything sort of....happens at the same time with just some vague differences setting them on different courses. Another example is at the very start if you choose the Romance option mark is there for a reference for our "second date". But oh, date with markiplier comes after Heist, doesn't it?!

again, it isn't linear. There isn't a chronological happenstance of events. As far as we know, the second Who Killed was over, there was no such thing existing as time anymore. It's just simply a matter of what we choose to perceive in whatever time we want. Some minor things obviously happen in between the lines, like damien being woken up by actor in DAMIEN, like William becoming wilford through his process of WMLW but as we know even those two happen at the same time. Wilford's "video" bleeds through to DAMIEN. Its the first thing that is out of ordinary for Damien. The thing that sets up that WHOLE video.

And that's sort of the main things I think were the biggest mysteries. God this whole series has been so fun, I can't wait to see what more there is to see that Mark is preparing for us.

We are simply in control of seeing anything and everything that is happening at whatever time we want as these endless stories happen all at the same time but also months, even years, apart.

----------------------------------------------------

#iswm #in space with markiplier #markiplier #theory #iswm theory #iswm spoilers

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beewithknee · 3 years

Text

facades, my dear, are everything

gavin + platonic caelum x freelancer hurt/comfort

“Facades, my dear, are everything. You can never let people see what lies just beneath the surface for that would be the day that you should find yourself more lonely than you ever thought possible”

Those words were like a prayer to you. You repeated them daily, a constant aggressive reminder of what you had to do with your life. You had stuck to those 34 words every single second of every day, but fuck if it wasn’t getting difficult. You had finally met people you loved and that cared about you in return. In particular, you had met a certain incubus. A specific incubus who was currently taking up the whole of your couch as he napped, spooning your empathy daemon child friend. The sight was a rather cute one and you found yourself having to force down a smile. Your chest felt light and you knew that from the way he was smiling, Caelum could feel your happiness too. Of course there were still knots resting in your heart, but they were being pushed down and weren’t taking up as much room. It was late, the boys needed to get up if they wanted any chance of getting any sleep tonight. You walked over quietly, kneeling down beside Caelum’s head. Bringing your hand up and into his ruffled pink locks, you smiled.

“Hey, it’s time to wake up.” you whispered, kissing his forehead. Gavin stirred behind the empath, tightening his arms around the younger daemon. Caelum groaned, shuffling back into him, trying to hide in his embrace. The elder groaned, chuckling as his eyes cracked open. “Hi” He groaned, shutting his eyes again, trying to go back to sleep. You leaned up, flicking his cheek, laughing.

“Get up incubus.” You teased lightheartedly. Smirking, he replied “Hmm no, freelancer” You chuckled and leaned over Caelum, placing your lips right above Gavin’s ear. You brought your hands down to cover the pink haired daemon’s ears and then, you screamed. Gavin flew forward, knocking Caelum into you and you all landed on a pile of tangled limbs on your (thankfully) carpeted floor. “Jesus Christ Deviant. You’re gonna make me go deaf one of these days, I swear to the gods” He groaned, but the small smile betrayed his fake annoyance. You smirked and told him he deserved it. Shuffling slightly, you remembered the small child on your chest.

“Hi. You wanna help me make dinner?” You asked, sliding out from underneath him and extending a hand. “Oh? And you’re just gonna leave me on the floor like an unwanted stain?” Gavin cried out dramatically, clutching over his chest. “Yep” You popped the ‘p’ and walked off, leaving your sulking incubus on the floor. He’d be fine. Sighing, you raked a hand through your hair, having to keep up the fake facade was exhausting, but those dreadful words still haunted you. At that point, you knew what you had.

You had Gavin and Caelum and Lasko, Hux and Damien and everyone at DAMN. You had a family and incredible friends, but… that wasn’t enough. They couldn't know, not yet at least. You didn’t know if it was a good or bad thing that you were so haunted by their company, because before the loneliness was overwhelming, but now, now you had so much to lose. You honestly didn't know if you would survive if they all decided to leave. You couldn’t go back to that crippling isolation, not again.

“Freelancer?” A timid voice broke you out of your thoughts, your head snapped up fast enough to give you whiplash. Plastering a smile on your face, you hummed. “Yeah, Caelum?” “Are… are you okay?” He asked tentatively. “Because it’s okay if you are, but it’s also okay if you aren’t. Y’know. Feelings are weird and complicated and messy and you don't always have to know what you’re doing or feeling. You can just… be” He went on and you found yourself thinking that for essentially a child daemon, he was incredibly smart. You moved forward, encasing the younger in your arms. “Thank you Caelum. Really. You always know how to make me smile.” You replied, never confirming nor denying his question. He seemed to be distracted enough to let it slip. “Well, that's because when you smile it makes me feel better and it makes you feel better, which makes me feel better and that makes you feel better and-” He cut himself off as he noticed your lover creeping up behind you. Gavin’s warm arms circled around your waist and Caelum’s back.

“Having a sweet moment without me? Hurtful.” That little drama queen. You rolled your eyes, “Of course Gavin. How bad of me to forget about you.” You said incredibly sarcastically. He huffed a laugh, head resting on your shoulder. Caelum looked up at him and you saw a look pass between the two. “What? C’mon, what was that look for?” You pouted, feeling thoroughly left out. A kiss landed on your neck. “Nothing. Don’t worry your pretty little head about it.” Gavin smiled, content at your confusion. You whined slightly and Gavin let out a snort. “Very attractive.” You teased, leaning back and kissing the side of his head. He hummed “And I know you are, but what am I?” Groaning at the awful joke, you broke the embrace. “That was awful, oh my god.” He laughed, a full belly, head back laugh and you just stood for a few seconds admiring the way he seemed to glow. He was like a glowing entity, illuminating your life and everything he touched. Caelum giggled from in front of you and you moved your head to look at him, eyebrows furrowing.

“What?” You found yourself giving in to his infectious laughter. “You- you just had actual heart eyes. You looked at him like he was the only person who existed in the world” You flushed and Gavin moved closer. “Oh? They did, did they?” He confirmed, looking at Caelum who nodded vigorously. “Dammit Caelum, you’re supposed to be on my side here.” You cursed, rolling your eyes at the empath before you. The younger giggled and shrugged you off, moving quietly around your kitchen as Gavin pulled you into his arms, chest to chest.

“Hey there”

“Hi”

“What’s a cute thing like you doing all alone?” He flirted, god he was a dork. “Oh? But I’m not alone. I have a boyfriend.” You sweet-talked, fluttering your eyelashes at him. “Oh, and where might he be? Can you give me any descriptions?” He paused, asking the question with an over exaggerated sigh. “Well, he’s an incubus. Cute, tan skin, cute messy black hair. Kind of short, kinda dumb.” You finished, insulting him cheekily. “Oi, I am not dumb or short, you gremlin.” He scoffed, mouth falling wide. You threw your head back, laughing at his shocked face.

God he had that coming.

You smirked, leaning on him. He met you halfway, lips falling against your own. As always, Gavin tasted sweet, a mixture of candy and cinnamon. You hummed into his mouth, enjoying the taste. “Don’t choke Deviant. I’d kinda like to keep you around.” He broke the kiss, laughing against your lips. You smiled at him, hand still resting on your chest. His hand was still on your cheek, no words were needed in that moment, it was just you and him. Gavin felt whole then, just standing there, admiring you. To him, you were the most gorgeous piece of art he’d ever seen. “God, you’re gorgeous” He whispered, letting you two savour in the moment. Your eyes locked and you could just see the small pink that was on his cheeks.

Cute.

“I love you.” You froze, yes, he’d said it before but… it felt different. “I love you too.” you rushed out, moving away from him. Turning your back to him, you hid your face. Your eyebrows furrowed and you clenched your eyes shut.

Fuck.

You always managed to ruin it. What you didn’t see with your closed eyes and toxic mind was the look that the d(a)emons were giving each other. Standing up straight, you plastered that fake grin back on your face, breathing back the tears harshly. You couldn’t let anybody see. You could never let them know. That would be disastrous. You couldn’t lose your little family, not now, not after everything you went through. You fought tooth and nail just to have them and you’d be damned if you let them slip through your fingers now, especially due to your own doing. So you’d be fine. You’d go make a frankly ridiculous amount of food for three people and you’d be okay. Because why wouldn’t you be? Everything was fine. It wasn’t like you had anything to show them beneath the surface. You were fine.

#redacted asmr #redacted gavin #redacted caelum #gavin x freelancer #love/hate relationship with this fic #angst #fluff #hurt/comfort #x male reader #x female reader #x gender neutral reader #idk just felt right ig lol #enjoy

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cactusnymph · 3 years

Text

matters of the heart

“Sir Caroline, I must ask your advice in an important matter.”

“You don’t have to call me ‘Sir’ anymore, Angelo. We’ve been over this.”

“Excuse me, Caroline. Now, this important matter—“

“Is this about Ale? Because, and I cannot stress this enough, I do not want to hear anything about your love life, Angelo.”

Angelo has to admit that this is not the way he had hoped the conversation to go. He feels himself deflate a little as he looks at Caroline’s disapproving face.

“But S—Caroline, I wouldn’t know who else to ask! Usually my best friend and former rival would be my first choice, but he’s not available at the moment.”

Caroline looks at him for a moment then sighs, lowering her head into her hands for a heartbeat before looking up at him again.

“Fine. Just this once. Next time you can just write Damien a letter.”

“Yes, Sir—I mean. Yes, Caroline.”

Caroline starts massaging her temple.

“So. Spit it out. What is it?”

“I almost can’t believe that I am saying this—truly, I think it is the first time I understand my friend Damien. I must speak my heart—“

“Oh, for the love of—“

“You are married to Miss Quanyii, are you not, Caroline?”

“Yes, I am. What does that have to do with anything?”

“So you must be well-versed in matters of the heart! How did you court your wife? I admit, I have never attempted this before and I have no idea how to go about courting a man—“

“And why should it be different than courting a woman, Angelo?”

Angelo pauses for a second. It was brought to his attention many times now that the distinctions between men and women he has learned about all his life might not actually be as accurate as many people make them out to be. Truly, Caroline is the best example. And now he has met Ale and Miss Quanyii, who is sometimes not Miss Quanyii but Mr Quanyii.

Angelo considers Caroline’s words.

“So you’re saying I should court Ale in the exact same way I would court a woman”, he says.

Caroline rolls her eyes.

“I do not see how gender has anything to do with this, Angelo. The way you court a person depends on the person. Not all women care for flowers and candles and love letters. I have no idea what Ale would prefer as courting; maybe he doesn’t want to be courted at all.”

“Like Sir Talfryn, yes. I have learned about this. You are correct, Caroline and I am glad to have asked you. I shall speak to Ale about this to make sure that I am not overstepping any boundaries! I thank you for your wisdom! Hophophophophophop.”

*

Angelo is not afraid of anything.

He’s not afraid of pain or fighting or dying or even things as complicated as numbers even though he is not very good at them. But when he finds Ale sitting next to Olala, showing her how to start a campfire with her little hands, something tightens in Angelo’s chest and all he can do is stare.

Ale is beautiful. Dark skin, long hair, big eyes and long lashes, a soft smile as he tells little Olala that she’s doing well.

Angelo feels his stomach drop; a sensation that is very similar to falling and his heart beats so rapidly in his chest that he has trouble breathing for a moment.

Maybe he should have rehearsed this. Maybe it would be better if little Olala was not there with Ale. Maybe he was hasty when he concluded that speaking directly to Ale would be the best course of action. A warrior’s approach. Head on. The same way he always approaches difficulties.

Ale looks up when he notices Angelo and he flashes him a grin that makes Angelo’s insides squirm around like very lively snakes. Saints, if he starts using more metaphors for how Ale makes him feel he might turn into Damien before he knows it.

“Hey schoolboy, what can we do for you?”

Angelo isn’t sure why it makes him feel warm and tingly when Ale calls him ‘schoolboy’, but it absolutely does.

He clears his throat.

“I was about to—hm. Well.”

Angelo wishes Damien were here so he could tell him how to find the right words for this. Damien has such a knack for language and beautiful words, while Angelo—well. Angelo has never in his life understood one poem that Damien showed to him.

“We’re making fire, Sir Angelo! I made a small flame, all without magic! Look!”, Olala proclaims excitedly and waves at the little wisp of smoke her efforts have conjured.

“Very good, Olala. I—uh. I must take my leave.”

And for the first time in his life, Sir Angelo The Strong turns around and flees.

*

“Aw, Angelo, what is it?”

Angelo looks up as Quanyii appears out of nowhere right beside him.

“I am afraid that I have become a coward, Miss Quanyii”, he says as he looks down at his big hands.

“I highly doubt that, sweetie. Is this about our beautiful vigilante boy?”, Quanyii wants to know as she scoots closer to Angelo, her colorful hair surrounding her head like a cloud.

“Yes. I have spoken to Si—to Caroline about this and she gave me important insight on the matter of courting rituals.”

“She did?”, Quanyii asks, sounding surprised.

“Yes. She explained that courting is not a matter of gender but of the individual’s personality. She also pointed out that Ale might have no interest in romantic relationships which I had not considered before.”

Quanyii puts her index finger to her lips and taps them thoughtfully.

“Yes, yes, such wisdom. But have you considered asking me about this? Romance is a magical thing after all and sweetheart, I’m a witch! Caroline doesn’t know one itsy-bitsy thing about romance, let me tell you that”, Quanyii says and pouts a little.

Angelo raises his head.

“So you would help me in this quest to court Ale?”, he asks. The grin that spreads on Quanyii’s face makes Angelo pause. This might not be a good idea.

“Oh, sweetie, don’t you worry your silly little head. I will give you one tip for free because we have become such good friends during those past few weeks! I know a little secret and that is that Ale does like romance!”

Angelo feels his face light up with a smile as relief courses through his entire body. He feels like he could do a hundred push-ups right here and now. Maybe even lift Porthos. Or the whole, fallen tree he’s sitting on.

“Why thank you, Miss Quanyii, that is most helpful!”

He grabs both of her hands and shakes them as Quanyii giggles.

“You are so very welcome, Angelo. For every other piece of help I’m going to require a little bit of payment. A witch has to make do, you know.”

Angelo doesn’t really understand but he nods anyway and gets up from the fallen tree trunk.

“I do not believe that I will need further assistance, now that the issue of romantic attraction has been resolved! Sir Angelo The Strong is back on his feet! Ha ha! Hophophophophophop.”

“Good luck, brave knight!”, Quanyii calls after him as Angelo runs back towards the camp.

*

Now that Angelo knows that Ale is not generally opposed to romance the path seems clear. That is, at least until Angelo arrives back at the place where Ale and Olala made their little fire before.

The two of them are still there, but both of them are asleep. Ale is sitting with his back against a tree, his legs spread, and Olala has curled up between his legs, her tail gently snoring. Caroline sits by the fire and sharpens her blade.

She looks up as Angelo enters the clearing.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Angelo”, she says as Angelo stares at Ale’s sleeping form. His long lashes are feathered out on his cheeks and for a second Angelo imagines to brush his fingers over Ale’s cheek and give him a kiss.

The thought immediately sends his heart into another gallop that would make Porthos proud and Angelo swallows heavily.

“I cannot report any ghost sightings at this point, Sir—I mean. Caroline.”

Angelo notices how Caroline’s eyes narrow as she looks him up and down and since Caroline has stated that she has no interest to know anything about Angelo’s love life he tries very hard to respect her wishes and to not look at Ale as if he’s the most beautiful thing that Angelo has ever seen.

Which he very definitely is.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, sit down, you oaf”, Caroline snaps and Angelo, still as an automatic response to her authoritative voice, walks over to the fire and sits down next to her.

“Did you talk to Quanyii?”, she wants to know.

“Yes. She cleared up a question I had and I thought it would make things easier, but as it turns out, it did not.”

“I wouldn’t make any deals with her, witches are fickle and cunning creatures.”

“Babe, you’re being so mean!”

“Oh, shut it. You know it’s true.”

“Yes, but when you say it like that it’s mean, mean, mean!”

Angelo watches them bicker for a while before his eyes drift back over to Ale and Olala. Ale’s hand is resting on Olala’s back and Angelo looks at it for a while. Ale’s hand is much smaller than his and Angelo wonders what it would feel like to hold it. It must be rough from all the sword-fighting, much like Angelo’s hand.

Maybe Ale doesn’t have any interest in holding Angelo’s hand. Maybe Ale doesn’t like men.

“What is it now, Angelo”, Caroline asks with an expression on her face that says she might regret asking.

“I forgot to consider another important thing regarding this whole courting business”, Angelo says and looks at Caroline. Quanyii seems to have vanished into thin air—something Angelo has seen happening multiple times during those last few weeks.

“Which is?”

“You made me aware of the possibility of Ale being averse to romantic relationships, but I forgot to consider whether or not Ale would be opposed to romantic relationships to men. I only ever knew one man who liked another man. Lizard. Does it count as a man if it is a lizard? I certainly don’t know. My point stands, though.”

Caroline sighs deeply and cards through her short her.

“It seems highly unlike you to ask all these questions instead of simply acting, Angelo”, she says and looks at him with a stern gaze.

Angelo sighs.

“Yes, I know. I am afraid I have found my most lethal opponent yet! Matters of the heart! No monster could ever best me in combat, but my own heart is betraying me.”

Caroline puts her blade to the side and leans forward, her elbows resting on her knees as she looks at Angelo with her piercing eyes.

“Just talk to him. It’s that easy. No one can ever truly know another person’s heart or thoughts unless they speak them out loud.”

“Unless you’re a witch”, comes a disembodied sing-song from somewhere above them.

“Unless you’re a witch in which case you should stay out of people’s heads”, Caroline barks up the tree and looks back at Angelo.

“I cannot believe that I should turn into a coward for something as simple as talking. It seems highly ridiculous.”

Caroline shrugs.

“Emotions are hard. And I... understand your hesitance. But you should not let your feelings rule over your rational thoughts.”

“That is a very Caroline thing to say, Sir Caroline.”

“Stop calling me ‘Sir’ already!”

“Certainly, Sir Caroline.”

“Ugh.”

*

“Ale, can I ask you a personal question?”

“You can ask anything you want, schoolboy. I can decide whether or not I want to answer.”

“Oh—yes. That is very reasonable. Thank you. Uh—“

“Sir knight, are you alright? Did you get sunburnt? Sir Caroline says it is important to not stay outside in the sun for too long!”

“I am not sunburnt, little Olala.”

“Ask your question, schoolboy. Is this about gender again?”

“Uh—no. Not—huh. I suppose it is! But not in the way you think!”

“Well then, shoot.”

“This is more about the genders of others, I suppose! A potential paramour, one might say! I have a friend who has a fiancée but who is also involved with a man. Lizard. Male lizard? I am not entirely certain about the lizard’s gender and I was told not to assume. Anyway. What I wanted to ask—“

“You want to know if I like lizards?”

“No, that’s not—“

“I was joking, schoolboy. Calm down. You want to know what kind of people I’m attracted to.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t much care about gender, but it doesn’t happen often that I’m attracted to people. Either romantically or sexually.”

“Oh.”

“I just don’t fall in love easily. And I don’t find many people hot.”

“Hm.”

“Any more questions?”

“Yes, but I am afraid they would be borderline offensive and highly invasive.”

“Well then. Let’s keep it at that, schoolboy.”

*

“Sir knight, are you feeling okay?”

“Yes, little Olala.”

“It’s just that you are usually very loud but you have been very quiet for a while. I recently learned about heatstrokes and it sounds awful and I hope you don’t have a heatstroke, Sir knight.”

“I don’t think I have anything of the kind, Olala.”

Olala sits down next to Angelo. He’s leaning against Porthos who’s lying down and nibbling on some grass. Ale and Caroline are investigating something and since Angelo is not the best at clues he offered to stay behind to guard their belongings and also Olala.

“Most adults do not like to tell children why they’re sad. But if you wanted to, I would certainly listen.”

“That’s very kind of you, Olala. Have you ever liked someone?”

“Of course! I like so many people!”

“Ah, yes. Hm. And were you ever scared to tell any of these people that you like them?”

“No, Sir knight. I grew up in the Garden of Graves and we tended to the dead and my sisters always taught me that it is important to speak your heart while the people you love are alive, for you never know when they might die and then you can’t tell them anymore.”

“That is... very wise, Olala.”

“Thank you, Sir knight! My sisters taught me a great many things and I am honored to pass their wisdom on to others.”

Angelo looks down at Olala’s small form and ruffles her hair.

“I will take it to heart!”, he promises.

*

“Hey, Angelo. Can I talk to you for a moment?”

They make camp by a river and Caroline takes Olala for a bath. Angelo turns around to look at Ale, who tied his long braids into a top knot. He’s wearing a white tunic that is a little too big for him and allows Angelo a view of Ale’s collarbone.

Angelo tries very hard not to stare because he refuses to be disrespectful any more than he already was when they first met.

“Of course, Ale.”

Ale looks at him. Angelo would never trust himself to read people’s behavior—that has never been his forté. But he could swear that Ale looks almost a bit nervous; something that Angelo hasn’t seen on him so far.

“So, remember that talk we had? About how I might like lizards or not?”, Ale begins and Angelo winces a little.

“It was poorly worded and I apologize—“

“It’s fine, Angelo. That’s not what this is about. But... you remember what I said. About not being attracted to people often?”

“Yes. I remember.”

“Why did you want to know that?”

Angelo takes a deep breath and scratches the back of his head.

“I—uh. Well”, he starts, then doesn’t know how to continue. He remembers the talks he had with Caroline and Olala and straightens his back. Sir Angelo the Strong will not back down from a challenge. Any challenge!

“I would like to court you, Ale.”

Ale blinks. Once, twice, three times.

He opens his mouth, then closes it again.

“You—what?”

“Courting. I would like to court you. Woo you. Win you over. In the romantic sense. But I was not sure if that was something that would make you uncomfortable, so I tried to figure out if you might be opposed against courtship. By men. Or anyone.”

Ale takes two steps towards him and Angelo has the great need to spread his arms and pull Ale close to him, but he doesn’t. He’s asking for permission and he will not ruin this by overstepping boundaries.

A slight chuckle pulls him back to reality and he sees Ale’s eyes twinkle, the corners of his lips turned upwards.

“Are you asking me on a date, schoolboy?”, Ale asks. His playful smile is doing things to Angelo he can’t describe because he is not Damien. But man, he almost feels the need to write a poem about that smile. That is how badly smitten he is with this wonderful, splendid man standing in front of him.

“I suppose so! Ale, will you allow me to take you on a date?”

Ale takes another step and raises his hand to softly flip one finger against Angelo’s forehead.

“I thought you’d never ask.”

#ale of milltown #tpp #the penumbra podcast #penumbra podcast #the second citadel #second citadel #sir angelo #sir angelo the strong #alengelo #mi writes #i'm still in the penumbra zone #and i love these two so much and also the whole weirdo brigade

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measuringbliss · 2 years

Note

hmm.. I've watched who killed markiplier. and the 3 hour explanation cut on 1.5 speed lol. so I think possibly I am just not smart enough to understand this cause I was like what? huh? who did it. so basically you can't actually figure it out unless you know that there's this third party dark guy? it's a very interesting whole project and I love listening to behind the scenes explanations but wow this is on like a much higher frequency than I was expecting. also read the wiki summary to like. get a summary explanation of the summary explanation video. so now I would say I understand it but I am still hung up on things like why the chef was making spaghetti for breakfast.

I actually eat meals (including pasta with bolognese sauce) for breakfast so there's your answer :p

The complexity of it all also took me by surprise, I was expecting something relatively straightforward, but that's not the case at all.

I think the clues are decent but Markiplier was so focused on his ideas that he expected his viewers to be far too perceptive. I don't know if you've ever written a mystery story, but there's leaps your mind will make that other people who aren't in your brain simply won't make. Maybe they'll search in the other direction, or maybe they just won't ask the necessary question to reach the truth. I think that's pretty much what happened, because his explanations clearly have ground in the released videos, but you have to - notice the clues - know how to interpret them - extrapolate A LOT

One positive consequence of this is that the next two projects (Wilford & DAMIEN) are far more approachable and basic, and you expect them to be complicated to understand so they shouldn't pose too much problem.

And then you've got Heist and Space which... oooh boy. What a mess. On one hand they're not supposed to truly be about Who Killed Markiplier, but on the other hand, there's just enough elements... it's a gigantic mess. And coincidentally, Markiplier is supposed to do his usual stream about the most recent project (Space) in about 2 hours and a half.

But I will say WKM's "whodunnit" is... well, it would have benefited from more clarity because as it is, when I rewatched the series Friday I think, having forgotten a lot of things, well I simply didn't understand who actually was the culprit (as well as what was the victim's goal). There's clues I love though: the body having suffered "a" pretty Rasputinian death, the weapon in the party montage...

And I think overall it stays just vague enough that it's still very interesting and fun on rewatches.

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gabolange · 3 years

Text

So, let’s talk about Leverage: Redemption. In which I am medium-whelmed at best.

Spoilers below the cut.

I finished the show a couple of days ago and I keep trying to figure out why I didn’t love it. This isn’t to say I didn’t like it, because I did, but it didn’t land for me the way it seems to have landed for a lot of people, and so here I am with, like, meta. Party like it’s 2008 and all that.

2008. I actually didn’t meet Leverage until 2010 despite friends telling me for ages I should watch. It one of those moments that became a forever memory for many reasons, but the most important is this: the show was perfect. Those first hours spent watching a rerun marathon on TNT on a hot-as-fuck July 4 in Albuquerque, New Mexico came with them the understanding that this show was truly special.

It was funny, it was topical, it was sexy, and it was so fucking smart. I fell in love right away with all of them, but especially with Sophie, and with Nate, and with their complicated, complex, adult history. And then over the course of catching up and keeping up, I fell even harder, with them and those themes, with watching Parker and Hardison grow into themselves, with watching Eliot deal every day with his demons. I loved the way the show balanced light and dark, how it could have Archie’s zappy cane in the same breath as Eliot giving Nate advice about what it would mean to kill. I loved that we all loved Maggie, even though ex-wives are known in television to be evil shrews. I loved Tara’s complexity, and Sterling’s wit, and how every episode was a chess game. And oh, how I loved Sophie’s journey, how she had to decide every day not how to live but who to be.

When I say it was perfect, I don’t mean it didn’t have its duds. Of course it did. But it did the thing it was trying to do better than anyone has ever done it, with intelligence and respect, and its finale is one of the three best series finales ever filmed.

This is all to say the bar for Leverage: Redemption was both sky high and very low. When I heard they weren’t bringing Nate back, my first thought was don’t you fucking dare break my heart. If Nate was drunk off his ass in a ditch somewhere, if he had broken Sophie’s heart--that would be the ultimate betrayal (hi, I still have feelings about The Doctor Blake Mysteries). And so the bar was: don’t break my heart, while also being something like the perfect show.

They didn’t break my heart. I said early the best thing would be to kill Nate after he and Sophie had good, long, happy years together. And they did, and it was the right place to start.

They gave me that, and I am grateful, but when I look at the rest, I guess I was underwhelmed. Or at least only whelmed. Medium-whelmed at best.

There were things I loved: Hardison and Parker’s relationship. Eliot’s careful watch over Sophie. Hardison growing up to become the most epic white hat hacker ever. The idea that getting back into the game would be the thing that would make Sophie happy. Hardison’s commentary on redemption. The idea of Leverage: International. Gina Bellman is still made of magic and heartbreak and perfection.

There were things I liked: I am fond of our Mister Wilson, even if I find Noah Wylie about as interesting as plain toast. There were some truly great Eliot beats. I don’t yet like Breanna, but I like the idea of Breanna. I liked the way Nate hovered over the entire thing, because Sophie brought him with her. I think the sets were great, and I was impressed at how much they were able to do in a pandemic. I found utterly baffling but nonetheless charming that we meet Harry in the middle of a failed heist in which the team judges his technique and then adopts him. I liked Fake Nate and everything they did with that. The show had many bright spots, and I don’t in any way want to diminish them.

But. It wasn’t smart. It wasn’t sexy. Except for Sophie’s grief and Hardison’s plans, it picked up the character beats where we left them ten years ago. Has Parker been mastermind for this entire time? I would have loved to see that. Have they learned how to do this well without Sophie and Nate? I would have loved to see that. Show me the history.

Show me the history. Breanna and Hardison and Parker all say this is the worst timeline, and we know it is because we have lived it. But in the universe of the show, it doesn’t really seem that bad -- the plots of the week were silly and so small. I remember finding Damien Moreau too big, once upon a time, but this all felt too easy, the stakes far too small for this to be a show where everything has gotten worse. Nate almost murdered two guys in cold blood, folks. The show was missing any of the darkness that made the original truly compelling, and so lost the balance we loved between that and finding joy. I don’t need it in every episode, but I need a hint that there’s something bigger and meaner out there other than throwaway dialog.

(And, when it tried to go dark, it swung and missed. The episode with the collapsed building was timely, but as someone with anxiety and PTSD, the way the crew played on this guy who had apparently tried to do better this time around...was kinda not okay, to be honest.)

I don’t have OT3 goggles, but I think if I did, I would find Hardison’s absence a little sad--he was the glue, and they needed to do more to bring Parker and Eliot together as friends / colleagues / long-term members of the same polycue / whatever. But even without OT3 goggles, I missed Hardison a whole lot. And I am SO happy for Aldis Hodge growing up to be a real movie star, but he brought so much presence and capability to every scene he was in, even when he was just a kid. Nobody else has his gravitas, or Timothy Hutton’s.

I do have Sophie goggles, and Sophie / Nate goggles. And they didn’t ruin the ship or anything, of course not. But I missed the frisson they brought, the way they made the show just that much more adult. And I am so very, very glad they got their happiness, but I am kinda sad that sexy got replaced with grief.

So yeah. I don’t know. I didn’t hate it at all. I am willing to give it a chance, to let it grow into something I love. But it isn’t, at least not yet.

(x-posted to dreamwidth)

#leverage #leverage redemption #spoilers #leverage spoilers #meta #review #long post

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mrs-nate-humphrey · 3 years

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This is totally cool, lol! That's why I tagged you, I like different perspectives 🥰 and I adore lesbian Jenny

I've been thinking a lot about Jenny's character and sexuality lately since I'm in the middle of rewatching the show. I totally agree that she's attracted to women and most times she pursues guys it's mainly to increase social status and not because of genuine interest. Nate always felt different to me, though. Like, the two times she really pursues him is in season 2, when she's being homeschooled and trying to make it as a designer, and the end of season 3, which is after the whole Damien drama and she's just looking for someone who cares about her and respects her (I know you said once that it doesn't even feel romantic here, which I also agree with, poor girl just needs a connection). I do really see how it can be interrupted as comphet, though. Like she feels like she's supposed to be attracted to Nate because who wouldn't be?

I think the reason why I lean the other way is probably just projection. Jenny's been my favourite GG character since I first watched the show when I was 12, partly because I relate a lot to her, and since I'm bisexual... Add that plus the fact that I totally have had a crush on Nate and of course I'm gonna ship them. I've been relating to Jenny even more this time around cause I dropped out of school this year, so her season 2 arc really hit close to me. So this made my jenate feelings come back tenfold and also made me that much madder at Rufus, lol. I just wanted to go through the screen and shake his shoulders like "There are other paths than the one you want your daughter to have, not everyone has to go through life like society expects you to let your daughter carve out her own unconventional path you fucking idiot!" Luckily my parents have been way more supportive.

Mainly I just see Jenny as bi with a strong lean towards women, but I like to think about lesbian Jenny, too. It wouldn't exactly be the first time I had contradicting headcanons.

I don't know I just think it's really cool that different people can have such different interpretations of the same character. I think that's what's so interesting about fiction, to see how we view things differently depending on how we view and relate to things based on our own experiences. Tumblr can be so focused on hating people who disagree with you, but I like following people with different opinions, it helps me understand people better.

Yeah, I'm glad you tagged me!! back in November, some anons were mean to me about shipping Jenate (me??? who literally does not even - anyway) and ever since then I've been trying extra to ensure that Jenate shippers feel welcome on my blog - you may already know this, because I've brought it up before, but I'm saying it here to let you know that every time you tag me in your Jenate edits I get so happy that you're sharing something you're so passionate about with me!! I'm also a big believer of like........ making the content you want to see (a big part of why I even learnt to gif is because nobody was giffing Dan & Nate, and I was like...... that's the content I need, so if it's not already existing, I'm gonna make it happen!) so regardless of my feelings it's always so cool to see the way you conceptualise JN + their feelings re: each other, and your choice of scenes + lyrics (??? I'm not actually familiar with where you got the words for your edits, they're likely songs I haven't heard, haha) is just so interesting & good!

OH my full Jenny & Nate feelings are a lot more complicated than just comphet on Jenny's part. I feel like..... neither of them was romantically/sexually into each other? and that is kind of the appeal to me? I've always interpreted Nate's interest in Jenny during the s2 arc as sort of like - everything in his life is so unstable and undetermined, and here is Jenny who is so clear on who she is and what she wants, and he admires and respects that, and he wants to be there for her and support her, so when she kisses him he just sort of lets her take their dynamic wherever she wants to? that is very much the vibe I got. You already know how I feel about lesbian Jenny, I mean, you quoted my meta right back at me :'))

but I DO agree with you that Nate is different from the other guys to Jenny. JN have this really specific kind of honesty to them - well, when Jenny wasn't spiralling and trying to get power and acting out, and when the writers actually cared? I still think that NJ had the potential to be a SOLID dynamic but the writers made it sorta unhealthy on the show :(( - but I've spoken abt moments like in seventeen candles and the empire strikes jack before, where they're both able to be emotionally vulnerable around each other in ways we don't see them be with anyone else. I've even compared that to what I like about Derena, whom everyone knows I ship in every possible way, haha. But there's something about characters who trust each other and allow themselves to be honest with each other in ways that they wouldn't otherwise EVER be - especially with characters like Jenny & Nate who have spent so long trying to seem fine and okay even when they're really not.

I honestly really like the idea of queerplatonic Jenate - they're life partners, they're each other's rock, they're each other's person - but it's not romantic OR sexual - and for Nate & Jenny, whose adolescence has involved navigating other people sexualising them so much + not having the best track record with romantic relationships - for them, I feel being qpps gets REALLY interesting, because you get all the perks of a relationship without the romantic/sexual obligations? (obligations isn't the best word, but i don't know what else to use here? LOL) and that's something i love to explore.

I feel like book Jenny was bi! The way she gushed about Nate, whom she canonically had a crush on, and the way she gushed about Serena were EXACTLY the same. Also YES I love multiple headcanons always, it's a lot of fun seeing people explore that!!! I know people who have aroace readings of Jenny, or aro lesbian / ace lesbian readings of her, and I find that really cool, too!

I also definitely get you about relating to Jenny a lot, and feeling that kind of connection. It's similar to how I feel about Dan, and .... explains a lot of my contradicting dair views, actually. A few years ago I had a seriously intense crush on a girl who was... a lot like Blair, in many ways. I spent a ridiculous amount of time writing poetry about her, etc etc, but I never actually acted on it. If she'd fabricated schemes that involved us kissing, though..... I don't know. I don't think I would've denied it if I'd felt like I actually had a chance. I think we just had a case of bad timing, & I like to think in another universe, maybe we were actually together for a bit. I'm glad that your parents are supportive of you and better than Rufus! <3

I think that's what's so interesting about fiction, to see how we view things differently depending on how we view and relate to things based on our own experiences <- THIS exactly! this is a big part of why that "proship" is in my bio. like this is exactly what it means to me and how I conceptualise & understand it!!! Like you, I also like engaging with people who have different understandings and opinions of the characters -> it definitely helps you make new friends you would otherwise not meet by staying in your bubble, & from a fandom point of view, it also helps you develop a more nuanced understanding of a character. Some of the best written Jenny Humphrey I've read was in Jenate fics - and I've had people who don't even ship Blenny tell me they liked the way I wrote Jenny in my post canon blennyfic, so... idk. it's loving Jenny hours - each and every single iteration of Jenny!!!

#long post #edmundapologist #jenate #i would usually like . put a post of this length under a read more #but i don't know where i would insert that here? so this is how it turns out i guess #meta #also adding the #personal #tag. this feels mildly TMI but it's nothing i haven't said before in tags #this is the first time i'm Formally putting it out here though #tumblr user rainathorpe came THIS close to having an irl dair arc... hashtag so much for that #ALSO ! sometimes i tag stuff like that because like -#my blog kind of serves as a record or journal for ME #sometimes i read thru my own posts like 'so true bestie' fghgklhf #which i think is the best way to run a tumblr. be your own audience!#thank you for this ask btw - it's very sweet!! <3

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chasseurdeloup-retired · 3 years

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Hell’s Kitchen || Ariana, Rio, Damien, and Kaden

TIMING: Current LOCATION: Kaden’s Apartment PARTIES: @letsbenditlikebennett, @3starsquinn, @damienxsheppard, @chasseurdeloup SUMMARY: Kaden finally recruits help to make the staggering number of pies needed. Two werewolves, two hunters, and one pixie, no problems whatsoever.

“Is there more flour over there?” Kaden called out, barely looking up from the counter as he worked to make more dough. It didn’t matter who answered. Honestly he wasn’t certain that his apartment was big enough for all four of them at once, at least not actively working and baking. He knew it wasn’t big enough for the number of pies they had to make. It was hard to keep from muttering curses under his breath as he worked, mostly about two hundred pies and mostly in French. Still, he was grateful for the help at the moment, odd bunch though it might be. Two werewolves and two werewolf hunters. All in one apartment. Kaden had to keep rolling his shoulders back to ignore the chills down his spine every now and then. “Make sure the finished ones are labeled,” he called out to the living room. “Uh, please.” The timer buzzed and he nearly jumped out of his skin. “And someone grab that. I’ve got another ready here to swap out.”

Orion felt like a fish out of water. He didn’t think it was going too far out on a limb to assume that he had the least amount of experience with baking. Unless watching his sister bake growing up counted for anything. “I think I saw some flour over here.” Rio answered Kaden, dodging in and out of furniture and people to get to the counter. “Sorry, excuse me!” Rio mentioned to Damien as he slid behind him. Though the two had not met before, Rio figured that if he was a friend of Kaden and Ariana’s then he must be alright. He finally reached the bag and held it up in the air triumphantly before tucking it under his arm to take back over to Kaden. He ignored the tingling sensation nipping at his skin, a mainstay anytime he hung out with Ariana. Eventually it would stop bothering him like it always did. “What do you want me to do with it?” Rio found himself asking. This had been how he tried to make himself useful despite the minimal amount of baking experience he had. He didn’t know how to bake the pies, so he busied himself grabbing ingredients and measuring things out instead.

Damien wasn’t sure why he agreed to help. He was not typically the sort to be favorable to others, and he sure as shit didn’t know how to bake. Regardless of his usual disposition, he found himself here, ignorant of the threat the two men in the room could be to him, and annoyed to see the little werewolf walking about. “What are you doing here?” Damien grumbled lowly as he bent his form down to address Ariana. His tone lacked the sharp edge he wanted it to have, dulled now by their familiarity and a liking he wouldn’t admit to. If he was made to recognize the two hunters in the room he’d be forced to realize she was his closest ally. With a brief introduction to Rio, and an old greeting given to Kaden, Damien went to work. His hand snapped out to clasp the timer as Rio slipped past him, he should be glad the alarm of it signaled another pie was done and the lot of them were closer to their goal, but he hated the sound. Maneuvering through the maze of people, Damien arrived at the oven to free it of a recent baked good, leaving the door open for someone to place another on the racks.

“Hand it to me,” Kaden said simply, holding his hand out to take the bag of flour. With a quick sigh, he realized he could actually take a whole fucking second to explain. Rio did want to learn about baking, he’d said as much before. “I need to coat my hands again so that the dough doesn’t stick to them when I’m working with it.” Without even looking at the bag, Kaden reached in to scoop out some flour and pat it onto his hands. Only as soon as he did, something was off. It was… sticky? Definitely not flour. “Putain de merde,” he grumbled to himself, holding out his sugar covered hands. “Did you read the label on the bag, kid? I thought you liked reading.” he asked as he dodged around the two werewolves to get to the sink. “Please tell me you’re doing better over here. And can you get the next pie in the oven, Rio? Just make sure it’s not one that was already baked.”

Appreciative of Kaden trying to teach him along the way, Orion listened eagerly as Kaden explained the process and dipped his hand into the bag, only to pull out a handful of definitely not flour. Rio frowned at the bag, doing a double take to see that it did indeed claim to be sugar on the outside. Which didn’t make any sense considering he knew he had grabbed the flour. “I’m so sorry! I swe- I thought it said flour.” Rio caught himself mid sentence and rephrased, still eyeing the package as if the words were going to change back to flour. Rio pivoted quickly, still listening to Kaden while trying to right the wrong he had done. He found the bag of flour, opening it up to confirm this time before picking it up to take over to Kaden. Except this time when he lifted it, a stream of flour began pouring out of the bag from the bottom. “Oh come on!” Rio groaned, lifting it up to see a hole in the bottom. How had that happened? He plugged it with his hand and moved it next to Kaden, “There’s a hole in this, I don’t know why.” He explained clumsily before moving along to Kaden's next request, the new pies. He grabbed an unbaked one and moved towards the oven, waiting for Damien to remove a few before occupying the empty space. “Are you any good at baking or are you just as inept at this as I am?” Rio asked, smiling weakly at the man in what was probably a poor attempt at making conversation.

The commotion behind him drew Damien’s attention and he turned to watch as Kaden plunged his hand into a white bag and drew it back with his fingers covered in sugar. It seemed like an easy enough mistake to make, various ingredients in the kitchen were astray as the lot of them clamored to make more pies. One by one Damien pulled the pies from the oven, placing them on the limited counter space till only one was left perched in his hands wrapped in a cloth to prevent the heat from sinking into his fingertips. Searching the area for an available space, he found Rio struggling with the sought after bag of flour, a hole allowing for white powder to flow from the bag and dust their surroundings. He couldn’t help the small grin that developed on his face as Rio spoke to him, “you’re making me look good,” the werewolf replied as he moved through the limited space and dropped the last pie on the counter. An audible crack followed its landing as egg oozed from beneath the pan. “Fuck!” the curse was a little louder than need be, amplified by his genuine surprise, “where the hell did that egg come from? Did one of you put it there?” Damien reached for some paper towel to address the mess, “who the hell just leaves eggs lying around like that.”

The last person Ariana expected to see at Kaden’s apartment to help with baking pies of all things was Damien. Did Damien know Kaden was a hunter? Did Kaden know Damien was a werewolf? He had his whole werewolf sixth sense thing so he had to know, right? Maybe Ariana wasn’t his only exception which she was somehow both grateful for and a little jealous of, but she definitely preferred Kaden not trying to kill the grumpy werewolf she adopted so she’d take it. She couldn’t help the eye roll when Damien asked why she was here. “Helping make pies, obviously,” she answered jokingly as she continued rolling out some pie crust she had been working on. As fun as embarrassing Kaden could be, she wasn’t too keen to go into their fairly complicated backstory. Instead, she cackled as Kaden got his hands all sticky with sugar. It seemed like what followed was just a series of unfortunate events as Rio dropped flour everywhere and Damien broke a random egg. Ariana couldn’t help but laugh at Damien’s curses. “Y’all good? Do we need to like… reorganize the space,” she asked before her rolling pin went over an egg that definitely wasn’t there when she started rolling. “Hey,” she exclaimed with a hint of frustration in her voice, “Just because you’re making a mess of the eggs doesn’t mean you had to put one in my way,” she grumbled at Damien.

The kitchen was filled with cursing, which was nothing new, but it left Kaden wondering if the was a good idea after all. Maybe he should have just continued to struggle on his own to chip away at the growing list of orders. “My hands are wet, I can’t--” He didn’t get to finish his sentence before having to try and clumsily grab the leaking bag, alternating wiping his hands dry on his jeans. It only worked a little. The cracking behind him made him wince. “The hell is going on in here?” he muttered, mostly to himself, setting the bag aside for now. He ran his fingers through his hair, pushing it back out of the way before remembering that his were both still a little wet and sprinkled with patches of flour. “Rearrange. Yeah, let’s do that. We can, uh… We can move things…” He looked around for any opening. “Somewhere. I don’t know, we can move the extra ingredients out onto the table over there, the one with the--” His brows furrowed as he went to point towards the dining room table. The one currently covered in mushrooms. Putain. Of course the fucking pixie was at it. Something he knew he could explain to Rio and Ari. How much did Damien even know? And what kind of shit would that lead to? Kaden sighed. For now, ignore it. “The mushrooms. Just move those. Ignore them. Whatever.”

“When was the last time you had your eyes checked,” Damien countered Ariana as she reeled to recover the damage the egg had done to her rolling pin, “I’ve been too busy to plant eggs around here for you.” He snagged another paper towel and cleaned the surface the pie was resting on, discarding the material into the nearest trash bin. He had hardly been paying attention to what the hunters were doing, only turning around when Kaden began to formulate a new plan for their operation. Eyes scanned the cluttered workspace for available room for the pies, locking on the table the same time Kaden noticed the abundance of mushrooms. Where the hell had those come from? He didn’t remember seeing them when he walked in, and if he had he would have turned tail and left thinking this was some kind of joke. Damien had been fortunate enough that since moving to White Crest his interactions with the supernatural were limited, or subtle. They didn’t exactly step out and admit they were vampires or fae. Only recently had he encountered another of his kind that resulted in any damage. He had no idea what could have produced so many mushrooms. “Are you joking?” he turned to the others, clearly confused, “are we using those? We’re not using those, right? That would be disgusting. I might not have the cooking skills of a Frenchman but even I can’t stomach the idea of mushroom pie.”

Did baking usually involve this much mess? Orion knew people always said that a few eggs had to be cracked, but he had never considered that the phrase was meant literally. “Mushrooms?” Rio asked, perplexed by Damien’s statement until he had turned and spotted them for himself. That was certainly odd, and if Rio had to take a wild guess, probably involved some sort of fae. But why here of all places? “Is this a normal occurrence while you’re baking?” Though the thought was perplexing, he thought it would be mildly humorous if the hunter’s secret to baking was some sort of fae ingredient. Rio was checking on the pies he had put in the oven when he heard music start playing from seemingly nowhere. Recognized the song too, Abba. He had always loved the group until he realized the Silver Bullet played it so much. “Where is that music coming from?”

Not quite willing to admit Damien was probably right, Ariana opted to stick her tongue out at him before cleaning up the mess in front of her. “Whatever,” she muttered before following Kaden out to the table. Her brows furrowed in confusion at the sight of all the mushrooms. Sure, he was dating a banshee, but Regan didn’t exactly seem the type to enjoy getting hopped up on fairy mushrooms. Plus, she was pretty sure those weren’t there when she arrived. “Ignoring the mushrooms. Sounds like a great idea,” she said with a not so subtle hint of sarcasm in her tone though she eventually found herself laughing at Damien’s questions. She’d explain later, but for now, she joked, “Obviously someone requested a mushroom pot pie.” Only seconds before Rio mentioned it, she could faintly hear the sound of that one Gimme Gimme Gimme song that Celeste had always liked. It caused her mouth to twist into a slight frown. “Yeah, Kaden, what’s with the old people music?” She shook her head, “No wonder you and Celeste were friends. Same boomer music taste.”

“Not normal, no,” Kaden called out with a sigh not far behind. He wiped off his hands once more on his jeans before turning to the fridge, swinging the door open, and reaching in for two bottles. “Here,” he said, handing one of the bottles of beer to Damien. “I think we’re going to need this.” He cracked open the cap and took a swig before looking at the state of the table. Rumpleskuffs, had to be. Showing off for all the new guests. Kaden debated disappearing into the other room to make a deal with the pixie just long enough to get this all over with when he, too, heard a familiar sound. His eyes darted to the teenager, wide and shocked before narrowing in on her. “Cut it out, Ari. Is this another one of your tocking tick pranks? Putain, this isn’t--” Only it was clear she wasn’t responsible for the music, either. “Hey. I’m not that old. I don’t even like ABBA. That much. Anyway.” The timer went off again. His brow furrowed and he looked back to the oven. There was no way that was right. The pies just went in. “One second,” he said as he went to check on the pies. Not done. He turned off the timer and reset it, hoping that he wasn’t going to have to reset it again in a minute or two. Something told him that might be the case.

“You don’t like ABBA?” Orion questioned the hunter, perplexed by the bold statement. When it played at the Silver Bullet was just about the only time that people in that place didn’t seem all that bad. For a moment, they stopped being all grumbly and macho. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on Rio’s part. “It’s tiktok, Kaden.” He sighed, almost amused by how terribly he had butchered the app name, “And I don’t think this song is one of the popular sounds.” Not this ABBA song at least. A timer suddenly going off made Rio jump, hopping away from the oven and raising his heart rate on instinct. There was no way those were done already. Rio folded his arms and cast a worried glance over towards Damien. If he wasn’t here, Rio would be asking about what was actually going on. Since Kaden and Ariana weren’t bringing it up, he assumed that meant he must not be in the know. Or at the very least, not in the know about fae and the mischief they can allegedly cause. “I didn’t know volunteering to help you bake pies was going to be so... eventful.”

Damien gratefully accepted the beer Kaden offered him, with the music playing in the background and mushrooms piled up onto the table things were starting to feel part of a show. A cooking segment you accidentally landed on while clicking through shows and paused on because of the quirky nature of it all. He took a drink of his beer and shrugged off the remarks between the two discussing the name of an app and their taste in music. Damien snagged an empty bowl meant for cooking and started to collect the mushrooms, “mushroom pot pie my ass,” he replied, though he was sure by Ariana’s tone that she hadn’t been serious at all. “And don’t lie Kaden, everyone likes ABBA, or at least one of their songs.” Damien took the mushrooms he collected into review, looking over the strangeness of their appearance as if the answer was written just out of sight. “What do you even want me to do with these?”

“What? No. Even if this was a good prank, this whole mess is longer than one minute,” Ariana said with a matter of fact tone to her voice as if Kaden was supposed to know that TikTok videos couldn’t be longer than a minute. She grabbed some more finished pies to set on the table and clear their workspace and shook her head at Damien’s mushroom pot pie questioning. Later, she’d explain the significance of mushrooms though she was dying to know now just why they were here. Still, curiosity took over as she picked up one of the mushrooms and eyed the almost fake looking spots that danced across it’s cap. “Is Regan on a mushroom kick or something,” she blurted out before adding the mushroom to the bowl Damien was collecting them in. Regan didn’t seem the type to intentionally partake in fae things, but it would explain the pimping out pies thing.

How was it that everyone in that damn room knew his secret? How the hell did they find out? Kaden’s eyes shot to Ari. Did she tell Rio? She could have. But how did Damien know, too? “Alright, fine,” he admitted with a grumble into his beer. “I don’t hate ABBA but I don’t love them or anything like that.” His brow furrowed again as Damien brushed the mushrooms off the table. Interesting. Normally they were just visual illusions. Then again, Rumpleskuffs had been very bored lately. Maybe he save some spores just for this sort of occasion. “You can, uh, just put them in the trash. Or something.” Shit, would that anger the tiny fae? Probably. “Or, uh, just set them to the side. Somewhere. Doesn’t matter, figure it out.” The timer went off again and Kaden thought he might scream. At the very least he was going to take this fucking timer and chuck it out the window. Instead, he simply turned it off again, reset it again, and placed it down on the counter as gently as he could manage. It still was a bit of a slam. “Huh?” he called back to Ari, his chest tightening at the thought. He knew Ari knew what Regan was. And Rio. But would that give her away to Damien? Couldn’t they just all pretend to be completely fucking normal humans for an hour or two? Wouldn’t that be nice? “No, definitely not hers. Regan hates mushrooms. I think. Nah, this is just, uh, wel…” Shit, should have gone with her explanation. “Maybe just another experiment of hers or something. Like that.”

Damien discarded the bowl of mushrooms on the couch sofa, it seemed unlikely they’d need that space for anything else with the pies quickly taking over the apartment. He had never asked how Kaden managed to rack up such an order and it seemed a little late now to question it. The timer began to chime again, signifying one more item baked towards their goal, but the sound of it landing on the counter a little too harshly caused Damien to turn his head. Was this about Regan? He didn’t see how mushrooms could be tied back to her but the stress of this, it seemed like the roots really dug into something more daunting than a bake off. “I don’t get the impression Regan is much of a trickster. Though maybe she’d have an interest in mushrooms if they were sprouting from something recently departed. Or were related to the death of something,” at least, that was more of the impression Damien had of her, knowledgeable about all things deceased. He strode over to Kaden, placing a hand on his shoulder, “maybe you should take a break man,” he gave a light push over towards the couch, “I think he can manage for a little bit.” It was then that Damien turned his head, or rather, looked down to find Ari, “come on girl scout, time to earn a badge for baking mastery.”

Mushrooms were a fae thing, Orion knew that much. Though he didn’t think it was really a Banshee thing. Definitely not a Regan thing. Not unless this whole health kick where Regan assumed that Rio was one missed protein or strong breeze would be his breaking point had been nothing more than a practical joke all along. If that were the case, Rio would actually have to be a bit impressed. And maybe a bit disappointed. “Saprophytes” Rio suggested casually as the discussion turned towards mushrooms growing on dead things, “It’s a type of fungus that grows on dead things.” Not that those mushrooms were the kind that grew on dead things. At least he didn’t think so. Damien was trying to get Kaden to take a break, which was probably the right idea. Even if the idea of losing his lifeline to this whole baking thing was a bit terrifying. “Who is in charge then? Because I don’t know what I’m doing. Guidance requested please.”

Considering Damien seemed to shrug off any warnings she gave him about other supernatural crap that happened in town, Ariana doubted that he’d put together two and two when it came to fae and mushrooms. Kaden seemed pretty certain Regan hated mushrooms and given how serious Regan was, she doubted she was really into pranks. Still, if she happened upon some mushrooms, that could have changed her outlook a bit. At least from what Ariana understood about fae and mushrooms which admittedly wasn’t much for someone who had a warden girlfriend. She looked Damien and Kaden both with an amused grin on her face and wondered why they weren’t just throwing the mushrooms out. “Couch, seems good enough until the kitchen is freed up,” she said with a shrug before she added, “And I’m a little old to be a girl scout, but I’ve gotten pretty good at baking. So don’t worry, you two be grumpy old men together and Rio and I can take over in the kitchen for a bit.” Before she even finished her sentence, she could practically hear Kaden grumbling about how he wasn’t grumpy or saying some French swear word. While he hadn’t responded, it still left her smiling. She linked her arm up with Rio’s and assured, “No worries, Rio. I’ve been baking with your sister long enough that I’m practically an expert at this point.” Somehow, the timer was going off again and she swore it had only been a few minutes. Someone was definitely joking around here. If this was a cartoon, she was sure steam would be coming out of Kaden’s ears and that was enough to have her laughing amongst the chaos again. She dragged Rio into the kitchen, turned the timer off, and whispered, “Okay, what the hell is going on here? Who is not me and pranking Kaden?” Mime stripper reviews crossed her mind and her eyes lit up. She poked her head out of the kitchen and asked, “Hey, Kaden? Has Nell been here recently?” Though mushrooms still didn’t seem like Nell’s style even if she had joked about enchanting vegetables after the potato incident.

Damien was going to elect Ariana as the leader of this little group, she seemed to be the thread that connected most of them, but he also did not want to give Ari the satisfaction of his vote. So, he took to his role in accompanying Kaden to the couch as the second half of the grumpy man team, throwing an arm around Kaden’s shoulder as he indulged in his beer. “I’ll be happy to fit the grumpy man trope if it lets me finish my drink,” he murmured to Kaden, maneuvering towards the couch. Damien let his body all but crashing into the cushion, sinking in without protest. The time spouted off again causing him to briefly turn his head to see how the others were managing the kitchen before returning his focus on the drink. He knew he shouldn’t ask what came next, that he shouldn’t want to know, but some part of him had grown to care for these people and Damien struggled to ignore that. “How are things going with Regan, with her classes I mean?” he asked Kaden, “is she taking breaks in-between to work on the pie business?”

“Guess Ari is your guidance,” Kaden said back to Rio. “Just shout if you all need help. And I’m not that old, alright,” he grumbled as he took a seat on the couch. Putain, he couldn’t remember the last time he sat down today, if he was being honest. Maybe the teenage werewolf was right and he did need the break. The timer went off again and he pinched his nose between his fingers, hoping the pressure would relieve some of the tension in his head. It wasn’t working so he took a swig of his drink instead. It didn’t make the headache go away but it was good beer and it was better than the goddamn mushrooms. “It’s not Nell. Or Blanche. Or Grace.” Not that it was even possible to be some of them but he knew the cause of this was a small fae who had taken up residence in his apartment. Another swig was definitely necessary. “How do you know Nell, anyway?” Then again, it wasn’t hard to run into at least one Vural in town. Well, now that there were three again. Kaden sighed and was about to take another drink but Damien’s comment made him stop and furrow his brows. “Huh?” he asked as he looked over to Damien. Classes? What cl-- Oh. Oh. That’s right. When he’d explained the banshee lessons. Putain. “Uh, yeah it’s going alright. She’s made progress I think. Almost done. But yeah, the pies have been a good break for her. As much of a fucking mess this is, it’s been nice to have.”

Somehow, the two youngest ended up in charge of the pies. Luckily for Orion, Ari knew what she was doing. Unluckily for him, she knew what she was doing because of his sister. She wasn’t exactly an ideal conversation topic. Ironically, she was probably the most conflicting part of his own friendship with Ari at this point. He trusted her to keep Ari safe, but not much beyond that. “Just tell me what to do. I’ll be the obedient sous chef.” Rio laughed. When she whispered to him he shrugged but glanced toward the two. He didn’t know Damien, but he didn’t really seem the type. Kaden hadn’t been wrong to suspect Ari first, admittedly. “No idea. But all seems very… fae-y. Just pretend that’s a word.” The kitchen was a mess and he couldn’t tell what parts of that were their doing and what part was whatever was continuing to mess things up. While he waited on instructions, Rio worked to try to tidy up. “We have a very intricate young person friend group, Kaden.” Rio answered his question. Of course they knew Nell. Probably because of Winston. At least in Rio’s case, they had been the common string that introduced most of the friends Rio had now. “We’re all very tight knit.” Trauma and near death experiences had a habit of encouraging bonding experiences.

Seeing as Kaden wasn’t dropping any hint of who the hell was playing mushroom pranks on him, Ariana figured it was probably time to drop it. She could always bug him about it later. It seemed like she could have a true partner in crime with pranking Kaden. The part of her that enjoyed the clout on TikTok was delighted. The part of her that still struggled to wrap her head around fae things after everything with Lydia and then Deirdre, decided maybe this prankster wasn’t up her alley. Mushrooms brought a rightful sense of unease. “Your sous-chef duty for now is gonna be turning the timer off since it seems to like going off every 2 minutes and we all have too good of hearing for that shit,” she said to Rio who could probably already sense she wasn’t the only werewolf in the room. She got to rolling out some more dough for the crust and called out, “What he said.” It was easier than explaining they chatted online a few times before Nell and Bea helped make charmed jewelry to help protect her and Celeste. So much help that did, not that it was their fault. With a few more crusts cut out, she got another batch of pies ready to move into the oven. As crazy as the afternoon was, Ari found there was some sort of content feeling that came with being surrounded by people she loved.

#writing #wickedswriting #chatzy #hell's kitchen #ariana #letsbenditlikebennett #damien #damienxsheppard #3starsquinn #orion

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curious-menace · 3 years

Note

The rogue gallery members general reaction to encountering the batman who laughs and his creepy ass Robin's.

ok id like to preface this by saying that red death batman straight up crucified riddler and decapitated scarecrow and the batman who laughs is MUCH worse than red death batman.

i want to enjoy the dark knights metal but it is needlessly fuckin complicated with all this multiverse oververse omniverse shit. maybe i just don't have the galaxy brain necessary to get it so i apologize if this is all wrong

(also i know its canon that the batman who laughs has no rogues gallery left, either because he killed them or joker killed them before he turned but hey ho hypotheticals it is)

also no one talk to me about kiss fan lookin riddler from this verse. im not ready.

Penguin

i think his first reaction was to laugh. Batman’s finally gone and he took joker with him. I mean he literally calls him "bat gimp". I seriously doubt he anticipated the fallout of batman becoming some sort of hideous joker hybrid. he still chuckled when he started seeing the news. someone calling themselves “the batman who laughs” and “the darkest knight” then he sees the robins, he even recognises damien and it makes him a little sick. he books the next flight out of goodwin before things get too hot.

shame goodwin was burned to the ground to stop anyone leaving gotham.

with everyone inside.

Twoface

i dont think its an exaggeration to say he was absolutly fuckin horrified. it's rare that harvey and two face agree on something, but this bastard has to go. the murder and mayhem he could tolerate, hell even killing the other rogues, some of them needed to be stopped. but having to look at this creature and know it was once bruce? harvey knows better than anyone its a fate worse than death to be trapped in your own mind with someone else running the show. they do their best to stop the darkest knight, bring all the hired guns they can to the fight but it wasnt enough. Harvey dies, but at least he went out trying to do the right thing.

Poison Ivy

She sensed him coming, her flowers screaming at her to save herself. part of me wants to hope she took one look at that abomination and noped the fuck out of there to slaughter swamp or something. but we know ivy, she stands her ground like a tree planted by a river. she looks people like batman and joker right in the eye and down the barrel of a gun and says “no, you move” Shes not a good person, but in this verse she might as well be the hero of the story, maybe the only meta human in gotham who stood a chance against him. The batman who laughs was scared of her and thats why she had to die. if she’d just minded her own business she might still be here but no. She dares the batman who laughs to come for her, she’s going to take him out. for what he did to her plants, to gotham, to HER home and HER friends. unfortunately for her ivy was one of the first on his kill list. She doesn't go down without a fight. ironically it was her human qualities, the human drive to help people that got her killed. she heard one of the robins crying and went to investigate. the batman who laughs doesn't care about those robins, he’s got a basement full of jokerized kids to throw at people. 1 to trick her and a few more to hold her down while he doused the lot of them with weedkiller and gasoline then poof.

i doubt the botanical gardens will ever be the same.

Scarecrow

part of me wants to say he’s loving this. He’s enjoying all the suffering and sadness and fear as the batman who laughs murders everyone and everything from the dandelions upwards . but he cant, not just because he’s not the one causing it. this is fear without meaning or purpose, this is killing hope so thoroughly that there is nothing left for people to fear, not even death. he’s not so foolish as to think he wont also be on the batman who laughs chopping block. so he makes himself scarce, works on a toxin that might be able to stop him or even slow him down so someone has a shot at it. Jon knows hes going to die, its only a matter of time before that thing calling itself the darkest knight sends one of his minions to his doorstep. He’s been working on something to try and help the rabid robins. he has a small soft spot in his cold obsidian heart for kids and looking at these creatures makes him physically ill.

he thinks hes made a breakthrough, thinks he’s finally got a formula that will effect batman and the joker and hopefully, whatever abomination they’ve become . he decides theres no time like the present to try it out when word of the other rouges deaths reach him. he’s the last one left and thats....well its scary. His surprise attack works, the robins go down without a fight, screaming and scratching at their faces, their throats and each other. regrettable but if he stops the darkest knight now, maybe jon can help them. Just when he thinks he’s got him, scarecrow goes down. so close, he falls at the finishing line, his toxin having as much effect as a gentle summers breeze. Much like the original scarecrow , the batman who laughs likes using guns. For jon however? he makes an exception. poor scarecrow gets eviscerated by his own scythe, pilfered from arkham asylum by the batman who laughs. gotta love the classics, right?

Riddler

Riddler was second on his kill list. only because the batman who laughs knew how much it would annoy riddler not to be at the top. He’s another rogue who stood a chance of stopping him if he really tried. sadly edward is nowhere near as altruistic as harvey, and could never be as strong as ivy. He likes to think his escape is for everyone's benefit. live to fight another day and all that. He learned from harvey and pamelas mistakes, took one look at this new batman and his creepy kids and said “fuck that noise” and tried to run. except he didn't really try. god if he’d only gotten out of the city, he would have been the only rogue that survived. the batman who laughs looks at him like a pathetic insect, unworthy of notice. he’d have killed riddler eventually, maybe put him in a riddle with no answer or a trap with no escape for extra irony points but he wasn't about to stop the little green cockroach from skittling away. but of course, riddlers ego got in the way; he just HAD to try and best this new batman, no matter how much he scared the shit out of riddler he just HAD to try. and of course, pride comes before downfall.

The batman who laughs helpfully provided riddler with some rope to help break his fall.

Harley Quinn

some part of her was happy to have joker back. he was different, scarier but she was used to the abuse. what she wasn't used to were all the kids. she recognised damian wayne but didn't quite put the pieces together to realise it was bruce under there. she thought maybe he was just a random casualty . she tried hard to look after the kids but they act like animals rather than humans, there was nothing she could do.As time went on she found it harder and harder to sit at the right hand of this clown prince of horrors. harley has always been along for the ride, but how are you supposed make the whole world laugh if everyone in it is dead? i dont know what happens to harley in this world. either she leaves and much like joker, the batman who laughs fails to notice, shes killed by him because he was bored or she does when the world is destroyed by barbatos. either way, no happy endings here.

Thanks for this incredibly depressing ask Ghostly T-T

im kidding, im kidding it was fun! it makes me wish i knew what the everloving FUCK was going on with this verse so i could enjoy it properly. the only comic store i know of has been closed since like march of last year and i don't know what im looking for on amazon to actually order them. i have 1 issue of nth metal but it was interesting enough that i want the collection.

if anyone knows what the collection is actually called hmu bc i wanna buy it.

yes i could read it online but i like owning the hard copies.

got something you wana talk about? send me an ask or a dm!💜💙🧡💛💚❤️

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beyscape · 4 years

Text

The Intern - 4

Andy Barber x Reader

Summary: Being Andy’s intern meant you got to spend more time by his side more than anyone. This was fine, however, until feelings got in the way and made things complicated

Warnings: swearing, age gap relationship, implied sex, technically cheating

Word Count: 3754

A/N Contains spoilers from episodes 1-6! 9 Crimes by Damien Rice kept coming up in my shuffled playlist when I was writing this, thought that was interesting,,

Ch.1 Ch.2 Ch.3 Ch.4 Ch.5

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The room was quiet. The only sounds were coming from the man laying beside you, and even those were rare. You watched the dark blue shade of the sky grow lighter as the sun rose slowly, not daring to move out of the fear of disturbing your lover beside you. You knew how hard it was for him to get a good night’s sleep. You felt his fingers twitch slightly from where they lay on your waist.

The sneaking around was proving to be harder than you both had thought. Well, you hadn’t really thought about the technicalities of this whole thing, but still. Ever since that night you had first shared such an intimate moment in the hotel, both you and Andy had decided it was too hard of a task to keep away. That meant, almost every night since then, Andy found a way to sneak out of his bed and into yours. He came when everyone was fast asleep, when there was nothing but the moon and the stars to hold witness, and left with the first rays of sun. You knew it was all borrowed time, only a couple of hours bliss, and it was coming to an end already as the sun blinked lazily. Andy’s slow and steady breathing was warm on your shoulder, you felt a small kiss placed right under your shoulder blade.

You shifted from where you lay, now facing him. His hand remained on your waist, holding you close. His blue eyes were still halfway closed, eyelids heavy with sleep. The tips of your fingers traced his cheek gently, Andy smiled at the touch. He was slowly getting used to the affection he once forgot the feeling of, it kept him grounded. Sane. In a time when everything felt so out of control and so wrong, he was glad to have found his anchor. His safe haven. He pulled you closer.

“Andy,” you whispered, your eyes searching his face, savoring every last detail like you did every morning.

“I know.” He sighed, well knowing he had little time before having to leave the warm bed and go back to his equally cold house.

In the next twenty minutes he was up and dressed, and disappeared into the beginning day after kissing you one last time. It was never easy; your heart would ache and protest every time you had to go back to merely being ex-colleagues. Your only consultation was knowing you would be able to throw yourself into his arms when the night fell.

You slept for what felt like only five minutes after Andy left, and would have slept more had it not been for the shrill ringing of your handphone form the night stand. You blindly reached an arm out, refusing to open your eyes, and brought the phone to your ear.

“Neal? Yeah I was sleeping,” you shot up, fully awake as Neal gave you the news, “Alright I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

You pulled on your clothes and grabbed your stuff with a practiced speed, well aware that you had no moment to waste if you were to make it to work with minimal scolding. You also had a pit stop to make before that. Soon enough you were in front of the bright red door of the Barber house, trying to gather up the courage to knock. You had been in the house before, when you helped Andy with carrying some files, but that was before getting romantically involved.

“Y/N?” someone called, sounding out of breath, you looked up and met the person you were trying to avoid. Well, not really trying as you stood right in front of her house, but you were hoping she would be on her jog. Laurie, much to your dismay, returned from her jog in that same moment.

“Laurie, hi!” you stammered, somehow managing to smile. You tried not to look at the wedding ring on her hand, or think about how her husband was in your bed just a couple of hours ago.

“It’s been a while,” she weakly smiled at you and you didn’t blame the woman, “is Andy not home?”

“Oh, I haven’t knocked yet. I was afraid I’d wake you guys up.” It wasn’t entirely a lie. “I have something I need to talk to him about.”

“Is it about Jacob’s case?” Laurie’s eyes widened.

You bit your lip. “I don’t know yet, that’s why I need to talk to Andy first.” Laurie nodded, and ushered you in.

“Andy,” she called, “we have a guest.” Laurie turned to you; expression grim as she tried to give you another smile. “I’ll be upstairs, I need a shower.”

“Who came at this hour—” Andy appeared on the stairs, and stopped. “Y/N.” His gaze flickered between you and Laurie. You swallowed.

“Well, I’ll leave you guys to it.” Laurie left, barely even looking at Andy. A breath you didn’t know you were holding escaped your lips. Andy lead you to the kitchen wordlessly.

“What are you doing here?” He finally asked, satisfied with the distance. Relief washed over you as you noted the tone of his question, he wasn’t angry. Instead, he seemed almost concerned.

“I’m sorry for coming like this, I wasn’t sure what you’d say.” Your words were barely above a whisper. He immediately shook his head.

“I know you wouldn’t without a good reason.” His gaze looked over you.

“We have Ben’s phone. Neal just called me, and I have to go to the courthouse as soon as I can. He’s probably gonna try and keep it hushed, so I figured you should know.” You breathed out; chest heavy. Andy’s eyebrows raised, thinking.

“Thank you so much for telling me,” he muttered, looking over his shoulder before his fingers grazed yours slightly, not daring to do more.

“Just, wait for like a day, alright? It’ll look suspicious if you go and request to see the evidence so soon. He can’t know it was me.”

“I know, baby girl,” he said quietly, “I’ll give the tall bastard a day to gloat before coming in with Joanne.” Jacob barreled in just then, coming to a halt upon seeing you. He didn’t say anything if he noticed the way you and Andy jumped back when he came in.

“Y/N, hi.” He greeted you with a small smile, “are you staying for breakfast?”

“Hi Jacob. I was just actually leaving. Had something to discuss with your dad.” You gave him an apologetic smile before turning to Andy. You nodded, not really meeting his eyes. he did the same. You dashed out of the house with a quick goodbye to Jacob, it was too hard to stand there and look at Andy while his son was right next to him and his wife upstairs. You rested your head on the steering wheel for a moment, before driving off to work; you were already late.

------------

Andy kept his word and gave you and Neal one day with the phone before telling Joanne what he knew. You were at the courthouse with Neal the next day, looking into some other evidence for another case when you finally left Duffy’s office and saw Andy at the end of the hall. You froze as your eyes met. Yu couldn’t read anything form his expression, he looked like he was marching into war as Joanne said something to him. His gaze flickered to yours just for a split second and you almost saw his determination falter. Almost.

“Mr. Barber has every right to be here, Neal.” Joanne spoke before turning to you, “Y/N.” she gave you a smile.

“Hi Joanne.” You smiled at the older woman.

“Well technically I could argue that he doesn’t since he’s a possible witness in the case but I’m letting it slide.” Neal retorted, a smirk appearing on his face as he took Andy in.

“What a mensch.”

“You’re not going in there with us if that’s what you think was gonna happen.” Andy finally addressed Neal; his voice was hard. You just prayed Neal wouldn’t provoke Andy too much.

“Of course not, I already examined the cellphone. I was up here for something else. We do have other cases, right Y/N?”

“Goodbye Neal. And next time you want to conceal evidence from us, don’t.” Joanne nodded before her and Andy moved on. You were just about to breathe in relief when Neal spoke again.

“Oh, I have been meaning to ask,” his voice called, “how’s your father, Andy?” You didn’t need to see Neal’s face to know he was smirking; you suck in a sharp breath.

Andy turned. “What did you say?” If only looks could kill, Neal would drop dead; your gaze darted between Andy and Neal.

“I asked about your father. How’s he doing? You know, I knew criminal law was a passion of yours but I had no idea it was the family business.” Andy, who was slowly walking back to where you and Neal stood, slammed him to the wall by the collar of his suit. Duffy was already making her way towards you, but you were closer.

“You think this is a joke? Do you?” Andy’s voice trembled with anger as you put a hand on his arm, pulling.

“Andy! Stop.” You managed to push the two men apart with the help of Duffy, your hand lingering on his arm as you stared at Andy’s face, twisted with fury.

“Shit.” He stormed off, you followed without knowing what you were doing. All you knew was, Andy was upset and you wanted to be by him.

“Don’t lecture me about concealing things,” Neal shot from the hall, not done with the baiting, “I will say this, it explains a lot, Andy, about you, about your son.” You cursed as his words were successful in getting a raise out of Andy, he made a move towards him.

“Andy,” you stopped him, your hand on his chest, as everyone moved closer. Ready to break apart a fight.

Andy’s burning eyes calmed as he looked at you. You dropped your hand when you felt the stare of everyone else.

“Fuck,” Andy moved out of your reach, frustrated as he breathed hard.

Neal cleared his throat. “Y/N.” He ordered, snapping your attention back to him. You ran out, dizzy, adrenaline still pumping wildly in your veins. You spared one last worried look at Andy’s figure, noting his balled fists with a troubled heart. However, in the moment you were lost in your feelings for Andy, you missed the strange look Neal gave you.

------------

You immediately knew something was wrong when Andy came over that night, his regular gentle kisses leaving their place for rougher ones. His roaming hands gripped tightly, desperately as the layers between you were thrown away. A part of you wanted to ask, to comfort him, but desire was stronger and was quick to shut your mind to all but Andy’s burning touches.

“I’m just trying to look out for him,” he murmured into your hair later, telling you of the night’s events. Your head lay on his chest, one leg thrown over his, a light blue sheet was draped over the two of you.

Your fingers idly drew shapes on his chest. “He knows, deep down. I’m sure.”

“I hate yelling at him.”

You raised your head, holding yourself up with the support of your elbow. His blue eyes were weary under the pale light of the moon, they fluttered shut as your hand laid on his cheek. He leaned into the touch. You placed a kiss on his temple, right between his brows where the worry lines seemed to make a home for themselves.

“Andy,” his eyes opened slowly, “I wish I could find a way to end this all. I hate seeing you like this.”

He sighed, but a small smile formed on his lips nonetheless. “You have no idea how much you help me, do you? You are the one thing that keeps me sane these days, baby girl.” You kissed his cheek at that, his beard slightly tickling. His cellphone rang then, earning a groan from Andy.

“Who the fuck calls this late?” he hissed, his expression souring as he saw the word ‘unknown’ flash on the screen. He sat up in the bed, listening intently; you ran a hand over his strong back, trying to surpass a smile. Andy Barber was one handsome man, sometimes you found it hard to believe he really was here, in your bed. He ended the call.

“I’m so sorry sweetheart, but I gotta go.” He stumbled out of bed, his moves fast, almost panicky.

“Is everything alright?” You sat up as well, not wanting him to leave when you already had so little time together.

He pulled on his pants. “Yeah, I think,” his eyes searched for his shirt, “this might be good news, I gotta go talk to this kid.” You threw him the shirt he was looking for.

“Call me later, then.” You sigh, nothing you could do or say would change his mind once it was set.

“I will.” He kissed you once, twice, “go back to sleep.” You nodded. Just like that, he was gone. It took some time for sleep to coax you back into its arms, but when it did, you were still thinking of the warmth of his hands as they explored every inch of your body.

------------

Your morning of dealing with Neal and working on the mountain of paperwork was interrupted when Lynn, your boss, called you and Neal to her office. Possible important development, she said, in the case of Ben Rifkin. You shot a confused glance at Neal, who shrugged before following Lynn.

A moment after you were seated detective Duffy strode in, with two people you didn’t recognize in tow. Then came Joanne and Andy, who shot you a quick, apologetic look. He hadn’t called, but you didn’t blame him with everything going on. Your attention turned to the fidgety boy. He started speaking once everyone was seated.

As Matt told his encounter with Patz, Neal grew more annoyed by the word, on the other hand you could see Andy’s hidden hope. This could potentially lead to linking Patz to the crime, getting Jacob off the hook. You tried to not show your own relief. Maybe things would look up for the first time in a while.

Neal tried to dismiss the boy’s story once they left with Duffy, but Lynn wouldn’t let it go so easily. After a moment of consideration, she finally agreed for a search warrant, much to Neal’s dismay. He scoffed before leaving, your eyes found Andy’s before following Neal out of the room. Your phone buzzed in your pocket.

It was from Andy. “Meet me in the file room 2” the text read. You sat at your desk, eyeing Lynn walk out Joanne and Andy. Joanne smiled at you as she passed, Andy barely looking, he leaned and whispered something to the older woman. She nodded and patted his arm.

You waited for another moment, making sure everyone else was busy with their own works, before grabbing some files from your desk. If anyone tried to ask any questions, this way you hoped to avoid them. With the rhythmical click of your heels, you made your way down the hall, took the stairs, and found the file room 2. You quickly slipped through the door, shutting it behind you.

The room was small, walls lined with shelf after shelf, all of them had boxes filled with old case files. In the middle of the room, Andy stood with his hands on his hips, his back turned to the door. His head snapped to your direction with the sound of the door. He exhaled, seeing that it was you. A soft smile broke on his handsome face, illuminated by the dim yellow light of the room. You tossed the files in your hands on top of a box, running into his open arms. A quite laughter of disbelief escaped him, shaking his chest as your head rested on the crook of his neck.

“Finally,” he spoke after a moment, “there has to be something, right?”

You nodded, “The guy’s shady for sure, there has to be something in the apartment.” You pulled back a little, just enough to see. There was hope twinkling in his eyes, such a beautiful sight, you let out a happy sigh. He leaned in slightly, his gaze fallen on your lips. The door flew open, revealing a tall figure on the doorway.

Neal.

You and Andy flew apart instinctively, your heart pounding in your chest. You looked at Neal in horror, as his eyes drifted between you and Andy. He smirked.

“Well, what do we have here? Mr.-I’m-morally-superior Andy Barber, fucking the intern.” He sneered.

“Neal—”

“Be careful, Neal.” Andy took a step forward, fists clenched, “It’s none of your business.”

“Oh, I think it’s my business alright. Murder suspect, coming from a broken home, you know how it’s gonna look in front of the jury.” He raised an eyebrow, his eyes roaming over you. “I can’t fire you, but you’re off the case of Ben Rifkin. Conflict of interest, when you’re screwing the dad of our prime suspect.” He shrugged, turning to Andy. A cold smirk still playing on his lips. “And here people were feeling bad for your family. Does your wife know you’re running behind her back with a pretty young thing between your arms?”

Andy moved towards the tall man with fire in his eyes, fists drawn back and ready to punch, you stepped in front of him. Beating Neal would only make things worse for everyone. Neal scoffed.

“Listen to your little mistress.” He looked around the room. “Honestly, with the way you two are so carless, I’m surprised this isn’t the talk of the town. I don’t even have to say a word, you’ll probably handle getting caught yourselves.” Neal laughed, a bitter sound to your ears.

“Keep your fucking mouth shut, Neal, or I’ll shut it for you.” Andy spit, his eyes focused on the guy behind you. You kept your hands on his arm, firm. Neal looked at both of you for a second.

“I won’t say anything, for now.” You turned to him then, surprised. Neal continued. “But you both know that I know. And personally, I’m sick of your attitude, Andy. I’d like to see you squirm a little.” He laughed again, placing his hands in his pockets before turning around and leaving.

“Fuck,” Andy breathed, “God dammit.” He kicked one of the shelves, shaking the boxes of files. The shaking of your hands and the swaying of your head kept you in place. You looked at each other with matching expressions.

“We’ll figure it out,” he said after his breathing calmed down a little, “I’ll go there now and talk to him—”

“Andy.” You closed your eyes, steadying yourself before your next words. “It won’t change anything. You know Neal as well as I do. Better, even.” Your mind running a thousand miles per second, you tried. Tried to figure out a way out of this hole you had dug yourselves into, tried to find the right words, tried to breathe… All three proved to be more difficult than you wished for.

“Shit, Andy, what if he’s right?” You opened your eyes to look at him, his frozen face not helping the tears stinging in your eyes. “You’re married for fuck’s sake, and everything with Jake… You’re upset and I, I should have known better.” You choked on your words, barely managing to get them out. It was one thing to be with a married man, that was always looming over you, but if your little affair ended up hurting Jacob’s case… that was a fact you hadn’t considered.

“Baby girl,” And shook his head, not wanting to hear it. He stepped towards you, grabbing your arms. “No. If you’re blaming yourself,” he gulped, his gaze burning into yours, “you can’t. Okay? I wanted this, if anyone’s responsible, it’s me. And, fuck…” he muttered under his breath, “We can’t change anything now.”

“What are we gonna do, Andy?” you whispered, warm tears dripping down your cheeks. He wiped them away with his thumb, pulling you in an embrace.

“I don’t know.” He needed to think, with Neal knowing it was a matter of time. At the best-case scenario, Neal would wait until the trial and use it there. But that meant, you had maybe six weeks before coming clean at least to Laurie and Joanne. Andy cursed. It was way too soon than he hoped for. “We will figure it out.”

His hand rubbed your back mindlessly, soothing your silent crying. Just when he thought things were starting to get somewhat better, it all came crashing down. He didn’t regret what he had with you, no matter how much he tried, he couldn’t feel guilty about it. But, it meant, another mess to try and figure out, it weighed on his shoulders. It was his fault, Andy knew it, his fault for being careless. Maybe he had grown too comfortable in the weeks he had spent with you. He pressed his lips together. It was better to talk to Laurie before the trial. Better she learns from him. You shook between his arms, drifting his attention from his thoughts.

Yes, he had to talk to Laurie soon. It could wait though, for another moment, as he held you in his arms, savoring the feeling. He wished he had more time, to no avail. Andy sighed. “We’ll figure it out, Y/N.” He murmured, placing a kiss on top of your hair. He closed his eyes, praying to whatever was out there to give him enough strength; to figure out a way out of this mess, to protect his son, and to protect this woman who occupied the most hidden, special place in his heart.

-------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: oooooh shit’s hitting the fan. My askbox is open for requests, feedback and just to talk about chris evans!

CHRIS EVANS TAGLIST @marvelouspottering @kelbabyblue @hidden-behind-the-fourth-wall @may-machin @little-dark-empress @retro-babez

THE INTERN TAGLIST: @patzammit

#andy barber #andy barber x reader #andy barber x you #defending jacob #defending jacob fanfiction #andy barber x y/n #andy barber fanfiction #chris evans x reader #Chris Evans #chris evans imagine

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five-rivers · 4 years

Text

Mask

Danny slouched against the back wall of the ballroom, mask dangling from his fingers. He didn't want to be here. If his parents weren't out there having the time of their lives, he wouldn't be here, but someone had to keep an eye on them and keep them from getting sucked into whatever scheme Vlad had this time.

He sighed, tracking the bulk of his father across the dance floor. His mother was harder to see, but she was never far behind.

A masquerade ball. Really. Ancients, Vlad was so pretentious.

(Internally, Danny thought that a masquerade ball could be cool... except, well. Vlad.)

His mother briefly emerged from the crowd, caught his eye, and mimed putting on his mask. Apparently she was watching him, too. With a grumble, he put the mask back on. Vlad had given it to him, and although he couldn't see or feel anything wrong with it, he still felt that it was suspect.

"Did your parents make you come, too?"

Danny glanced over. A girl was standing a few feet away. Her dress was red and puffy, and her mask was golden. Her hair was done up in complicated braids. She was, perhaps, one or two years younger than he was, though it was hard to tell with the mask. She was certainly shorter than him.

The silhouette of her dress crumpled as she also slumped against the wall. "You'd think that a masked ball would be, you know, cool, but it's just a bunch of old people jumping around and trying to talk business with the 'great Vlad Masters.'"

"Ouch," said Danny. "At least my parents aren't trying to do that, I guess."

"Oh, yeah? What are they doing, then?" asked the girl.

"I honestly have no idea," said Danny, watching his parents gyrate across the floor again. "Dancing? You could call it dancing." He shrugged.

"Ah," said the girl. "My name's Ellie, by the way."

"Danny," said Danny. "Nice to meet you."

"Same. So, what do your parents do?"

"They're scientists," said Danny, not wanting to get into the whole 'ghost hunting' thing. This wasn't Amity Park. Most people didn't believe in ghosts.

Ellie bobbed her head. "Cool, cool. I kinda want to be a scientist. Like, finding out new things, it just sounds really awesome?"

"Yeah, it can be fun sometimes," said Danny. "I don't understand most of it, though." He rolled his shoulders. Actually, he understood a lot more of his parents' work than he let on, in some specific areas more than them, even. Admitting that wasn't wise, however. "What field are you interested."

"Astrophysics, definitely," said Ellie, firmly. "Space is the coolest thing."

Danny grinned. "Oh, yeah. There's just so much. I mean, have you ever looked at the Hubble Deep Fields?"

.

Two teens talking together and having a good time evidently had a magnetic property. Three other high school kids had come to join them, all boys.

One boy was very tall and broad. During their introduction, Danny reflected that if he was on Casper's football team, Dash wouldn't be the star player anymore. Unlike Dash, however, Dustin was quiet, barely speaking at all and always deferring to the others.

The second boy introduced himself as Damien, and he was also tall, but thin and skeletal, like a strong breeze would blow him away. He seemed to realize this, because he had a pair of small enamel pins on the lapel of his suit: a skeleton and a scarecrow.

The last, Dmitri, a redhead, was about the same size as Danny. He reminded Danny of Jazz, for some reason (clearly, her psychology-camp-induced absence was driving him a little crazy). And, less pleasantly, of Wes. He had... a lot of questions. Not quite to the point of being annoying, but still a lot. There was also something wrong with his mask. It was hard to tell, but it looked almost as if one eye of it had been filled in. Danny didn't want to mention it, and ruin the atmosphere, though.

There was an atmosphere. Shockingly enough, these kids liked him, and they were much cooler than Danny would have expected of kids who's parents had been invited by Vlad. Which, yeah, was maybe a weird prejudice on his part. His parents had been invited by Vlad, after all.

Danny liked them back.

"... and the names of the dark matter candidates, whoever thought them up was a genius," said Dmitri, waving his hands.

"Well, yeah," said Danny, grinning, "if they were allowed to pick the names, they probably were the ones to come up with the whole idea for it in the first place. But I think MACHOs might be more likely than WIMPs. You've heard about the exoplanets they found last year?" He let his eyes briefly lose focus. "I bet there are even more of them, that we just can't see yet."

"Yeah, but there have been a lot of tests for MACHOs," said Damien. "You'd think we'd have seen a least a couple. And what about dark energy?"

"I don't think those two are actually related," said Ellie.

"Sure they are. They both have the word dark in them."

"Yeah, but I don't think they actually have anything to do with each other," said Ellie.

"They just have similar names," said Dustin.

"We can look it up, later," said Dmitri.

"Speaking of related," said Danny, "how are you guys related?"

There was a pause. "How'd you know?" asked Ellie. "Like, I could understand if you could see our faces, but..."

Danny shrugged. "I don't know. It just... Felt that way?

"We're cousins," said Damien, leaning forward. His body language spoke of nerves.

Danny couldn't imagine why Damien would be nervous about that, but he probably had his reasons. Family drama, maybe. It wasn't Danny's place to ask, he was a stranger.

Even if he was rather wishing he wasn't. How often did he meet people who shared so many of his interests? Never.

(Well, they were mostly just talking about the one interest, space, but still. And Dustin had mentioned liking Dumpty Humpty.)

"That's cool," he said. He would have liked to have helped. Maybe he still could, somehow? He and his parents were going to be here for a few days.

If he focused, there was an aura of something being not quite right with the cousins. Nothing he could put his finger on, and nothing to do with them as people, but... something.

"Hey," said Ellie, "what do you say we raid the snack table? It can't all be super fancy stuff we can't name, can it? I mean, at least there's punch."

Danny followed Ellie's gaze to the refreshments table. When he'd been over there before, everything had been covered, and he hadn't felt like fighting his way back across the floor and potentially losing sight of his parents. He glanced at them now. They looked like they were having fun.

He lightly bit at his lower lip. He knew Vlad had to be up to something. Otherwise, why bother with all of this?

But... new friends... He liked friends, and Vlad was always up to something. Danny deserved to have a little fun now and again, even so.

"Sure," he said. "We can ruin our dinner."

Ellie snickered. "That's the spirit!" she said, patting Danny on the back and slipping past him.

He smirked at the pun, even if it was unintentional.

"Yeah, better do it now, before there's a punchline," said Dmitri. "Wouldn't want people to think we're in a joke."

Danny choked a little, trying to swallow a laugh.

"That was terrible. You're terrible," said Damien.

"Hey, our new friend seems to like it," said Ellie.

Danny's core did a little bounce when she said friend. He really did want to be friends. "What can I say," he said, shrugging. "Better a joke, than a fist?"

Dmitri smiled broadly. Damien groaned, arcing his long body back dramatically.

There wasn't a line for the punch, or even very many people around the snack table at all. What few people had been there moved off, glaring, when the five children descended on the table. He caught Ellie sticking her tongue out at a woman who was giving them a particularly dirty look.

They gathered cups of punch and piled tiny plates high with pastries before retreating to a nearby corner to resume their conversation.

Danny was having a harder time following it this time, though. He felt tired. Drained. A little overheated. He wasn't used to wearing this suit. He went back to refill his punch a few times.

Words started to blur together. The inside of his head felt staticky. But he also... really content... New friends... His core felt strange...

"Danny?" a hand on his shoulder made him flinch, which made him sway rather dangerously. "Are you okay?"

Danny blinked at Ellie. "I don't feel..." he mumbled. What? What didn't he feel?

"Did someone spike the punch?"

"There's a room back here, you can lie down."

"I'll go get Father, he'll know what to do."

He was gently guided out of the ballroom, most of his weight resting on Dustin. There was a reason he should stay in the ballroom, but he couldn't remember what it was. Was someone missing?

Wait, spike the punch? Was he drunk?

The thought was lost almost instantly. His core, and therefore his mind, was lost in delirium and delight. New friends! But they needed his help, there was something wrong with them. But he could help! So, everything was good, and he loved his new friends very much.

The place they took him to was darker and quieter than before. They laid him down on something soft and squishy, and he giggled, weakly. They were talking. They might have been talking to him, but he couldn't understand aaaaaaaaanything.

He was so happy, helping his new friends.

The light changed as the door to the room opened. Music and other noises from the party briefly grew in volume, and were muffled again as the door swung closed.

"Well, that was faster than expected."

Vlad's voice briefly pulled him back into lucidity, and he struggled to sit up before collapsing again. No, all his energy had to go to his friends. They needed it. No time for Vlad.

Still, he glared up at the older man as he leaned over him. There were two Vlads. Was that because he was seeing double, or because Vlad had split himself?

The question was answered as Vlad picked Danny up. Danny was distressingly limp. He couldn't redirect any energy to his muscles, and thinking was hard. There was a thunk, and one of the walls opened up, revealing a hidden staircase. Vlad carried Danny down, but that was okay, because his new friends came with them, and- Oh!

There was another new friend down here!

Danny's core reached out to his newest new friend.

.

He came back to himself with only the sensation that something was wrong wrong wrong. He jolted up, only to be stopped by a pressure across his chest and shoulders. He squinted, trying to see. His mask was gone, and the clothing he was in felt different, looser.

"What'd you do with'm?" he demanded.

"They're just in the next room, Daniel," said Vlad. "Calm down. I had no idea you'd get attached to them so quickly. I had a whole program for this week for you to get to know them."

"No," said Danny. He finally managed to get his eyes open. He was in Vlad's lab, lying on something padded. He'd been strapped down, and there were various IVs running into his arms. One of them was a lurid ectoplasmic green.

"No?"

"Won't calm down. What did you do to me?"

"Nothing."

"This isn't nothing." He finally managed to find Vlad with his eyes. The man was sitting almost behind him. It was difficult to bend his eyes to look that way.

"Oh, very well then. I increased the energy levels in your core, allowing you to wake up and us to have this lovely conversation. The rest, my dear boy, was all you. An instinctive reaction on the part of your core, although you, as usual, took it too far."

"What?"

Vlad walked around the tube, to a position where Danny could see him more easily. "This will require some explanation. I realize this situation isn't intuitive, to one such as yourself." Vlad waved a dismissive hand.

Danny scowled, but had the presence of mind to bite his tongue. He needed to know what was going on. He was beginning to suspect that Vlad had drugged him, put something in the food or punch that only affected ghosts and half ghosts, but he had a feeling that wasn't quite right.

"After you and Jasmine blew up my football field, I came to the conclusion that you would never accept me as a father," said Vlad, with the air of someone narrating a tragedy. "I was forced to reconsider my methods and goals. You see, Daniel, all I really wanted was to be loved."

In Danny's personal opinion, that was a load of crap. Vlad, more than anything else, wanted control, he wanted power.

""To be loved," continued Vlad, "and understood." He looked up at the ceiling and sighed. "And who could understand me, but a fellow half ghost? So, I decided to make one."

"Wait, wait, hold up," said Danny, beyond horrified. "You made someone a half ghost? You killed someone?"

"What? No, don't be ridiculous, Daniel. I cloned you."

He pointed at something behind and to the left of Danny, and Danny craned his head back to see a tall, vertical tube full of ectoplasm. Inside floated a boy who looked just like Danny in Phantom form. The boy's eyes were closed, and there were tubes and wires connected to his body.

"That's just as bad. Oh my gosh, Vlad, you can't just clone people! Why didn't you clone yourself?"

Vlad's face twisted like he had just bitten into a lemon. "I had attempted to do so, initially, however, my ectoacne and other instabilities in my makeup precluded me from doing so. Cloning you was my only choice."

"We cured your ectoacne," said Danny.

"Yes. But I had already started this project. It did take time to grow your brother into maturity, Daniel. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts, David was unstable."

"David?"

"The name given to him by your other siblings. Do keep up, Daniel."

"Other- You made more clones? Why?"

"I had done some research," said Vlad. "Into how ghosts normal reproduce and stabilize children. I discovered that family members, those ghosts with similar ectosignatures and core properties, play a major role in stabilizing and providing energy to newly formed ghosts. My ectosignature was too different from David's, but I thought that if I could just make one stable clone..." Vlad trailed off, the look in his eyes almost haunted. "I tried everything. A mix of your DNA and ectosignature and mine, extra DNA from your sister, your mother, even your father. Nothing worked!" Vlad threw his hands up, angrily. "They are all more stable, but none of them are completely stable!"

It took Vlad several seconds to calm down, during which Danny put a few more puzzle pieces together.

"Ellie and the others, they're all clones?" That hurt, for some reason. Did they like him at all, or were they only being nice to him because Vlad told them to.

"Yes," said Vlad. "Danielle is the most stable." He smoothed down the front of his lab coat.

"So, you need me to stabilize them. That's why you drugged me?"

"I didn't drug you Daniel. Your collapse was a surprising to me as it was to you. Based on my readings, I can only conclude that your core recognized Danielle, Dustin, Damien, and Dmitri as family, registered their instability, and attempted to rectify it by boosting your ectosignature and sending them energy. Unfortunately, the effort overwhelmed you. You are only a child yourself, and..." Vlad trailed off, almost sheepish, "it is my understanding that they process is usually undertaken by multiple adult family members, and with only one child at a time."

"Great," said Danny. "And you didn't plan for that to happen at all."

"I had believed that you would bond with them more slowly," said Vlad. "That your reaction wouldn't be so extreme."

"Well, it was," said Danny. "But they're stable now, right? So, you can let me go." He tugged against the restraints again. He hoped they were stable. He had heard his parents talk about what happened to destabilized ghosts.

"Sadly," said Vlad, sounding like he was gritting his teeth, "that is an incorrect assumption."

There was a long pause.

"I want to make a deal with you, Daniel," said Vlad.

"You- Are you asking me for help?" Not that Danny could refuse. For one, he was tied up, for another...

"I suppose. For my children. They are children, Daniel, and they will die if they aren't stabilized. Painfully. Perhaps not today, but within the month."

Danny's heart clenched, and his core shivered. Even if Ellie and the others had been tricking him, he didn't want them to die. He would do what Vlad asked, if it stabilized his... cousins.

He was going to go with cousins for now. Siblings felt a little too close at the moment, and 'clones' was sort of dehumanizing. They were the ones who had started it, calling each other cousins.

But even if he was going to cooperate with Vlad, that didn't mean he wasn't going to try to get as many concessions out of Vlad as possible. True, he wasn't going to get very many, Vlad was holding the cards in this game, but he still might be able to get something.

"What kind of deal?" he asked, cautiously.

"You cooperate with stabilizing the cores of my children," said Vlad, "and I will make sure your little town stays safe and protected. Fail to cooperate, and not only will Amity Park be exposed and helpless against any ridiculous poltergeist that comes through your parents' portal, but you will be unconscious. As demonstrated earlier, you do not need to be awake for your core to be at work."

Danny frowned. Apart from the threat (honestly, Vlad was borderline pathological) that was a pretty good deal. Heck, Danny wasn't even supposed to be back in Amity Park until the end of the week.

It was a good deal... too good.

"Exactly how long do you think it'll take, anyway?" he asked. "To stabilize all of them?"

"I don't know, Daniel, this hasn't ever been done before."

Danny scowled. He hated it when Vlad said his name with that supercilious tone of voice. "Fine. How long does it take with ghosts, Vlad? You said you researched it, didn't you?"

"The time varied based on a number of factors," said Vlad.

"It takes a long time, doesn't it?" asked Danny. "I want a cover story. One that doesn't make me disappearing for Ancients know how long my fault. I want to be able to talk to Sam, Tucker, and Jazz whenever I want. And I want to be able to veto anything too invasive or dangerous."

"You're hardly in a position to make demands."

Danny made a shrugging motion, hoping that Vlad wouldn't call his bluff.

"I can do the first," said Vlad, finally, "but if you want it to hold up, the second is impossible. The last is ridiculous. Cooperation means full cooperation, nothing less."

That was about what he had expected. "If I can't communicate with them, they'll just show up here, guns blazing. You know that."

"I think I can handle three human teenagers."

"Sure, but do you want to have to?"

Vlad frowned. "I will consider the merits of your suggestion," he said. "I'm impressed, actually. I didn't think you had it in you, to bargain with lives on the line." Danny swallowed to keep himself from gagging. "But in the meantime, do you agree to cooperate, or no?" He drummed his fingers on something Danny couldn't see.

Between Danny's Obsession, and what were apparently ghostly family bonding instincts, there really wasn't any way for him to say no. "Yes, fine, whatever. I'll cooperate. You can let me out of these things, now." He pulled at the restraints again.

"Oh, no," said Vlad, smiling, then moving out of Danny's line of sight. "Those are for your own protection. You see, your core isn't really mature enough to cope with sustaining five other cores, so we are going to have to significantly supplement your ectoenergy levels."

There was a small click, and the table Danny was on started moving backwards. After a few inches, it angled up, until it was vertical. Danny discovered that there were little platforms under his bare feet, and other supports to keep him upright in his new position. Directly to his left, floated the clone, David, in the glass tube. Danny's core seemed to strain in that direction. His eyelids fluttered.

Vlad walked back over and pulled something with two tubes attached to it from the space over Danny's head. "Open up," he said.

"Why?" asked Danny.

"This is a breathing mask," said Vlad. "It will supply you with oxygen and atomized ectoplasm at three times the levels generally available in the Ghost Zone. But this part," he tapped part of the mask that was fitted with something like a bite guard, "needs to go inside your mouth."

After a moment of hesitation, Danny opened his mouth, and Vlad inserted the breathing mask. Almost at once, Danny could tell the difference. The air coming through was just so much richer.

Vlad pressed the cup of the mask over Danny's mouth and nose and sealed the edges with tape.

"Now," Vlad said, as he began pulling other things from the ceiling and attaching them to Danny, "in a few minutes, I'm going to start giving you instructions. I want you to follow them. Cooperate, do you understand? The first thing I want to do is stabilize David enough that he is no longer dependent on the containment chamber to survive."

Danny was getting a bad feeling. Many of the wires Vlad was attaching to him mirrored wires attached to David. Vlad attached a few more wires, and inserted several needles. Danny tried to hiss at those, but the mask acted as an effective gag. Finally, Vlad inserted two small plugs into Danny's ears and stepped back, half smiling.

As Danny had almost expected, a curved glass barrier sprang from behind him and encircled him, trapping him in a chamber much like the one David occupied. Ectoplasm began to bubble up from below, from a source Danny couldn't see.

"You will be submerged shortly." Vlad's voice rang clear in the earbuds. "This will allow you to intake ectoplasm through your skin. You will also be in the same environment as David."

The ectoplasm hit the soles of Danny's feet, and he flinched. It was rising rapidly.

"Do try not to panic," said Vlad. "Now, I want you to focus on David."

It was at Danny's knees, now. He took a deep breath, reassuring himself that the mask was in place. He wasn't going to drown. He looked over at David. What did it even mean, to focus on him? Danny had no idea what he was like, not really. Like him, he guessed, but not?

"With your ghost sense, Daniel," said Vlad. "Not your eyes."

Danny scowled at him, trying to distract himself from the fact that the ectoplasm was up to his chest. He closed his eyes and tried to do... that. It wasn't something he normally did and had no idea how to go about it but-

Ah. Oh, there it was. There he was, Danny's new friend. That was easier than expected. Danny's core began to purr, some of the euphoria from earlier in the night returning.

The ectoplasm closed over his head.

"Good," said Vlad, his voice slightly warped. "It appears that you have connected. Now, I am going to stimulate and amplify that connection. I want you to stay focused."

Of course Danny would stay focused. He was helping his friend, wasn't he? He always stayed focused when it came to that.

Several of the places Vlad had attached wires began to tingle. His core jumped and he twitched. Everything briefly took on a very severe cast.

It was very hard to think, after that.

.

Vlad smiled at his readouts. Securing Daniel's cooperation beforehand had been worthwhile. Had he been struggling, it would have been difficult to establish the connection to this extent. David's energy and stability levels were increasing slowly but steadily. Despite the measure he was taking, Daniel's were dropping. Some of the data concerning his human half was less than ideal. That would be troublesome to deal with later on.

He took a moment to check in on his duplicate upstairs. The party was going well. Jack and Maddie hadn't noticed Daniel's absence yet. With luck, they wouldn't until the next morning.

Overall, tonight had been fruitful. With Daniel, he would be able to stabilize all five of the clones, and, perhaps, he would even be able to win over Daniel. He had seen the relaxed smile on his face when he had been with the clones. Vlad knew how powerful ghost instincts could be.

He stood up and walked over to the room where he had asked his children to wait. They should be told that their elder siblings would make a full recovery shortly.

#danny phantom #dannymay #dannymay 2020 #day 24

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