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foxtophat · 3 years

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i got thrown off my groove for a month there doing irl shit but i finally sat down and posted this piece of mercy fic that i’ve been sitting on for like a month. it’s all about john and kim hanging out and bonding so that’s fun!!!

i have a couple of ideas for stories but i’m not QUITE SURE how many of them are going to actually get posted. i might do like a yearly synopsis and put it in the series, writing out what happens between stories and stuff so when i reference shit it isn’t out of the blue, BUT ALSO i am lazy and it’s a miracle mercyverse has gotten this much from me, so lets not try to rock the boat huh???

anyway this is a story about john and kim falling into a cave. it’s like a bottle episode except the bottle is like a large intestine. i hope you like it!!! if you do, consider reblogging this post, or sharing the link, or kudosing or commenting or liking or subscribing or SMASHING THAT BELL

as usual, the story is under the cut for those of you who want to stay on tumblr for some godforsaken reason

Kim had thought that she was doing Nick and John a favor when she first offered to go cache-hunting with them. After all, Grace and Carmina had their hands full working on the yard's shooting range, and there hadn't been anything better to do than dig a couple of holes out in the woods. She'd figured, why not? An extra set of hands could speed things up, and she could keep them focused on digging instead of bickering.

Of course, now that she's out here with them, she regrets ever having offered. As it turns out, their method of cache-hunting involves incessantly goading one another into a fight, trading places between aggressive pessimism and irritatingly fake optimism whenever it might serve to piss the other off more. She's given up on trying to stop it; after all, it's not too much worse than what they say while mending fences and hauling scrap. It's just that the distance between them means that they're arguing at a headache-inducing level.

At the very least, Kim had hoped for some kind of method they could fall back on, but at three hours in, they've all but given up. She supposes the first two caches had been pretty easy to find, being in areas where the terrain hasn't changed much — but this neck of the woods has definitely seen some shifting. Between the rock slides and massive knots of collapsed trees, the steep hillside looks more like a beaver dam than the picturesque hiking trail it probably used to be.

"I'm starting to think that Jacob was full of shit," Nick says, as if he hasn't been reiterating the sentiment for the last thirty minutes. "There's no way we're gonna find anything out here."

Nick might be right, but Kim isn't about to gang up on John right now. She's been mostly staying out of it as the two of them argue about Jacob's map coordinates; why get involved now?

She ignores them and instead picks her way up the hillside towards one of the many uprooted trees nearby. Just like the last dozen trees she's checked, this one doesn't hold a barrel in its roots, nor do any of them have any damn sign indicating where they should be looking. Whatever marker Jacob might've left, paranoid bastard that he was, it's definitely been destroyed by the apocalypse.

"I told you that this wasn't going to be easy," John says. "There's half a mile of trail to search, and there's only three of us. This isn't some pasture outside town —"

"When I asked you if we should bring Grace and Carmina along, you said they would just get in the way! Now here you are, telling me we need more people!"

"If they were here, who do you think Grace would blame if Carmina got a goddamn splinter or scraped her knee? How do you still not get that she is actively looking for a reason to shoot me?"

"At this point, I'm looking for a reason, so I don't know what you're expecting!"

Kim has to admit, they're both making pretty good points. She just wishes they wouldn't make it sound like the start of a fistfight.

John's sigh is especially theatrical, and Kim hears the leaves crunch underfoot as he begins to stalk up the hill after her. He's probably going to try passing her, just to get space from Nick, but he really shouldn't bother. They should at least stop for something to eat and some water, and then they can figure out whether or not expanding the search zone is a good idea. They should probably reconsider their current "poke around and hope" method, too.

Setting her sights on a stout, dead tree with its roots partially torn up, Kim decides to make that the last straw. If she's got any luck at all, the cache will be tangled up in the tree's roots, and she'll be able to gloat about finding it for the rest of forever.

"Don't get too excited," John says, catching up to her as he runs away from Nick.

"Too late for that," Kim teases. "My hopes are at an all-time high. I'm about to be crushed by the disappointment."

"Fantastic," John grunts, rolling his eyes.

He lets her take the first approach on the tree, which juts awkwardly out of the ground at an acute angle. Its scraggly branches are covered in dry needles, and the partially exposed root system seems to have rotted from rain. There are no other trees for a good couple of yards in any direction, so this tree must've gotten the brunt of the worst nuclear weather.

"We should take a break," Nick shouts from halfway down the hill. "I need a goddamn drink!"

"I told him this would be a waste of time," John grumbles. "We could have taken any other location, even the one at the goddamn compound, and had better luck than out here."

"Well, we're here now," Kim replies. "Come on, maybe the cache is tangled up in the roots or something."

John reluctantly follows Kim as she tests the spongier, damp soil around the rotting tree's base. It's clear he's already given up, but that only makes Kim more determined to find something worth the trip out here — at the very least, so that she can rub it in John's pessimistic face. He can't be a sour bastard forever.

No barrel in the root system, of course. All Kim finds is molding wood and the flash of exposed rock. It's just muddy enough that Kim's going to have to scrub her boots when they get back. From here, she can see the slope of the hillside, and the trees that slump with their tops pointed in her direction. It's like they're telling her, go back!

"Please talk Nick into giving this up," John insists, lingering right behind her and scowling at the roots that have betrayed both of them.

"I mean, we've only been out here for two hours. There's plenty of time to find something." Kim crouches down to check the rocky substrate for anything interesting. "Look on the bright side, at least we don't have to dig."

"I think you two are blinded by that bright side of yours." John sighs, leaning against the tree and glaring down in Nick's direction. "You know that the interstate is only a half-day hike from here, right? This is the exact sort of place Jacob would've stashed passports, money — bug-out kits to abandon the county, that kind of thing. It's not like he buried more coffee and rice out here."

"So is that your new theory? Jacob was planning escape routes for you guys?"

John frowns. "It's one of them."

Kim stands and comes around to join him by the trunk. She debates on invoking Jacob's memory any more than she already has; he seems to have a habit of upsetting John even from the grave. She gives the tree trunk a little kick as she considers pressing him, knocking some mud from her boot tread.

Her curiosity takes a backseat as the world lurches uncomfortably beneath them. She catches herself against the trunk and looks towards Nick, who's picking his way up towards them. Only now does she notice that the trees in this direction also lean inwards, towards the lone tree they're currently beside.

John catches on at the same time, hissing under his breath before hollering a warning. "It's a goddamn sinkhole, Nick, watch out!"

The inconvenience turns into real fear as Kim considers the terrain. With all the caves littering the mountains around here, there's no telling how deep the void beneath their feet might be — five feet, twenty? Or, God help them, more?

Kim struggles not to panic as Nick makes no effort to hide his own. "Come on, you guys," Nick calls from between two jutting evergreens, "Just cut across before the whole damn thing gives out!"

There's not a second to spare, but even as Kim starts to move she knows it's too late. She gets one last look at Nick's horrified expression before she, John, and the dead tree crash down into the empty space below.

Kim lands hard on her side, her arm taking the brunt of the blow and blossoming in radiant, white-hot pain. The world around her, suddenly dark and unfamiliar, tunnels alarmingly out of her vision, her blood rushing into her ears until she can only vaguely hear her own pained crying. Trying to move only causes daggers of pain to shoot right up her arm and into her brain, but she only finds that out as she rolls off of her definitely broken arm. At least, Kim's pretty sure it's broken. She's terrified of looking over and seeing her bone poking out, or something even worse — she knows that she won't be able to stand it, that she'll pass out, and she can't do that down here in this goddamn cavern!

Vague, warped voices vibrate through her as John appears abruptly by her side. The left side of his face is covered in a smear of blood from a deep wound scored over his brow. His mouth moves like he's trying to speak to her. God, her fucking arm!

"Take a deep breath," John commands once again, and this time Kim hears him and abides. The pain doesn't subside, but at least the panic that comes with it is softened as she struggles to calm down. As she does, the background noises begin to come into focus; the crumbling rubble settling, the sharp, birdless silence of the air, and most importantly, Nick hysterically shouting her name from above.

John puts a hand on the shoulder not currently delivering mountains of pain. "Another one," he says, and Kim obeys. It's while she's trying to catch her breath that John steps away, cupping his hands to his mouth and shouting up, "Kim's broken her arm!"

"God damn it, what happened — never mind, just —! Stay put! I'll go get help!" Nick's voice cracks as he realizes aloud, "Shit, there's nobody to get help from!"

Kim sucks in a deep breath. There's no way that John is going to be able to handle Nick's mounting panic by himself, and so she steels herself and tries to steady her voice. "It's gonna be okay!" she shouts. "I'm fine!"

"Bullshit you're fine, that looks like a two-story drop from here!"

John swears under his breath. "I don't have time for this."

"He's going to try and jump down if we don't talk him out of it," Kim hisses, closing her eyes as a wave of painful pins and needles washes up her arm. She keeps accidentally moving it, and the feeling of the bone scraping is enough to make her want to vomit.

John clearly decides she's right, changing tactics as Kim desperately tries not to start sobbing again. "It isn't bad, Nick!" he shouts, "But I need rope if I'm going to splint it! Get the cord from the glove box!"

Nick is quiet for a moment. "Y-Yeah," he calls down shakily, "I... I guess you got plenty to work with — hold on!"

Kim lets out a breath she hadn't meant to hold, then bites back the scream that threatens to rip from her throat. "Please tell me you can do this," she moans as John crouches down beside her broken arm. "I can't look — is there bone?"

"There's no bone," John replies. His voice is tight and unhappy, but at least he isn't lacking in confidence when he tells her, "I know what I'm doing. Try to stay conscious, and don't move. The last thing I need is to be stuck alone with Nick."

"Excuse him for worrying," she groans, staring up at the sky through the fifteen-foot-wide hole above her. She counts down the seconds until Nick gets back, if only to focus on something other than the pain.

John leaves her to it, making his way over to the tree that's joined them here in the cavern. There isn't much else down here besides them and the vegetation that came down with them; the sinkhole must have joined with a cavern somewhere along the way. The rock here probably hasn't seen daylight before — when she glances around, she spots a dark crack in the wall that implies there might be more, unlit caves to explore beyond.

Boy, she really does not want to go into that creepy tunnel, and she especially doesn't want to do it with a broken arm. Thankfully, Nick returns before that worry turns to panic.

"Everything okay? Actually, never mind — look, I got the rope, and the first-aid kit!"

Anything Nick decides to throw down is going to stay down here, and so Kim quickly stops him. "You keep that, Nick! If you get hurt up there, you'll need it!"

"We need it more," John points out, returning to her with a few branches that he clearly intends to use as a splint. He's not wrong about the medkit; the cut over his eye is a nasty one, and Kim could use all of those expired painkillers about now. Not to mention, there might be more injuries they've missed.

Still. "I'm not leaving Nick without supplies," she says.

John doesn't reply, but his scowl speaks volumes.

After a minute or so, Nick is ready to throw the cord down. They coordinate the hand-off just fine without her, which is great, because Kim needs to reserve all of her strength for what's to come.

Nick's bundled a few of the medical supplies into his worn-out flannel, along with the crank flashlight and one of the ultra-dry military rations, all tied off with the paracord. Kim is both touched at the thought and horrified at the idea that they might be here long enough to get hungry.

"This is good, Nick," John calls. "We're in a cave — there's got to be another way out nearby!"

"I'll go look for a way in!"

"No," Kim shouts, her voice cracking, "You might get hurt, Nick!"

"Well, what the hell am I supposed to do, Kim! I'm not gonna leave you down there!"

Kim has never in her life imagined that she would say her next words, but that doesn't mean she doesn't mean it. "I'm going to be okay! John's down here with me, I'll be fine!"

John doesn't seem to have expected her to say that, either, boggling at her with open confusion. But... well, come on! If John can trust her enough to gun down Peggies trying to kidnap him, then she can at least trust him to help her limp out of one of Hope County's many caves. Sure, it's not an ideal situation by any means, but Kim's just happy not to be stuck looking for a way out by herself.

"Are you sure you can even walk?" Nick calls uneasily.

"I can handle it, Nick," John replies for her. "We'll look for a way out — if we don't find anything in an hour, we'll come back here and try something else!"

"What the hell do you want me to do!"

John pauses long enough to look at Kim, but since he seems to have more ideas than she does, she defers to his judgment. "Circle west around the hill and look for any entrances to call from! There's going to be a cave opening somewhere nearby!"

"I don't like any of this, Kim!"

John pinches the bridge of his nose, leaving Kim to answer, "It's the only plan we've got!"

The silence from above stretches out. "We don't have time for this," John mutters, abandoning his attempts to reassure Nick. "There's no telling where a way out might be, and I'm not wasting more time because Nick can't trust me."

"It's not about trust," Kim snipes in return. "He's trying not to panic."

John only grunts in return, settling on his knees next to her as he prepares to do the hard part for her. That leaves it up to Kim to encourage Nick to get a move on; she really doesn't want him sticking around for the painful part. "Nick, be careful, I don't want you to fall in another sinkhole! We'll be okay!"

Nick is frustratingly silent for another moment, but eventually, he relents. "Okay, fine! Remember to mark your path! And don't trust any ropes or ladders you see! And stay outta any water you find, you don't know how deep it is!"

"Jesus Christ," John mutters.

"Oh, shut up," Kim tells him, lifting her strained voice to call back. "Alright, Nick! We'll be careful! We'll see you soon!"

Kim makes John wait another minute after Nick leaves before she lets him at her arm. Despite his sour expression, John manages to be nothing more than stern, and surprisingly gentle. "Careful," he tells her, as if she needs a warning as he adjusts her broken arm. She's unable to decide if the burning sensation or the stabbing sensation is worse, but they're both vying for the spot as John examines the fracture. God, she hopes he knows what he's doing. She hopes it heals clean. She doesn't know what she'll do if she loses the thing.

John jostles her a little too abruptly, and a gasp of pain tears her from her downward spiral of worst possible outcomes. If John notices, he doesn't comment.

"It's not so bad," he says, although Kim's still not sure if she trusts his judgment on the matter. "It seems like a single fracture. I'll splint it, and... Well, there's somebody in town with medical experience, isn't there?"

"I don't know," Kim gasps, head reeling, "Maybe?"

John sighs. "Well, at least you'll survive."

"You better hope so," Kim jokes, or tries to anyway.

John rolls his eyes, but thankfully he's not in a vindictive mood as he prepares to set her arm. "You'll want to scream," he tells her. "Try breathing through your nose instead."

He sure isn't wrong. Kim can't think straight for a minute after he's finished, her face wet as the pain forces her to tears, but John is utterly detached and methodical as he binds her arm to one of the branches. It's reassuring at first, but Kim can't help but wonder just how many people suffered broken bones and serious trauma at his hands, only to see the same dispassionate bedside manner afterward? God, assuming they even survived what he put them through.

"Catch your breath," John tells her once he's done, standing and turning back to further investigate the tree. "The cave systems go on for miles down here, but there are dozens of openings in the hills. As long as we stick to the larger tunnels, we should be able to find one of them."

Kim watches him pick through the tree, sizing out larger branches and dismissing them one by one.

"I'm surprised you're not more freaked out," she says as he picks out a four-foot branch. "You know, being underground and everything."

John furiously breaks the branch from the trunk, then roughly cleans it of dead sprigs and foliage. "Thank you for reminding me."

"Sorry, I just meant —"

"I know what you meant," he says. "It's fine. I'm not... Like I said, these tunnels are hardly inescapable." He strikes the branch against the ground and seems satisfied by the sound. "I spent a lot of time studying the cave systems out here. We considered using them for passage between the gates, but that plan never went anywhere. It left me with enough useless knowledge that I'm not prone to panic down here."

"Useless until now," Kim points out. "Now help me up and let's get the hell out of here."

John helps her to her feet with her good arm, careful not to jostle the splint as she tests her balance. The world heaves for an uncomfortable second or two before righting itself, although it's mostly shock and adrenaline keeping her moving. She's not sure how long that's going to last, but she sure hopes it's long enough to reunite with Nick.

"I should probably lead," John says, looking unhappy about her tentatively upright position.

"Yeah, I don't think I'm in the position to trail-blaze."

"You're barely in the position to walk," he replies. Casting one last look around the sunlit cavern, John turns towards the dark crack in the wall that leads further into the system. "Try not to pass out."

"No promises," she says, staggering her way to their only exit.

She can feel the cool, musty air from here, oddly relieving against her sweaty face. She wishes she hadn't watched The Descent so many times before the apocalypse, because that is really coloring her perception of this situation. Of course, they're more likely to run into a wolverine or bear den than they are to be hunted by a pack of cave-dwelling mutants, but that doesn't stop her from considering it.

John starts forward. Kim, anxious and trembling in pain, tries to joke. "Just avoid stepping on any weird symbols carved into the ground, okay?"

"Christ," John groans, the same way he does every time somebody tries to rope him in with a pop-culture reference. He winds the flashlight up and the beam of light cuts a sharp swath across the dark tunnel "Will you two please let that Hollywood bullshit die already?"

"Oh, relax," she replies. "Tropes are older than L.A. and you know it. They aren't going to disappear just because civilization got nuked."

"One can dream," John snipes dryly in return.

Of course, even with the attitude, John keeps close to Kim, sticking to her uninjured side. Kim imagines her slow pace must be irritating the crap out of him, but he impressively manages not to sigh or stomp like a passive-aggressive toddler. He's been getting a lot better about letting his exasperation get to him, although she bets it's got a lot to do with exhaustion and survival instinct right now.

The silence stretches for a time between them. Kim imagines John is lost in his thoughts, but she's been hyper-aware of every distant sound of rubble shifting or oddly-shaped rock formations that are easy to mistake for humanoid shapes in the dark. The tunnel is only about eight feet across and somewhat taller than that, but that's plenty of room for Kim's imagination to play tricks on her.

"I always thought your anti-Hollywood thing was some kind of shtick," she admits. "Maybe you got scorned on a screenplay or something, I dunno. But you really believe that all of the entertainment industry deserved to get firebombed out of existence?"

"It deserved a reckoning," John replies.

"You mean something like nuclear annihilation?"

John's frown deepens. "Maybe," he says stiffly.

Normally, Kim would try to dig into that more, but she's not in a position to make much sense of it right now. Honestly, the conversation is irrelevant — she just needs something to keep her from fantasizing about monsters in the dark. Or, you know, passing out. Whichever would be worse.

"So I guess you don't have a desert island five, then."

John huffs loudly at that. "I wouldn't be able to remember it."

That just tells Kim that he does have one. She bets American Psycho or Fight Club was on it. Maybe Fear and Loathing?

"Okay, well... say you had to pick a movie to watch as soon as we got home. What would it be?"

Even without looking, Kim knows he's rolling his eyes. "Seriously? Is this really the time?"

"Humor me."

He groans in annoyance, but Kim doesn't miss the short stretch of silence that follows as he thinks it over.

"I don't know," he finally grumbles.

"Come on, you've got to have something."

"I only ever saw a handful of movies growing up, and I lost interest in the medium in college."

"God, you must have been a pretentious bastard."

Despite himself, John chuckles at the jab. "Oh, you have no idea," he replies.

The conversation dies, just like John had probably hoped it would. Kim tries to find something else to distract her, but there's really not much to look at. They've only found one offshoot that John had been able to fit in, but it had ended only a few yards in. They've been exploring for maybe fifteen minutes, though; there's still time for a miracle. Until then, she's got moss to look at, and the distant trickle of water from somewhere far away. With the way the land's shifted, there may be a new river forming somewhere up on the surface. In a few decades, it could swallow these caverns entirely.

"How does your arm feel?" John asks, his voice bouncing off the walls and breaking the silence.

"Not... great," she admits, still trying not to focus on the numb agony of her arm. "I wouldn't mind lying down and sleeping for a few weeks right about now, but I think I can keep it together until we find a way out."

She hopes, anyway.

"Good." John takes a moment to crank the flashlight before it can go out, then picks up the conversation as though Kim weren't even there. "There's nobody in town that I know of that has serious medical experience. With the gates destroyed, there's no telling where the experts we'd vetted for the Project wound up. Dead, probably. Or worse, still involved with Joseph. Hell, even a vet would be better than nothing."

He's definitely more anxious than he wants to let on. Kim doesn't believe for a second that being in this endless, dark tunnel is any better than being trapped in a bunker, save for maybe the space. At least in a bunker, you know which way is out, and you know what's going to kill you.

Now Kim is the one who starts to ramble. "I mean, there's got to be an eagle scout out there somewhere. And there were a couple of doctors still working when I had Carmina — one of them might've survived, right? Somebody out there will know enough to check your handiwork. For the record, though, I think you did a pretty good job for a guy stuck in a pit."

John shakes his head. "I've set plenty of broken limbs." There's a weird sort of challenge in his voice as he says, "Of course, I was the one who broke most of them."

"And I think you feel pretty shitty about it, so I don't know why you sound so smug."

"I'm just reminding you of who you're trying to compliment."

Kim rolls her eyes, her exasperation carrying over in her voice. "I know exactly who you are, John. Quit trying to rile me up like you do with Nick, it isn't going to work."

He huffs. "Sure," he says, then promptly shuts up. Of course he does. No wonder he only ever wants to talk to Nick — it's like he doesn't know how to hold a conversation without trying to start a fight.

Well, Kim needs something to distract her, so she'll carry on with it herself. "I've sprained my ankle a couple of times, but the only time I've ever broken a bone was in soccer camp when I was... thirteen, I think? It was my big toe, and the humiliation was way worse than the pain."

"I can't imagine," John drawls, distinctly unenthusiastic.

Kim opens her mouth to ask the obvious question, then catches herself. Asking about John's past is essentially opening Pandora's box; every time Kim has gone digging, she comes away with something new she wishes she could forget about. The breadcrumbs of information he's given her over the past year or so have honestly kept her up some nights. She probably doesn't want to know anything about the number of broken bones John's had. She definitely doesn't want to know how.

John looks over at her, daring her to ask. It's only when Kim manages to contain her curiosity that he parts with a few terse details. "The first time was when I was eleven. It was a powerful learning experience. One I... try not to revisit."

"Sure," she says. It sounds reasonable enough, anyway.

The flashlight's beam cuts across the wall further ahead, revealing the first major fork that they've come across. They're forced to take an impromptu break as John tries to determine their best way forward. John scowls at the darkness in either direction, but it doesn't seem to help make a decision. Meanwhile, Kim takes the opportunity to rest against the cold stone, swallowing down the nausea that's starting to build. It's a miracle that she's made it this far without fainting, but she doesn't think John's in the mood to hear that.

Frowning, John turns the flashlight back the way they came, sweeping the light down the forking path. "Strange," he mutters.

"What?"

"It's nothing," he says, sweeping the light down the way they came. "Except... see this?"

He steps closer to highlight a uniformly rectangular notch in the wall, just about hip-level. Moving the light reveals more, equally spaced notches, continuing along the wall of the newest fork in their road.

"There were guide ropes installed at one point or another. It doesn't seem to be an active mine, though — it must've been for dumb tourists, just in case of lawsuits."

"I hate to tell you, John, but right now, we're the dumb tourists."

"Unfortunately so. I guess that means we should take the left."

It's smaller, and it looks just as untouched as the rest of the cave has so far, but John's made a compelling point about the seemingly man-made notches.

"You're the expert," Kim says, "I'll take your word for it."

"Alright," he says, not as enthusiastic as Kim would have hoped for. He eyes her somewhat critically, then asks, "How are you doing?"

It's probably the pain making her delirious, but she's surprised at John's concern for her wellbeing. She really shouldn't be. Of course he cares; even if he weren't actively trying to be less awful, he's too smart to leave Kim down here and risk Nick finding out. But still. She's pain-addled enough to be touched by the sentiment.

That doesn't mean she's in the mood to sugarcoat the truth. "I'm surprised I'm still standing," she says. "Let's just hope we find Nick before I pass out."

"I'm sure he'd enjoy seeing me carrying your limp body out of the abandoned mine."

Kim laughs, regretting it as it sends an ache jolting through her body. "Oh, I bet. Just don't be surprised if I tap out at some point."

"You're stronger than that," John remarks. "Follow me."

Now, following John Seed through a dark cave tunnel with a broken arm seems like it would be a bad time. If this were ten, eleven years ago, Kim's sure she would be hunting for a weapon or looking for her own escape route. That is, of course, assuming he hadn't left her to die down here. No doubt that her survival would've banked on how much he would have needed her.

She's glad that's not the case now. John is a reliable navigator, slow-going and cautious as he leads the way, testing suspect rock formations and ducking into narrow crags that don't go anywhere. Honestly, he's probably being more cautious than they need to be. It's already been a half-hour or so, and they're going to need to turn back before much longer.

John has other concerns to bother him, though. "I wonder what happened to the anchors," he says at one point. "You'd think we would have found one by now."

"Maybe they took the rope down before the Collapse," Kim points out. "Lots of tourist traps weren't exactly up to code. Earl probably got here way before we did, back when he was trying to crack down on these kinds of things."

John frowns thoughtfully. "Maybe."

"It's not like people are down here renovating for the next season."

"We don't know that," he points out grimly. "Survivors might've hidden from the radiation down here. Or maybe some angels got lost after Faith was killed."

"Come on, John," she groans.

"Nick's always wondering where the mutants are. Maybe we'll be the ones to find them."

Kim side-eyes John just in time to catch the remnants of a smirk on his face, and she can't help but elbow him with her good arm. She tries to admonish him, telling him, "Knock it off," but she can't help laughing as she does.

"You're probably right about the code violations," John chuckles at last, lifting the light to check the ceiling ahead as it dips low enough for them to need to duck. "Not a lot of these cave systems were what I'd call safe. It's one of the reasons we decided against using them as tunnels. The work involved was too expensive, and the chance of cave-ins was too high. And, as we've found out, they weren't guaranteed to stay underground."

"So, what was going to happen instead? Were you guys going to rely on radios, or what?"

"It doesn't matter what we decided," John points out, more weary of the conversation than irritated. "The gates were barely finished before the Deputy destroyed them, and we never got to find out what might've happened."

They follow the notches through two more forks, and Kim starts to worry that they're only going deeper into the old attraction. Well, at least they're taking the easy way. With a smooth floor and a ceiling that rarely drops lower than eight feet, Kim gets the impression that they're in a manufactured mine, and not an organic one. For all they know, some crazy prepper dug this tunnel out to make a quick buck for his bunker-building hobby. Of course, if that's the case, it's a miracle that nothing's caved in yet.

They pass underneath a lower segment of the ceiling, and the tunnel abruptly opens up into a massive cavern. Defunct light rigs are scattered amongst the stalagmites, with several hanging stalactites covered in chipped fluorescent paint. The rest of the rock outcroppings are covered in lichen, which disappointingly fails to glow in the dark. As John sweeps the flashlight across the large, empty space, Kim gets a good idea of the cheap edu-tainment that was offered on short hikes through the mines. Somewhere in here, there's probably a storage closet full of Halloween decor waiting to liven up the otherwise boring cavern.

"Well, this wasn't worth the twenty dollars it cost to get in," John grouses.

"Don't forget the thirty-dollar iron-on tee-shirts they print off at home," Kim reminds him with a laugh. It's enough to make her lightheaded, and she doesn't quite regain her balance, even after she braces herself against the wall.

"We can only rest a minute," he warns her, sweeping the light in the direction they need to go. Any more huffing and puffing on his part is diminished as the light glints off the rounded edge of something metallic. When John refocuses the light on the object, neither of them really know what to say.

Lying amongst the rocks, battered and dirty, is one of the dark green bliss containers they've been looking for. Kim looks up, but the ceiling is rooted in darkness, and she can't see any sign of another cave-in or sinkhole. The idea that Jacob might've come this far himself crosses her mind, but if that were the case, why is it sitting out in the open like that?

"John, wait," Kim calls as John steps off the path. Suddenly, all her jokes about booby traps seem tasteless, especially with John charging into the unknown like he is.

Of course, this isn't Indiana Jones, and there's no pit of spikes or tripwire to trigger. John doesn't wind up with a face-full of poison darts as he picks up the dented canister; the only thing he's forced to sacrifice is a good grip on the flashlight, which shines at an awkward angle and only illuminates a useless part of the floor. His slow pace and the bad lighting leave Kim to imagine what he's found inside — remnants of supplies, or a dead animal? Indications that something chewed through the rubber sealant, maybe?

John drops the barrel between them, the clanging metal causing Kim to jump. John doesn't notice as he reorients the light, leaning over to illuminate the barrel's contents. The interior is flaked with rust, and whatever sealant had been used is all but completely worn away. The only thing left inside is an empty, smashed bottle of liquor and a few wrapped, moldy packages of cigarettes.

"I don't know if I'm disappointed or not," Kim says.

"I know I am," John replies, grimly reaching into the empty barrel to check for a false bottom. The screech of metal rises up into the cavern, bouncing off the far ceiling and turning into an ugly birdsong. Kim leans back against the wall; if she keeps looking down, she's going to end up toppling over like a broken Weeble-Wobble. John glances her way after a moment, before lifting a clump of wet paper out from the depths of the barrel.

"Of course he buried documents here," John mutters. Kim can't quite pin down whether he's upset or resigned to the bad luck at this point.

"Anything salvageable?" she asks.

"Doubtful. I'll... bring these along, I guess." He checks again, digging out what he can. Other than the loose papers, there's a water-logged manila envelope and an equally soaked box of ammunition. John tucks the box away in his front pocket, holding the papers uncomfortably in his hand. "We'll worry about what these are once we're out of here."

Despite the pain in her arm giving her full-body tremors and John's dismal mood, Kim is nearly upbeat as they exit the cavern. They're still in civilization, after all, even if it's a defunct tourist trap, and the knowledge that they're clearly on their way out is the main thing keeping her moving. If they're lucky, they aren't too far from the truck — if they're really lucky, Nick will have found the entrance before them.

They eventually find a few anchors that are still moored to the walls, a knotted bit of rope still attached, and Kim breathes a sigh of relief. The sigh quickly turns to a groan of pain as she rattles her arm, but at least it isn't enough to knock her off her feet.

John hesitates in front of her, slowing just enough so that he can offer his arm to her. "We can't stop now," he tells her.

"I know," she pants, wiping sweat from her forehead that she hadn't realized was gathering. "Okay. We're nearly there."

She gives up on pretending entirely, leaning heavily against John as they continue forward. Lying down and resting for, oh, a hundred years or so sounds great right now, but first, she needs to make sure Nick hasn't had a heart attack waiting for them. He's probably convinced himself that they've gotten killed somehow, and John isn't going to be able to talk him down on his own.

They approach what will hopefully be the last fork in the tunnel, only to find that both directions have anchors. The newest offshoot seems to curve pretty severely downwards, though; it's clear even as they stop that they should stick to the path they've been on.

"I don't like this," John says, looking first behind them and then ahead, down the new path.

"Fine," Kim groans, "You can choose the next tourist trap we get stuck in."

"I'm serious, Kim." John turns the flashlight down the new path. The air coming from that direction is thick and stagnate — Kim's imagination unhelpfully supplies a few images of killer clowns and deformed mutants to lurk down in the dark that way. God, why did she have to like horror movies so much? Why couldn't she have enjoyed normal, safe entertainment that wouldn't have filled her imagination with monsters and a deep-rooted fear of the unexplored dark?

It certainly doesn't help as John says, "I keep getting the feeling that we're being watched."

"Okay, that's it," Kim snaps, desperately trying to bury the surge of fear the suggestion fills her with. "I'm done being creeped out."

"I'm not trying to scare you —"

"Well, you're naturally gifted, okay? Look, let's just — we know that's the way out," she says, nodding towards the safer route. "Let's just go that way. The sooner we get out of here, the better."

"Agreed," John grunts.

John adopts a brisk walk that Kim has some trouble keeping up with, but she's not interested in slowing down for anything. She feels vindicated by their choice of exit as they pass a faded safety sign lying on the ground, as well as the decidedly fresher air coming in from what Kim expects to be the exit. There are a few moments where John has to resist breaking out into a jog; Kim can't exactly blame him, but his jitters are amping up her own anxiety, and now she's trying desperately to listen for chasing footsteps behind them. It's hard to hear much of anything over the blood pounding in her ears.

It's a massive relief when John finally slows down. "It must have been an animal," he says at last, casting one last look behind them. "God, I fucking hate being underground."

"Well, let's hope we aren't leading the mutants to the surface world," Kim jokes. It probably would land better if she didn't sound completely wiped.

John frowns at her, but the dark makes it hard to pin down his expression. "We're almost there," he says, which sounds alarming like a reassurance.

Her spirits lift as they pass an overturned rail barricade, but the wind is immediately taken out of her sails as they find the path blocked by a chained and padlocked gate. The thick gauge chain-link fence has been welded to brackets on the wall; the bottom has been bent outwards, likely from some angry animal forcing its way through. Unfortunately, it's too small for either of them to get through.

"For fuck's sake," John hisses between gritted teeth.

They're not going anywhere, and Kim's nausea forces her to find something more solid than John for support. She manages to stagger to the nearest wall before falling against it, but it's enough to make her regret moving at all.

At least she manages a weak thumbs up when John anxiously asks, "Are you alright?"

"Just — giving you room to work," she gurgles, staggering a few feet back down the path before throwing up.

John swears under his breath as Kim tries to coax her headache back to something more manageable. She can hear him tearing at the gate behind her; if she weren't feeling so miserable, she'd probably be flipping out on it, too. As it is, she takes her sweet time to turn around and start back for the fence, watching as John tries to widen the gap left behind by some tenacious wolverine. It's going to wreck her arm to try and weasel through the hole, but Kim is willing to try anything at this point.

"How far are we from the truck?" Kim rasps. "Maybe Nick can hear us?"

"How the hell am I supposed to know?" John snaps, well past the end of his rope. Kim has to admit, she's surprised he made it this far. "God damn it, I don't know where we are any better than you!"

"Okay, point taken," Kim says — after all, she's in no position to argue with him. As it is, it's taking most of her focus to keep from sinking to the ground. As soon as she's sitting, she's going to pass out, and she's not in any position to be doing that yet.

Thankfully, Nick's voice reaches them before she can give up. A tidal wave of relief floods Kim at the sound of him calling her name; she staggers forward, gripping the chain-link with her good arm.

"Nick!" she shouts. The sound of her own voice bouncing off the walls only amplifies her pounding headache, but it doesn't stop her from shouting his name a few more times in desperation.

John grabs her good shoulder. "Careful," he says, "Take it easy."

"You take it easy," Kim snaps as Nick's voice bounces off the far-away cave entrance. Trying to glare at John is a mistake, as vertigo nearly sends her to the floor. The only thing that keeps her upright is John's grip on her arm, easing her back until she finds the wall for support.

"Let me handle it," he says.

Kim has no choice but to follow his orders, reeling against the wall as he picks up the impromptu game of Marco Polo. She's not sure how much time passes between her slow, long blinks, but all that matters is the moment that she sees Nick appear with the lantern held high. It's enough to bring her to tears — well, that and the dizzying pain — and from Nick's tearful shout, it's having the same effect on him.

"Oh, thank Christ," he gasps as he reaches the gate, rattling it with his free hand as if he could just pry it back. "Kim, you're alive! Are you okay?" He turns the full force of his relief on John, concern furrowing his brow. "Jesus, John, are you okay? We needa get that cut looked at."

"It's fine," John says. "You didn't see any keys anywhere, did you?"

"Let me go check the ticket booth," Nick replies. "Don't worry, you guys — I'm not about to let a goddamn padlock stop me."

Nick jogs back down the tunnel and Kim finally sags, sliding to the ground with a tired groan.

"Okay, John," she sighs, "Mission accomplished. Wake me up when we get home."

"Kim, hold on," John replies, but frankly there's no stopping her now. This was as far as she'd hoped to get on her own two feet, and honestly, she's surprised that she made it that far.

She does rouse briefly as Nick begins wailing on the padlock with a steel pipe, but that's something the boys can handle without her. Here and there, she registers hands on her, and dappled light flashes over her face as they finally escape the caves. The fresh air brings her back long enough to help Nick get her settled in the truck, but she's already dozing off by the time John and Nick start arguing again. The rest of the trip, for better or worse, is completely lost on her.

————

When Kim finally comes to, she's immediately met by the familiar sight of her room at home. She can't tell what time it is, only that it's late enough for the lamp to be lit. Judging by the voices downstairs, everyone is still awake — and going by the sling and bandages, they've had some company since she was last conscious. She allows herself to imagine the whole thing was all a horrible nightmare, just for a second, but the throbbing in her arm is already reminding her of the unfortunate truth. At least she can check "escape mutants in a tunnel" off of her bucket list.

She doesn't have long to focus on the slowly returning pain; it's not even a minute later that she hears boots on the stairs, and Nick pokes his head in not long after.

"Hey," is about all she can muster up before she has to clear her throat, but it's enough.

"Christ, Kim!" he exclaims, throwing open the door as he rushes to her side. The worry breaks on his face as he crouches beside her, careful not to jostle her broken arm. "Are you okay? How do you feel?"

"Uh... not awesome," she admits, shifting in an attempt to sit up. Nick hurries to help her, and she can't help but smile at him as he piles the pillows behind her. "Better now, though."

"That's what I'm here for," Nick laughs, "That and making everybody else uncomfortable. They kept tellin' me not to worry, but you know how hard that is."

"They?"

"Well, John mostly, until Jerome and Grace showed up. Then I had to keep it together for Carmina, so that helped. Uh. How much do you remember about gettin' back here?"

"Not much," Kim says. Now that she's more conscious, she's able to discern the late evening light for what it is; it's been hours since she was last aware of where she was. "I... remember getting into the truck, I think? And then... Nothing. Why? What did I miss?"

Nick shakes his head, smiling fondly at her. "Nothing much, honest. Most of the ride back was me and John arguing about what to do. He radioed Jerome for help while I got you up here and settled in, then I called up Grace so she could keep Carmina busy until Jerome showed up with some help. I guess Winona, y'know, down at the Eagle? She was getting her nursing degree, or license, or whatever, so Jerome brought her over here to help out. She said it looked like a clean enough break, and John did a good job setting it, so we just had to make sure you wouldn't be accidentally moving in your sleep." He chuckles. "You know, real exciting stuff."

"Oh, boy," Kim groans, "I bet I scared the crap out of Carmina. Is she okay?"

"Yeah, she's fine. Worried about you, obviously, but Grace gave her a pep talk and we kept her busy downstairs. Figured you oughta be awake before she came to see you."

"Good call." Kim briefly debates whether or not getting out of bed is worth it, but she quickly decides against it. Even if she weren't wiped out, Nick looks like he'd fall apart with worry if she tried to exert herself. "You might have to go get her, because I don't think I could move if I wanted to."

"Don't even think about it," Nick says, pointing at her as he gets back to his feet. "You're on bed rest until tomorrow at least. I'll be right back."

Kim dozes for the few minutes that stretch between Nick leaving and Carmina coming up the stairs. It's impossible to fall back asleep, but the rest is good enough on its own. She makes sure to perk up when she hears Carmina coming up the stairs, smiling wide as her daughter enters the doorway.

"Hey, honey," she says, her voice rougher than she'd expected it to be.

"Mom!" Carmina exclaims, careful to avoid jostling Kim as she climbs into the bed on her good side. "I was so worried!"

Kim folds her arm around Carmina's shoulders and gives her a squeeze. "I know, sweetheart. I didn't mean to spook you."

"What happened? Dad said you and John fell into a cave!"

"That's pretty much it," Kim laughs. "We fell through a sinkhole into an old cave system. It used to be a place people could visit, though, so it wasn't hard to find our way out."

Carmina frowns, picking at a loose thread in the comforter. "But it was probably really dark. And your arm was broken, and John busted his head open, and..."

"First of all, his head wasn't busted open," Kim says, reaching up to ruffle Carmina's hair. "He probably needed a few stitches, sure, but he knew what he was doing, and we both made it out okay. And your dad got the flashlight to us, so we had plenty of light to see by."

Obviously, Kim never wants to go back to that awful place, but she needs her daughter to learn not to panic now, in case she ever has to go into those tunnels herself. There's no summer camp to enroll her in that will teach her how to be mindful of caves, so Kim's going to have to do it herself... She just wishes she'd gotten to it before she'd had her own scary experience.

Carmina huffs, frowning briefly at the door. "You were lucky John was there," she says.

Kim bites back on her knee-jerk reaction to scoff at the idea. "You're right," she admits, a little more reluctant to do so than she really should be.

"Nobody else thinks so," Carmina grumbles. "Grace got mad dad left you two down there and then Jerome got mad at John for getting you hurt and Winona was really mad that she had to give John stitches. I wanted to say something but dad wouldn't let me."

"That's because they have good reasons not to trust him," Kim points out, although that excuse is starting to wear a little thin, even with her. "They just need time."

Carmina groans. "I guess. I'm... just really glad you're okay."

Kim squeezes Carmina's shoulder. "Me too."

Carmina sighs. "So... what was it like?" she asks, unable to resist her curiosity any longer.

That's okay by Kim — she could use the distraction. "Well... it was dark, and chilly. It was really quiet — the only thing we could hear was water dripping on the walls and our footsteps. The tunnel wasn't very interesting... but there was a big cavern in the middle where we found the cache, covered in stalactites and stalagmites. You could see where they used to have lights rigged up, and they'd painted some of the rocks to glow in the dark."

"You didn't see any animals?" Carmina frowns. "I always thought animals would hide in the caves."

Kim absolutely will not be telling her daughter about John's creepy sense of danger, thanks. "You know, we didn't. There isn't a lot of food for rabbits or cougars in there, though. I think they usually prefer little caves, not big ones."

There are plenty more questions for Carmina to ask that Kim only barely knows the answers to. Thankfully, geography and natural history are easy to teach hands-on; while she's not about to go back to the cave they just escaped, there are a couple of old attractions she remembers visiting that might do the trick. Places with good gift shops and little museums and educational plaques everywhere to help Kim explain how basic geology works.

"If you want, we can do some cave exploring of our own one day," Kim offers. "I'll need some time to get better, first. And I'll have to find the right place. But when we have some free time..."

"That sounds fun," Carmina says. "Just don't fall into another one first?"

"I'll do my best. We'll, uh, teach you what to look for so you don't make the same mistake."

They talk for a little while longer about the cave systems that litter Hope County, but it's not exactly Kim's favorite topic right now. It's a relief when Carmina declares that she needs water; even more so when she offers to bring some up to Kim. She considers asking Carmina to relay her thanks to John, but it can honestly wait until morning. Hopefully by then, she'll have adjusted to the makeshift cast, although she suspects she'll have plenty of time to get used to it. How long does it take a broken bone to heal, she wonders? Probably a few months, at least. She's really going to have to take it easy, and hope that nothing catastrophic happens while she's down one working arm.

#far cry 5 #fc5 #fcnd #new dawn #john seed #nick rye #kim rye #far cry fanfic #my fic #mercyverse

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steve0discusses · 4 years

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Yugioh S4 Ep16: Rex and Weevil Do Not Understand “Rock Bottom”

Hey guys.

Hey.

So... kind of crazy out there, right?

Well, you know what they say. When life gives you lemons, you watch Netflix.

Anyway, Yugioh is racing down this canyon that should be going up alongside the 101 and through the middle of many cities. Don’t worry about it.

And then I found out the name of a card I haven’t seen yet and wow it’s a name.

I’m really glad that Rex Raptor, dinosaur enthusiast, has just no idea how to name dinosaurs and does so like a 6 year old child. Hornsaurus.

(read more under the cut)

So this episode is mostly about Rex and Weevil’s tragic backstory, and thankfully, it’s really not that tragic. We’ve had SO MANY bizarre and weird backstories under our belt, that to have a completely normal one is just...wild to me. They’re so freakin normal.

And on the way, our train just...

OK Train...anyway, I’ll do my best to show which scenes are flash back and which are not, but like bear with me because it flashes back like every other scene it feels like.

So Rex waxes long about that very short time in which he and Weevil were the best ever duelists in Japan (other than Kaiba, I guess, who they failed to mention in this flashback.)

(I used to have a very soft performance fleece sweater the exact same shade as Weevil’s jacket there, popped collar and everything, with piping outline. Don’t judge me, it was the 00′s, I’m just shocked that Weevil also shopped at Old Navy.)

(However I have no idea what’s going on with Rex’s three layers of clashing outfit styles that he has going on. A turtleneck under a thick button up jacket under an open fringe jacket is so much of a 90′s vibe.)

Up until now, bro has been PRETTY SURE every episode that Rex and Weevil are originally from America. I don’t know how I feel about being so right on the money about this one when the episode outright said that they’re from Japan. I don’t really want to out-Yugioh my brother, because at some point, I’ll accidentally let slip that in writing this blog I have accidentally gained all Yugioh knowledge, just like Noah did that one time when he was stuffed into that brain orb.

Just please don’t don’t ask me how this game works, I still have absolutely no idea.

Weevil and Rex had adoring fans in two-shaded polos exactly just like the type I used to wear in high school. But, their fans all left them the moment Weevil lost one single game against Yugi Muto.

Harsh. But granted, I feel like the people of Domino have rabbit memories and if you aren’t actively in the news every day because your blimp got abducted by sea pirates, then who the hell is EVER going to know who you are?

But youknow, Rex and Weevil are pretty sure that dodging getting murdered by Pegasus was actually their last shot at fame. It’s over forever. They’re done. Done until they beat either Joey or Yugi which...very specific, but, it would make you somewhat famous if you did that by simultaneously destroying the Caltrain.

And Weevil is like gunning for the King of Games title but...apparently no one in this episode wanted to mention to Weevil that the “King of Games” moniker actually went to Raphael?

That he needs to beat Raphael...not Yugi Muto?

Nobody?

Nobody feels like mentioning that neither Yami nor Yugi could possibly still be King of Games and that Weevil has no really good reason to be here? I mean it would save Weevil a lot of time. It would also save me a lot of time. We could just walk off this train and go back to what we were all doing before this happened, but nah, lets keep the lie going, because apparently Yami can’t bear to tell the truth, just like his host.

Waiiiit, isn’t Rebecca the King of Games because she beat Yugi in S1?

It’s the freakin Malfroy/Elder wand, it’ll be important in Ch 40 I’m sure of it. I’m sure they’re not going to just...forget...all of the people that beat Yugi before.

Man. Maybe that’s why Yugi is so hell bent on keeping tabs on Rebecca? Just to youknow...make sure she doesn’t tell anyone that she hella beat him that one time because otherwise Kaiba would have lost his freakin mind (again) that Yugi lost that title basically the same afternoon he came back from Pegasus’ island.

Also Rex and Weevil once charged for headshots and this makes them vile, terrible people for some reason.

Apparently this is a bad practice? I mean if you’re famous enough please charge for head shots, you need to make money between playing cards. Take it from this jaded artist, always sell out so you can save money for when you will absolutely get carpal tunnel.

Whatever. Back to Rex who is certain that he is not famous anymore because he lost to Joey.

S4 and still everyone is certain that Joey is bad at cards. Joey will just never be free from this.

It was beautiful anime food for like ten seconds until he did this. How dare. Literally though, how did he do that? Was that burger made out of potato chips?

Can we talk about what a freakin crime it is I can’t watch my Nick at Night retro shows on Netflix or Hulu? Like hell I’m going to get a third streaming service so I can watch and admire how bad “I Love Lucy” aged. I want to see how incredibly off-putting Fonzie is as an adult. But nah. Not even allowed. You can only watch Cheers.

Cheers. What am I? 65? Cheers wasn’t on Nick at Night. My Mom watched Cheers. Gross.

This show trying to convince me so hard that Rex and Weevils lowest point wasn’t when they were 5 seconds away from being set on fire and having their soul removed by Maxamillion Pegasus.

Like for reals, the lowest point for ANYONE (except for the Ishtars) on this show was when they were trapped on that island, without any camping supplies, surrounded by human skulls, Bakura pre-exorcism, and so many other duelists who were probably going to eat them had the tournament gone 24 more hours than it had.

The island that also had a basement that was entirely full of cultists who absolutely murdered a guy right in front of us.

Like when they finally got out of the island’s huge ass forest, their dinner included a soup filled with Pegasus’ eyes.

I would have gotten pissed on by like 70 stray dogs to get off that island, y’all.

So one of the best things about this blog is I don’t have to worry about the restraint of a.) looking professional b.) the fear of sharing my actual real deal opinion. Everywhere else I post, I can’t share anything. I’ve come to terms with this, and so I hide my hot takes deep, deep within this Yugioh blog and the only people who suspect my art rage are like...y’all in the corner of Tumblr who do not care about what I’m talking about.

++++++++++++THIS IS MY HUGE RANT ABOUT ART POLITICS AND ART BITTERNESS FEEL FREE TO SKIP THIS. WE’RE QUARANTINING SO MUCH OVER HERE DUE TO THE VIRUS THAT I AM GOING A LITTLE BIT HOUSE CRAZY+++++++++++++++

But like MAN I need to mention something. Both Joey and Rex are completely off base. Both of them.

Like I’ll be real, because of the sudden extra time I have on my hands, I was originally ranting quite a bit about art culture and stuff and I will admit it was projecting somewhat onto a TV show that was written before the recession and the gig economy basically came and laid a huge dump across the creative industry.

However, I really, really, really don’t like it when people naively say “I’m successful because I did the research, I did the work, and then I got a following despite doing no marketing at all,” LIKE HELL YOU DID, DUDE. And there’s certain places I go where this is the mantra of a hell ton of ppl who don’t believe in luck, and I have to just suck it in because they succeeded at a young age. Because inversely, if anyone doesn’t succeed right away--clearly they don’t work hard enough, right?

I won’t dig into real world stuff because that’s...the real world and the real world is a bummer, but even in the universe of Yugioh there’s this crazy disparity in duelers that the people on the top refuse to acknowledge and the people on the bottom have absolutely no way to cope with so they become insanely bitter about it.

Mai has mentioned that despite all of her hard work and success--because she isn’t the top 4 duelists of Kaiba’s tourney--no one knows who she freakin is. The card industry is so toxic, that even KAIBA dropped out.

And even without Kaiba to compete against anymore, Mai still wasn’t able to get in there to fill that void. The void that also has Marik and Odion in it, despite the fact that I’m pretty sure Marik will never touch a card ever again and might be back to living underground or on a boat in the middle of no-where. And we don’t even need to mention Bakura, right? Bakura who should have also been here to fill the void of fame, but his face probably only comes out fuzzy on camera like people haunted by that girl from the Ring. So we’ll just ignore Bakura, that makes sense, I can accept that canon.

But really...it’s just Joey and Yugi at the top of the crop when there should have been room for at least 4.

So, it’s interesting that the Oricalchos in this situation is the “get me popular quick” drug that will somehow give Rex and Weevil what they need for automatic success because I see people desperately looking for this SO MUCH online. I have seen so many post “This is how I got 100000 followers in 100 days,” and it’s always the same story that isn’t so much about hard work, but more how to game a broken system until all other competitors are invisible. And then there’s the hidden factor about...luck...that really offends people although we all know that it exists.

But just remember I’m not allowed to have this opinion that luck...exists...So if anyone asks, I never said this.

And also...if Rex and Weevil had any support up until now from these kids who have been stuffing them in the trunk for over a dozen episodes, they wouldn’t have done any of this.

So talking as a jaded Millennial, I’m not gonna judge you if you take your Oricalchos, if you know what I mean. Everyone has their reasons, and no one’s too good not to ever do it, lets be real.

+++++++++++++++END OF THIS RANT, WOW, I WANT TO SAY THAT WHILE SLAPPING A WHOLE LOT OF PEOPLE IN A GENTLE MANNER+++++++++++++

So I realized something. This cliff face is sort of an iconic train, but it’s the wrong train.

This is the Amtrak in the middle of Nevada/Utah, pretty sure. I know that shade of orange. I’ve done the Nevada drive a lot.

And part of the reason I’m even sleuthing into this is because as an artist I like to see where art inspiration comes from. It doesn’t just come from a void--they clearly did research and I just want to find out...how it happened.

So anyway, like I said last time, the Amtrak is in charge of the Caltrain management, although the Caltrain is not part of Amtrak. And so you get similar paint jobs--it’s just that Amtrak has blue topped cars, and the Caltrain cars are typically red. Yugioh safely did red, white and blue, which both cars do, to an extent, being American trains.

It’s possible that they decided to look up scenic trains in California and were like “this one looks neat.” This one is also named the “California Zephyr” which makes it seem super Californian but in actuality it goes from Emeryville, California to Chicago. Only problem is that Emeryville is North of Oakland, and we’re supposed to be taking the train “to the airport” when the airports are in Oakland or San Mateo. This train doesn’t go to the airport. You just drove by the airport.

This train also doesn’t go to Florida. Chicago is North, way north. This train exists to be a slow, scenic train for old tourists who want to sleep in cramped spaces or jaded millennials writing their award winning novel. It has no other purpose.

So, it doesn’t at all match anything story wise...but it looks cool. They would never take this train if the world was going to end, and Rebecca wouldn’t know it exists, but, it looks cool.

But anyway, onward to the next episode. I’ll be kind of bunking in my home for a while since my entire area basically shut down, so maybe I’ll get the next updates done earlier than usual? Maybe even catch up on my backlog? hm. Possibilities.

And if you just got here, this is all the Yugioh recaps in chrono order.

#Yugioh #ygo #Yu-Gi-Oh #recap #photo recap #episode recap #yugi muto #yami #train #joey wheeler #tristan taylor #rex raptor #weevil underwood #S4 #Ep16

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princesscyr · 4 years

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Gold & Venom: Chapter 1. A Fortnite Fanfic

Pairings: Midas/Yellowjacket Main characters: Midas, Yellowjacket, Jules, Fusion Rating: G (Might be mature later or something idk) This post includes: Authors note, chapter 1 Posted on: 28/2/2020 Submitted to: Tumblr, ao3, Wattpad

Midas didn’t think that his life could get any worse after The Agency blew up. The failure of the Doomsday Device he and Jules worked on was the big monkey wrench that foiled everything. So here he was, drifting on a small boat near Sweaty Sands. Two months ago he narrowly avoided getting eaten by a Loot Shark, turning the sea creature into gold in a last-ditch effort to get away. Whatever was left of The Agency after the explosion, he had given to Jules, in hopes she would rebuild it. Jules did not reject this as he thought she would have. Instead, she took the offer and gave him one last hug before she took off into the chaos. That was almost 3 months ago and the hatred he felt towards everything in this insufferable island just kept growing, and it was reaching its tipping point.

Today was day 87. Day 87 of drifting in the ocean, moving from his sleeping cot and back out onto the deck to see where he was. He could have made his way to the shore but that would be too obvious. Midas knew he was a wanted man and he wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bounty on his head. He was a successful man, a spy boss for one of the most powerful agencies on the island. He ruled with a golden fist and he was both respected and feared. He could make armies crumble with his golden touch. He had all the money in the world and had all sorts of riches: jewelry, clothes, and even some of the most expensive things in the world. He took his power and used it to build an empire, and now he was nothing. Nothing but a shell of what he once was. A small man with a golden touch but no power, no riches.

He was getting used to the serene environment around him. From the sounds of the waves crashing on the shore, to the sounds of seagulls squawking and looking for food. He reaches into his pocket for his smokes, he was a big fan of the Marlboro kind and pulled out his golden lighter. If there was one thing he was glad to have saved, it was his cigarettes. He would have lost his sanity if he didn’t have them. He could go without his scotch, certainly, but not his cigarettes. He had to ration his happy sticks, 1 stick a week. The black-haired man lit the cig before taking a long drag. He heaved a sigh, looking ahead.

“I need to figure out my next move, it has been almost 3 months, and I’m still at square one.” He speaks to nobody in particular.

He stomps out his cigarette later, moving back towards his sleeping chamber. That’s when it happened. In the distance, he hears what sounds like a motorboat revving its engine. Followed by another, and another. Growing a bit nervous, Midas reaches for the tactical shotgun he hid near his cot since he didn’t have his Drum Gun anymore. He cocks his shotgun, preparing for a potential attack. Soon enough, the sounds of the motorboats get louder and closer. Midas was ready.

His boat had been surrounded by motorboats, boats in black and purple colors. Some carried two henchmen, some boats even had three. Each one with guns at the ready, so he knew he couldn’t make a run for it. Those motorboats carried rockets. Within the chaos, Midas did not hear someone get off the motorboat until he heard a slow clap followed by a deep laugh. Midas turned around, gun at the ready.

Fusion puts his hands up, “Now now, goldilocks, you’re going to make a big mistake doing that. I just want to talk, whatever happens after that… well, the choice is yours.”

Midas growled lowly, cocking the shotgun again, “Speak and make it fast, Fusion.”

The blue flamed man motions with two fingers for the others to lower their guns. “Midas, I thought we made it clear that you needed to scram if you wanted SHADOW to forget about you. It seems you either misunderstood, or you have a death wish.”

“Jules said nothing about me needing to “get lost”, flame boy.” Spat the tattooed man, “I’ve been off the radar since the incident—how did you know I was here?”

“It’s not hard to find a lanky man that has a golden touch.” Fusion cackled, motioning with his fingers again for all guns to go up. “Take your pick, or would you like to ride with me?”

When Midas didn’t answer, Fusion moves closer, his blue flames leaving a light trail behind him.

“We can do this the easy way or the hard way, Goldilocks. Either way, you’re coming back with us. Except one of those ways, you’ll be dead and I’ll have to explain to Jules why I had to kill her big brother. Get the picture?” his voice was taunting, as though he wouldn’t hesitate to kill Midas himself, given the chance.

Midas throws the shotgun down, making sure to keep eye contact with Fusion as he did so.

“Fine. I’ll bite. But I wish to talk to my sister. Alone.”

Fusion grins, the flames on his face lighting up from contentment.

“Sure. We’ll let you two have your family reunion, but no funny business on the way there, or you’ll become swiss cheese, goldie.”

Jules was not the type of woman who cowered to men, and her older brother was no exception. While she and Midas had a decent sibling relationship, Midas still acted as though he was better than her. It’s that cocky attitude that got him to this point. His arrogance caused the engineers to rush the construction of the Doomsday Device and the machine's eventual failure, resulting in the flood that wiped out the island. At the time of this, she was just an engineer who worked for Shadow that went behind the agency’s back to work with her brother.

Now, at the humble age of 18, she was a spy boss. She took The Agency’s remains to The Authority and rebuilt everything. Now she ruled with an iron fist, not letting people treat her like she was an arrogant child. She was the opposite of what her older brother had become. The last time she saw him was before the flood, and she neglected to tell him that he should never come back. To go far away and start a new life—that he will be forgotten by the agency if he did that. Deep down, she didn’t want him to go. He was the only family she had left.

To a stranger, one would think Midas and Jules were twins. The trademark black hair and the full-body tattoos, but Jules was younger than Midas, who was only 23 years old. Their personalities were opposites. Jules wasn’t very social while Midas was charismatic and confident. Midas resembled his father more in terms of behavior and actions while Jules was more like her mother with her grace and patience. Growing up together, Jules was more favored by her parents than Midas was, as she was the only daughter and she wasn’t a troublemaker like Midas was. Jules knew Midas held resentment for her, and whether or not he’d admit it, she knew he held it. She loved her brother very much, but she also resented him right back for blaming her over their parents favoring her, as if that was her fault.

Jules heard a knock on her office door which caused her to turn around in her chair with a sigh, taking her attention away from an engineering manual she was looking at.

“Come in.”

Four henchmen step in, two of which were holding a handcuffed Midas. Fusion followed behind them, a shit-eating grin on his face.

“I did as you asked, Boss. Here he is in the flesh.” Fusion declared proudly.

Jules leans back in her seat, her eyes glancing over her brother as if she didn’t recognize him.

“Midas.” She clicks her tongue at the henchmen, who force Midas to sit down in the chair in front of her desk.

Midas hissed in pain, glaring at the henchmen.

“A bunch of incompetent monkeys. They swarmed me, I wasn’t doing anything. I was by myself enjoying the sea.” He sneers, glaring at his younger sister with disdain.

“Hey, aren’t you guys going to get rid of these cuffs, or am I some high-risk threat and you’ll throw me into a cell after you’re done with me?” Midas barked at the henchmen as well as Fusion, who were walking away.

When he doesn’t get an answer, he looks back to his sister with a ‘uncuff me?’ face.

Jules shakes her head, “I’m not removing those cuffs just yet. You and I are going to have a chat and you’re going to listen to what I have to say.”

Midas scoffs, “Oh please, you think because you’re the big spy boss now that you think you’re better than me? Because newsflash, doll, you’re not.”

“Maybe you’re right. I neglected to tell you before the accident that you need to leave this island and never come back. To start a new life on your own. We were willing to forget about you. Instead, I showed weakness by hugging you, because I was afraid you’d die. That’ll never happen again, however, so don’t worry.” She answers him, straightening up in her chair, her expression void of any emotion.

“I know there was a catch to that. There always is. You’d send a spy after me to make sure I stayed away. But guess what, Julia?” he leans forward in his seat as well, smiling perfectly so she can see his teeth both gold and white, “You’ll never get rid of me. You will always be that scared little girl who runs to mommy and daddy whenever something goes wrong. You have no good qualities about you except for your engineering. But I know you. I know you better than you’d like to accept. You’ll make a big mistake by not killing me.”

Jules clenches her jaw, standing up to make her way over to him. Compared to Midas, she stood at 5’3”. He was a good 6’5”.

“A mistake, maybe. But I think you can redeem yourself here. You are a poor excuse for a man, Midas. You always have been. You’re insufferable, cocky, and you hide behind your golden world to avoid any backlash. In reality, you’re just a lonely little man with a crumbled empire that’ll never get rebuilt. So here’s what we’re going to do,” she starts as she reaches into her utility belt for the cuff key.

After she frees Midas from his cuffs, he rubs his wrists before looking at her again as though he was waiting for her to finish speaking.

“You’ll be working for me. You’ll be seen but not heard. No missions. Think of it as an internship, but you’ll be paid and have free room and board here. You’ll do all the filing, transcribing… you’ll even have your own office. You’ll take orders from me and anyone who is above you in ranking and you’ll do exactly as you’re told. You will also be safe here, as you’ll be doing low profile jobs around this agency. Nobody outside of our agency will know you are alive and well. Along with that, you will also be an overseer for the engineering wing, you’ll supervise any work they do. You’ll keep track of their progress and I expect the report on my desk by 6 PM on the dot. Every. Single. Day.” She drawls out the last part of what she says, as though Midas was incompetent.

“And if I don’t accept your lovely job offer? It is lovely by the way, I never knew my work skills would bring me to this point of my life,” he comments sarcastically, almost insulted that he’d be offered such a basic job in the first place.

“If you don’t accept, then you’ll be in a nice 5 by 7 cell with no privacy, the henchmen will watch you piss, poop, eat and sleep. I’m sure that’s not a very comfortable outcome for you, Midas. I won’t lie, a lot of people here want you dead, but I’ve managed to convince them to spare you just this one time. I strongly suggest you take me up on this offer.”

Midas goes back to glaring at her, “So you’re going to hold everyone's resentment of me over my head as a way to get me to join you? Are you mad, darling?” he snaps at her.

Jules shrugs, “I think my proposition is really good, Midas. Think about it, you get to live. You’ll have your own office and own space to sleep. All you have to do… is do as you are told.”

Midas looks away from her, trying not to pout. Even if he had nothing, he was being offered immunity and any sane person would accept that over being stuck in a room with a few agents who are ready to kill, and they’ve killed for a lot less.

After a few moments of silence, Midas huffs, “I suppose I can accept the offer. So long as you give me a tour of this place. This building is a lot bigger than what The Agency once was.” He counteroffers, to which Jules gives him an accepting shrug.

“I can give you a tour of our agency. Bigger is an understatement, though.” She says with a hint of pride.

The Authority was made in Jules’ image of Midas. Its walls loomed over the surrounding mass of water, the building overlooked Salty Springs. Before the big flood, Jules had a foolproof plan to surround the building with high metal walls, to prevent severe flood damage. When the flood came, some water did get into the perimeter of the walls, a few feet away from the building. The building, while it looked small from an outside perspective, the inside was huge. With over one hundred rooms and underground bunkers, The Authority can function smoothly as possible. Recruits were trained in the training wing, where they receive intense training in a classroom as well as the sparring gym. Classes start the moment sunrise begins and ends at sunset, every single day. There was a cafeteria within the training wing for the recruits to replenish their hunger after long, hard training hours.

As Jules leads Midas down to the training wing, Midas could feel all eyes on him. He knew he was deeply hated around here but at the same time, he felt a sense of superiority and safety. He was safe. These people can’t do anything, so long as he stays on Jules’ good side. Surely, he could get away with some things, right?

“You’ll be proud to know that I have used your methods of training for these future agents, Midas. These agents have an equal opportunity to succeed with the trainers I have personally hired. Your dream of an ideal system hasn’t died.” Jules explains casually as the two siblings pass by a group of chatty recruits, who all greet Jules with respect.

“Good afternoon Boss,” one of the groupies greets her with a smile and a nod of his head.

Jules returns the gesture, “Afternoon, recruits. I’m assuming you are heading back to class now? Lunch just ended didn’t it?”

As the groupie and Jules talk, Midas couldn’t help but feel eyes on him from the rest of the small group. They were off to the side, whispering and gesturing towards him.

So even the recruits know who I am, huh? He thinks to himself.

He was used to that kind of treatment. Anywhere he went, if he wasn’t met with respect, he was met with fear. Unsettled glances and people afraid to look him in the eye, for they too, were under the ignorant belief that looking him in the eye means they’ll turn to gold. That wasn’t to say he didn’t have a fanbase of his own, though. Women who admired him for his good looks, his charismatic personality, and overwhelming confidence. He used to remember getting love letters every week when he’d pick up the mail for The Agency. Some letters were sweet, nearly flattering to him while some were… concerning. Creepy letters such as how they wanted to have children with him or help him run his empire. Midas had no desire for having a love life, much less offspring. He was a monster, or at least he accepted himself as such, and bringing a child into the world would just be bringing in a smaller monster of himself.

Midas crosses his arms, giving the whispering groupies a stone-cold look.

“Do we have a problem here? A reason you feel the need to stare me down?” he sneers, causing them to stop whispering, some squeaking in surprise. “N-No sir,” a girl speaks up, “We were just admiring your tattoos. They l-look nice.”

Jules looks over at the sudden commotion, sighing as the group trembles at Midas. “Midas, stop it. People are allowed to look at you. You have tattoos for heaven's sake!” she hisses at him, gesturing him to come beside her.

Midas huffs, mumbling a thank you to the girl who spoke up for the compliment, but he wasn’t biting easily.

“Let's go. I’ll show you one of the classes that’s on right now. You recruits have a good day now. Train and study hard!”

Jules leads Midas down a side hallway away from all the commotion. The hall was quiet as the recruits were already in class. Jules walked up to one of the classroom doors and knocked three times before letting herself in. It seemed that Jules had walked in on the middle of the instructor teaching the class more advanced attack movements. The instructor, whose name was Riptide lit up when he saw her.

“Everybody, what a wonderful surprise! Boss Jules has stopped by to say hello!” there was a cheery tone to the bearded instructor's voice, one could assume he held her to the highest regard.

The class, which consisted of 12 men and 12 women, grouped by twos, all greeted their future boss. They were in the middle of a battle exercise, where Riptide was showing his recruits how to properly body slam somebody. However, when Midas stepped in behind her, the teacher visibly tenses up to which Jules gives him a curt smile as if to reassure him that all was well.

“This is my older brother, Midas. He will be working under The Authority now. He will collect any mission files you give him, as well as answer any questions you may have during your time in this agency.” Jules explains to the class.

“Hello everyone, it is a pleasure to meet you.” Midas greets, bowing respectfully.

Of course, the girls in the class were trying to contain their excitement, all except for one. Midas made immediate eye contact with the quiet girl, eyebrows raised with mild surprise. He was usually used to every girl fawning over him. She seemed disinterested, just nodding her head at him in acknowledgment.

Curious… he figures, clearing his throat towards his sister, “Shall we continue with the tour, doll?” he asks Jules, who nods and says her goodbyes along with good luck to the class.

The girl’s eyes never left Midas though. Her gaze followed, almost like she was curious but also not interested in the hype about him. He gave her a curt smile and a nod before following his sister out, to which the girl sighs and rolls her eyes after his departure.

Jules continued the tour by showing Midas where he would be working which was a decent sized office space with a big desk and dual monitor set up. There was enough space on the desk to put nice decorations.

Shame, Midas thinks to himself, I don’t have any of my belongings.

“Oh and,” Jules pulls Midas out of his thoughts, “We can provide decorations if needed. I know you’re picky but you could always gold coat them if it’ll make it more bearable for you.”

Midas shrugs, “it's fine, I’ll make do with what I have.”

“Well, the last stop is your room. It’ll be far away from the other agents, mainly for your safety. You’ll get a keycard similar to the ones you gave your agents, which only you will have access to your room, plus the authorized areas you’ll need access to as well.” She motions in front of herself so he can walk ahead.

Two flights of stairs later and Midas lost his breath at the top of the stairs, at the sight before him. This area was the dormitory, with its halls beautifully decorated with gunmetal wallpaper, along with a furry black carpet. Near the stairs, he sees a sign that says, “No food or water in the hallway, please preserve the carpet.”

“Do people follow this sign?” he asks, actually chuckling to himself that a sign of this caliber had to be placed.

“No, but I believe it’s not a problem so long as I don’t see it. We kept that sign up for Chaos Agent when he was still alive, as he did monthly inspections. So no, no one follows the rules here, Midas. Just don’t get caught, simple as that.” She replies as she leads him down another long hallway.

Towards the end of the long hallway, there was a door. Jules swipes her keycard and when the door beeps, she opens the door, revealing a presidential suite type room. Midas stopped in his tracks when he saw exactly how big it was.

Though empty, the room had a lot of space. This included a walk-in closet and a walk-in bathroom, the bathroom is a bonus for Midas because he sure didn’t feel like risking his life every night here to go across the hall just to pee.

Jules pats his arm, “Just because things are bad right now, doesn’t mean I’ll treat you any less than family.”

Midas gives her a small smile, his heart swelling up slightly at that.

A knock on the door gets both sibling's attention. Two henchmen stood in the doorway, holding boxes.

Jules politely excuses herself, leaving Midas to take in the room some more. He could hear them murmuring and whispering to one another before Jules takes one of the boxes with a kind smile and guides the henchmen away.

I don’t understand why she’s being so nice to me, Midas thinks with a slight frown, I don’t even deserve this act of kindness, especially from her.

He stops trying to think about it, he’s not here to make amends with her. But his mind insisted on thinking about it. He’s here to get back what he rightfully deserves. His empire that crumbled too early. It has always been this way. Don’t take anyone’s kindness, you never know what their true intentions are until you’re too far in, was a quote he learned while growing up. His father was a good example of this, his constant reminder towards Midas that he owed him everything, simply because he brought him into the world.

What about Jules? A question formed in his head, she was never told she owed father anything at all. It was always me.

He ends up reacting angrily by putting his hand against the wall, the area around his hand turning into solid gold. Every wall of the room followed suit until the room was all shiny gold. This included the floor, the door, the closet, and the bathroom.

She is so, so lucky she never has to be me, and that’s what angers me the most, his mind seethes.

Midas, still angry, heads back to his new office. He wanted to get a feel for it, maybe even add a golden touch to it. As he used a temporary keycard to get in, his eye lands on 2 boxes on the desk with his name on it. He approaches the desk, curiosity getting the best of him. Inside the boxes were a lot of his belongings, some damaged by the water, but the rest were in decent condition because of the gold touch.

Reaching into the box, his anger was replaced by a sudden pang of sadness in his stomach. He pulled out a picture frame of his old agent team. Skye, Meowscles, and Maya, the ones he was the closest to. They were all posed for some goofy picture they took at Retail Row a few months before the disaster. The water had damaged the photo, making Midas’ face look warped and distorted, while the rest of the photo was in pristine condition. He frowns at this, but the pang in his stomach only grew more when he pulled out a folded note with some water damage. He figured he wouldn’t be able to make out the words on it because of the water, but opened it anyway, curiosity piquing his interest.

Midas,

By the time you have received this or find it or whatever, I’ll already be gone. I want to say thank you first and foremost for raising me all these years. You found me when I was only 11 years old. You weren’t much older than me and I still looked up to you as a brother. You gave me hope when nobody else did, and that is why I need to write this. Your selfish actions involving the Doomsday Device has left a trauma that will never heal. How could you be so selfish, Midas? Why did you think using that device would be a good idea? I know you had good intentions—you wanted to end the chaotic storm once and for all and you figured that device would be the solution. It wasn’t, because many people died. People lost their homes, jobs, anything and everything you could think of. I risked my life to protect you, just so you could activate that fucking thing and now I see that it wasn’t worth it. Don’t try to look for me, because you won’t find me. I’ve gone far away. There will be no point in sending someone to make sure I’m okay because there is nobody left. They all died with the flood. The flood you caused. You did all you could to help me, and I, you. To think, we could have celebrated my 17th birthday had you not set off that device. I’m sorry if this has come off harsh or it is too long and you don’t have the patience to read it. I love you very much, but you have caused such deep pain for me that I fear you. I truly fear you. I thought I knew everything about you but it seems like I don’t. Do you feel any remorse for what you’ve done? I beat myself up for thinking like that, thinking that the man I looked up to as my father could be a cold-hearted murderer, but that’s all I can think of. That’s why I’m writing this to you. I don’t know where Maya, Meowscles, or Tina are. They may feel differently about you as well.

I don’t wish any ill-like things to happen to you, but you will be alone if you continue to act the way you do. Whether or not you leave the island and make a new life for yourself, that’s your choice. I know I promised I’d stay by your side forever because that’s what friends do, but I can’t live with myself doing that for you. I hope one day you open your eyes and realize what a monster you’ve become, and that you can fix yourself before you end up alone forever. Nothing is worse than being in a room full of people and still feeling so alone.

Goodbye, Midas. You did so much for me, and I’ll always appreciate that.

-Skye

Midas didn’t even realize his hands were shaking violently as he read the note. Every word brought pain to him as if he was shot. He didn’t notice he had turned everything in that box to gold until he had thrown it at the adjacent wall, causing a loud crash.

“How could you be so appreciative of me and then turn around and call me a monster?!” He yells to nobody in particular.

Tears clouded his gold eye but he tried his hardest to not cry.

“Crying is for the weak, and I’m not weak.” He tells himself, clenching his golden fists tightly.

Stop showing emotions, you fucking coward, a voice in his mind scolded him.

Midas bitterly snorts, “I will.”

Take back what is yours and rebuild your empire. Kill anyone who gets in the way. You have nothing to lose, after all. Jules doesn’t care about you, if she did, she would have left you alone instead of exposing you to this shit, the voice sounds almost taunting to him.

He tries to take deep breaths in an attempt to calm down and ignore the whispers drilling in his head, but the voices became the only thing he could hear. He couldn’t hear his breathing.

You will rebuild a new agency. You just need to overthrow Jules. There are a lot of agents here with potential. Those who do not join—well, you could always make new statues.

He wasn’t going to let another person cross him again. While he loved Skye like a sister, the feeling of betrayal was strong right now. She assisted him with this device and she wants to turn around and make him out to be the monster? If she felt that way about him… how about Meowscles, Maya, and Tina? Perhaps that’s why there’s no letter from them. They couldn’t face him, while Skye could stand up to him. Perhaps Skye spoke up for them.

Never again. He won’t make the same mistake twice.

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slurpingsoba · 5 years

Text

Hollow

I decided to write a Shiggy x Spinner story because of the latest manga chapters. I kind of like the pairing, so maybe I’ll write more for them in the future?

Btw, I also posted this to my ao3. tumblr always messes up the formatting when I post things so it’s probably easier to read there.

This hollowness was inescapable.

But it wasn’t something that I wanted to escape.

The hollowness was my best, and only friend. It comforted me when I felt down, wiped my tears when I felt sad, embraced me when I felt lonely, and calmed me when I felt angry. Like a looming shadow, it followed me wherever I went, clinging to me like an invisible companion.

I loved my hollowness and it loved me.

I told it my fears, and it reassured me that nothing could hurt me as long as it was by my side. I told it my sins, and it promised to keep my crimes from preventing my salvation, my plummet into the deep end, feeding the fires of hell with my own evil, challenging the devil for its domain. I told it all my deepest, darkest secrets, and it swallowed every one of my words, letting it sink into its abyss. And then it swallowed me.

I forgot what it was like to feel emotion for a while. And for a while, the feeling of nothing was everything. My numbness was a comfort, a familiar safehouse to hide in when things were too much to handle. I could crawl into myself and use my hollowness as a sanctuary, enveloped by emptiness. I knew my hollowness would protect me when others failed to, I knew it would defend me when I could no longer defend myself, and I knew it would still linger long after the death of me. My hollowness was greater than myself; a powerful lack of feeling that in turn enhanced my feeling of no feeling until I didn’t know if I were feeling or not.

What would I be if not for my hollowness? My friend was apart of me now; I could not exist without it, I did not want to exist without it. One day, when my body decays and I’m nothing more than a broken vessel of anger and misery, my hollowness will live on. It is intangible, unbreakable, unlike me. It has no bounds and is immortal, unlike me. I wish it were me. Do I exist for my hollowness, or does it exist for me?

I looked towards my allies scattered within the room we were in. Maybe I existed for them, I thought. Not as individuals, but as an idea. The notion that my hollowness and I could take over the world, destroy it even, with their help. I could use them however I pleased. For the most part, they believed in me wholeheartedly. They were the bullets in my gun; simple projectiles I could utilize against my enemies. Maybe I existed for them? Yeah, right. Maybe they existed for me.

Sensei always told me that everything was for my sake. Therefore, my allies were here for my sake. The world was mine to tarnish for my sake.

If he were still with me today, I’d like to thank Sensei for giving me the best gift I’ve ever received. My hollowness, my edge, my friend. My void that encompasses me completely, to the point that it sickens me and makes me nauseous. My black hole that gives me strength through the pain.

My hollowness is a cage that sets me free.

“Shigaraki.” I heard a voice call from behind me. I turned around and noticed Spinner walking towards me.

Once he was closer to me, he began speaking again.

“Is everything you said… true?”

“Yes, Spinner, why would I lie about something like my past?” I reasoned, trying not to show irritation in my voice.

Spinner questioning me almost made me want to retract my statement from earlier. I was vulnerable in front of him, a person who cared less about me and more about what I represented. I’m not Stain; I don’t need a messed up moral code to justify my tirade against hero society.

“I’m not doubting you.”

I opened my mouth to retort, but I held back my tongue. You’re not doubting me?, I wanted to say, like you did at the hideout?, but I knew that I shouldn’t agitate him again. He might actually punch me in the face this time.

“Then what exactly are you trying to say?” I asked.

“Is it true… that you also feel empty?”

I blinked and stared at him. I was wondering if he even paid attention to my speech when a word in Spinner’s sentence intrigued me. “Also”.

He’s hinting at the fact that he related to me, isn’t he?

“I do.”

“So you understand how it feels.” Spinner replied.

“Feels to…?” I prodded Spinner to continue.

He sighed. “Don’t make try to explain this.”

“I’m not making you do anything, but you’re the one who initiated this conversation.”

“Goddammit Shigaraki, why are you like this?”

Spinner closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and spoke.

“How it feels to be trapped in your own numbness. To desire change, but not know how to achieve it…

To feel upset, but in a lackadaisical way, like nothing matters to you but everything does.” Spinner’s face scrunched up, as if it were painful to talk. Still, he prevailed.

“To feel weighed down by your absence of substance. How it feels to be hollow.”

“Wow Spinner, I didn’t know you were a poet.”

“Don’t joke about this! I’m being serious!” Spinner exclaimed, his posture becoming more rigid.

“I know you are, and I sympathize with you.”

“Then how do you keep going? How do you learn to live with this,” Spinner paused mid-sentence, gesturing to himself, “emptiness?”

“You learn to enjoy its presence, I guess.” I said nonchalantly.

“You guess?”

“I know.”

Deeming my answer to be acceptable enough for him, I attempted to turn around and walk away from Spinner, but I felt his hand grab onto my shoulder and keep me in place.

He was mere inches from me now, his eyes looking straight into mine.

“So you’re not looking to change the world?” He said.

“Huh?” I replied, confused. This didn’t correlate with the topic of emptiness.

“Do you want to change the world or not?” Spinner repeated, his voice even and firm.

“Oh I’ll change the world alright,” I grinned, “I’ll make it all disappear.”

“So you don’t care about reform.”

“Destruction is my version of reform.” With three fingers, I removed Spinner’s hand from my shoulder.

“But what if it’s not mine?”

Spinner backed away a bit, giving me space.

“You said you would take your allies’ wishes into consideration when making your plans. What if my wishes conflict with yours?”

“We’ll have to compromise then.” Or not, I thought, not like your wishes matter as much as mine.

“What if I said I wanted to save the world, what would you do?”

“This is a hypothetical situation so—“

“What would you do?!?” Spinner interrupted me.

It was obvious that he was trying to evoke some selfish remark out of me.

“Why would you want to save this shithole of a world anyway, Spinner? It hates you, and it hates me, so wouldn’t we both be better off without it?”

From the corner of my eye, I saw Dabi move from where he was in the room. He walked to the nearest door, exiting. That bastard always seemed to leave when there was any sort of tension between us league members. It’s like he doesn’t want to be involved.

“Not everything in this world is shitty, Shigaraki! That’s what I don’t understand about you!” Spinner pointed at me, stepping forward, “how can we feel the same yet be so different?”

I gave Spinner a moment to calm down before I began speaking. He dropped his finger, but he persisted in defiantly keeping eye contact with me, waiting for my reply.

“I view my hollowness as a virtue. You see it as a vice.”

I walked towards Spinner, not breaking eye contact with him.

“You feel restricted by it, but I feel liberated by it.

It is the air I breathe, the water I drink, the earth I step on. Hollowness is intertwined in every fiber of my being.

But hollowness is not apart of you.”

I moved closer to Spinner’s ear to whisper to him.

“That’s the difference between you and me. But I don’t think you’ll ever understand.”

I continued walking past Spinner, having nothing else left to say.

I was tired of making excuses for my actions, needing some sort of will to legitimize my villainy.

Why wasn’t my hollowness a good enough conviction?

#shoot whats their ship name #shigaspinner #spinaraki #do they even have a ship name?#spinner #shuichi iguchi #shigaraki tomura #bnha #mha

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sunsetpatterson · 6 years

Text

Puppy Love

A/N: Here I am!! Back at it with the writing challenge fics. This one's for @whyistomholland, finally giving me a reason to write that Stark!Reader AU in my head!! That being said, this is a Holland!Peter fic.

Attempt number 2 at posting the whole fucking fic. Don't mess it up, Tumblr.

Summary: After asking permission, Peter makes a confession to the girl he loves.

Pairing: Peter Parker × Fem!Stark!Reader

"Peter, you're a good kid. I like you," Tony stood from his seat in his lab and stepped toward the younger boy, his eyes narrowed. He felt his protective-ness twitch in his chest. "But if you hurt my daughter, I will do something much worse than take your suit away. You got it?"

Peter gulped and nodded quickly. "Y-yes, sir. Of... of course, Mr. Stark." He wrung his hands together, nervous sweat making them slippery. "N-no hurting Y/N - not... not that I intend to, of course. I just-"

Tony huffed a sigh and flopped back into his spinny chair, flicking his hand toward the door. "Stop babbling. Tell her you love her."

"Yes, sir! Thank you!" The grin on his face was hard to miss as he spun on his heel and darted out of Tony's lab.

With the speed he was going at, let's just thank Valhalla he had shoes on - otherwise he would've smacked straight into the adjacent wall.

Peter skidded to a stop outside the elevator, tapping his foot impatiently as he waited for the doors to open. "FRIDAY? Where's Y/N?"

"Miss. Stark is currently studying in her room, Mr. Parker. Might I suggest you do the same?" The Irish twinge of the AI answered almost instantaneously.

The seventeen year old boy rolled his eyes and groaned inwardly, leaning against the wall of the elevator after stepping inside. "Yeah, later. Can you take me to her, please?"

FRIDAY never responded, but he knew she had listened the moment the button for the number of Y/N's floor lit up with a yellow-ish glow.

Peter felt his heart threaten to beat out of his chest, thudding violently against his rib cage. His hands shook and his thoughts began to run fifty miles a minute.

What if she didn't love him back?

What if she didn't even think of him like that?

What if he told her and she hated him forever?

Oh God, what if he ruined their friendship forever?? He loved Ned, but he couldn't spend the rest of his days building and rebuilding the Lego Death Star.

"Mr. Parker, I am detecting a panic attack. Might I suggest going to see Doctor Cho?"

Peter's head snapped up to the ceiling as he took in a shaky breath - only just realising that, yes, he was in fact having a panic attack.

But, nevertheless, he shook his head and wiped his hands on his jeans. "What? N-no, FRIDAY, I'm good." He mumbled and spent the rest of the ride chewing his lip nervously.

The doors opened to reveal Y/N's floor. Peter looked up like a deer caught in headlights, blinking for a few seconds before taking a hesitant step out of the elevator. Before he could even think of backing out, the doors closed and the elevator took off.

"Okay, come on, Peter. You can do this." He mumbled to himself as he all but tip toed to her room door. "Worst case scenario, she hates you forever and you die a lonely old man."

Peter's eyebrows knitted together not seconds after, and he found himself wanting to laugh at how pathetic he sounded. "Pull yourself together, Parker."

The moment he raised his hand, the door swung open. Y/N sat on her bed, her hair unruly and clad in one of her father's old band shirts, surrounded by books.

Peter found himself wanting to curse FRIDAY for not giving him more time to gather his courage.

But all that flew out of the window when she looked up at him, dimples indenting her cheeks as the biggest grin grew on her lips. "Pete, hi! You gonna stand out there all day?"

"Uh, yeah. I was thinking about it." Peter wanted to slap himself.

Y/N laughed and shook her head affectionately, her eyes going back to her book. "Well until you come in, FRIDAY's keeping my door open." Her voice was soft and riddled with sleep, and it occurred to Peter that she hadn't been awake long.

Her dark hair was messy, her eyes tired and her face completely void of makeup - which he knew she didn't need.

But God, she never looked more beautiful in his eyes.

Peter wrung his hands together and quietly walked into her room. His feet padded along her carpeted floor before he sat on the end of her bed. "There's, uh... there's actually something I wanted to ask you."

Her eyes snapped up from her books and she found the pace of her heart slowly increasing in speed. "Ask away."

"I need some advice... girl advice. I-I mean, you're a girl so I though it'd be best to come to you instead of Ned." He laughed nervously.

Y/N felt her smile falter at his words and she swallowed thickly. "Right, yeah. I guess Ned probably doesn't know much about girls." She joked lightly, but her eyes didn't reflect the emotion she tried to fake for his sake.

"There's, um... there's this girl at school," Peter swallowed the lump in his throat. "I've known her for a really long time, a-and it's recently occurred to me that I may be in love with her."

Her eyes went wide, her mind immediately going to Liz Allan. It made sense, really. Liz was the prettiest and most popular girl in school.

"O-oh. You're- you're in love with her?" Peter only nodded in response. "And I'm guessing you want me to help you find a way to tell her." It wasn't a question, but Peter nodded anyway. "Just tell her."

Peter looked at Y/N, his eyes as wide as saucers as he registered her words. "I-I'm sorry? I thought you said just tell her."

Y/N rolled her eyes and gave him a soft, but sad, smile. "Pete, you're an amazing person. Don't laugh at me, it's true!" She scolded as he rolled his eyes with a scoff. "You're amazing, sweet, kind and the most selfless person I know. She'd be an idiot not to be in love with you. Why make a big deal out of it when you can just... tell her?"

As he sat there, he mulled over her words. Deep down, he knew she was right.

Making a big deal out of it wasn't important, but the message he was trying to convey was. Peter knew Y/N didn't really need a grand gesture when he could just tell her how he felt about her.

Tony would be disappointed, not being able to help. But if she was happy, who was he to argue?

Peter suddenly grinned, taking her by surprise as he wrapped his arms around her before standing up. "Thanks! You're the best, Y/N!" Without another word, he walked out of her room, leaving her alone.

Y/N sighed and bit her lip, tears pricking her eyes. At that moment, she swore she never disliked Liz more - but she couldn't protest if it meant Peter was happy. That's all that mattered to her.

The door closed after Peter left, and he stood in the same spot where he started. His heart pounded in his chest and he felt a little light headed as he tried to find the words to say.

It was approximately five minutes after he left, that he knocked on her door. He had only five seconds to calm his nerves before the door swung open, revealing Y/N's shocked face.

"P-peter? Did you, uh... did you leave something behind?" Her voice was quiet, but her he heard her perfectly.

Peter chewed on his lip, his dark eyes sweeping over her face as if he tried to commit every part of her to his memory. God, he loved everything about her. He'd be crazy if he didn't.

"Y-yeah, I did." He stepped closer to her, her wide eyes looking up at him before they dropped to his lips.

Y/N drew in a sharp breath, too afraid to let it go as her hand lingered on her door handle. "I-I could go get it for you..."

"Or you could stay and let me kiss you." Peter murmured, too in the moment to ask himself where in hell that sudden surge of confidence came from. "I really want to kiss you."

Peter lifted a hand, brushing his knuckles over the smooth skin of her cheek. He felt her skin heat up under his touch before he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

It was the most cliché move in the book, but he remembered she somehow loved all the cliché stuff.

Lost in the intensity of his eyes, Y/N had to force herself to remember how to breathe, otherwise she knew she'd faint from a lack of oxygen. "O-okay."

Peter didn't know he was leaning in until his nose brushed hers, and by then he knew it was too late to stop. "I love you, Y/N." He murmured and closed his eyes before kissing her.

The kiss wasn't short and sweet like he was aiming for. Hell, he wasn't even expecting to kiss her when he knocked on her door. The kiss was long, breathtaking, and full of emotion he now knew wasn't unrequited.

Y/N was putting just as much effort into the kiss, her sweaty hands gripping the front of his shirt as she pulled him closer to her. It was like all of a sudden she didn't need air to breathe, because she had him.

He didn't want Liz, he wanted her. Nothing but love blossomed in her chest at that moment. Y/N was in bliss, and she didn't want it to stop.

Unfortunately, they were human. To live, they required oxygen.

Their chests rose and fell in sync, eyes remaining shut as their foreheads pressed together. Her knuckles were white as she gripped the front of his shirt, and his hands rested on her hips.

"If it wasn't clear, I love you too." She breathed out.

Peter huffed a laugh, his eyes screwed shut as he snaked his arms around her waist, holding her tight as she laid her head on his chest. "You made it painfully obvious." He mumbled and pressed a kiss to the crown of her head.

For the next few minutes, they stayed like that - until their moment was interrupted by FRIDAY, at the command of none other than Anthony Edward Stark.

"Miss. Stark, your father has requested that I remind you that while he is happy for your recent change in relationship status, you still have to study for your chemistry exam."

Y/N groaned and buried her face in his chest, though she was unable to hide her smile when she felt his laughter.

"Mr. Parker, Mr. Stark says that he is happy for you to stay and study with Miss. Stark, and he is formally inviting you to dinner with the Avengers."

Peter tightened his grip on her, pulling her impossibly closer as they stood in her door way.

"That's my dad for you, always looking to ruin people's moment." Y/N teased, knowing fully well that Tony could hear her.

"Mr. Stark has more to say, but I refuse to play messenger."

Y/N giggled before peeling herself from Peter's chest. His arms slipped from her waist and his hand fell perfectly into one of hers, fingers intertwining as she led him back into her room.

"So, what do you say, Mr. Parker? You wanna study with me and eat dinner with the Avengers?" Peter grinned at the teasing glint in her eyes and kicked her bedroom door shut behind him.

"Might as well."

#bexwc #super anxious about this #not as good as the original version...#peter parker x reader #peter parker x stark!daughter #peter parker x stark!reader #peter parker oneshot #holland!peter parker

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