#whoa love the lighting in this op!
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okokokok, i LOVE how you wrote the overwatch boys, and I have a kind of long-winded request for Cassidy, Hanzo, Genji, and (if you write for him) Ramattra:
their s/o was previously a test subject for Talon experiments, something they have nightmares about. how would the boys react to their partner having one of said nightmares and trying to attack the person trying to wake them up.
ik this is kinda specific, but thank you if you write it! ♡♡♡♡
A/n: oooo this is a good request, let's hope my angsty writing chops are up to par bcuz i really hope this lives up to what you want (hcs under the cut!)
Warnings: general angst, accidental physical violence, mentions & implications of past torture (also op doesn't really know how to write nightmares/night terrors asdfghjkl)
Word Count:1586
Headcanons: Cassidy, Genji, Hanzo and Ramattra with a Former Talon Test Subject S/O (Separate)
Cassidy:
When Cassidy awakes in the middle of the night to the sound of you fiercely muttering at no one, its safe to say he's concerned.
He listens for a moment as you make alarmed noises, trying to discern what exactly is going on.
After turning over to flip on the light, he glances over at your sleeping form thrashing around with your brow furrowed in terror.
"N-no... get a...away f-from me..." Cassidy hears you say clearly, getting more worried by the second.
As he begins to reach over to try and rouse you from your slumber, the volume of your voice grows from a to an earsplitting shriek.
As you keep screaming, you start becoming combative, slapping and punching at Cass while somehow still asleep.
"Whoa, hey, hey, hey! Jus' h-hold on a darn second here!" He says as he tries to block your attacks by grabbing your hands.
"No! NO! Let me out!" You wail as tears start streaming down your cheeks.
"Darlin', it's a dream, you gotta wake up! I'm here, just open your eyes!"
Debating between forcing you to wake up and just continuing to reassure you and talk you down from the fear, he decides that the latter is probably going to be the safest for both of you.
After a several minutes long struggle, you slowly stop trying to fight Cole as your once frantic breathing begins to return to its normal pace.
Your tired eyes begin to blink open as the last bit of panic leaves your body in a few small gasps. When you fully regain consciousness, Cassidy sighs in relief as realization begins to sink into your thoughts.
"Are you okay, what the hell happened there?!" Questions Cole as he smooths his hands over your hair.
Choking out a small sob, you gently grasp his bicep to try and ground yourself as more tears begin to fall from your eyes.
"Cass, I-I'm sorry... I- I was back in Talon and the pain j-just wouldn't stop!"
His heart drops at the mention of the evil organization, knowing what kind of awful treatment you went through while kept there.
"I tr-tried to get away but I just.... couldn't! It was awful!" You whisper as you cross your arms over your chest.
"Darlin' I'm so sorry... I am so sorry..." Cole responds faintly before carefully pulling you into a hug.
The room grows still again for a moment, with only the sound of your hushed weeps filling the air.
"I don't wanna go back, please don't let them take me!" You cry into Cole's shoulder as he holds you close.
"No, no, you won't. I swear that as long I'm breathin', I will always make sure you never have to go through that ever again."
Genji:
Genji is all too familiar with nightmares. During the first couple years after his confrontation with Hanzo, he would very frequently have them. He's been through that whole song and dance a million times before.
Which is the reason he immediately knows what's happening when he wakes to the sound of your screams next to him.
He rushes to throw your shared quilt off and make sure you're okay, getting punched once or twice in the process.
After the nightmares pass and you calm down enough to speak, Genji is right there to comfort you.
"It's alright, my love, it is over now... Are you okay?" He questions as he holds one of your palms in his.
You shake your head no as you take several sharp breaths in and out.
"I was there again... in that-that godforsaken lab with fucking Moira prodding at me like cattle! It felt li-like it would never end! I can't go through that again!"
"And you don't have to. I don't know all of what happened to you, but I promise you will never have to face it on your own. I'm here to help you however I'm able to."
As the fearful adrenaline steadily leaves your veins, Genji brings your hand up to his chest so you could feel his heart beating just beneath his cybernetics.
"I love you and will sit here with you as long as you need me too."
With a sad, shaky laugh, you nod and you take your hand back in order to wrap yourself around him.
He does the same in turn as you embrace him ever so slightly tighter before he ushers for you to lay back down together so you can get some much needed sleep.
Pulling the blanket back over your bodies, he scooches in a little closer and begins to hum softly in the hopes of lulling you into a nightmare-less slumber.
Watching as your eyes begin to flutter closed again, he hears you mumble something just before you doze off.
"Thank you, Genji... I love you too."
Hanzo:
Hanzo already has trouble sleeping himself, so when your nightmares come around, he's already wide awake.
As you toss and turn underneath your blanket, he tries to calm you down by running his hand over you head, not caring if he gets hurt by your unintentionaly violent movements.
Once the night-terror ends, you start holding your face in your hands and rock back and forth as Hanzo rubs assuaging circles on your back.
"My dear, what can I do? How do I make the fear stop for now?" The archer inquires as you continue to shake in place.
"I don't know, Han... every time I close my eyes, all I can see is the lights and the wires and the needles... It won't go away no matter how hard I try. I just want them to be gone." You state, anxiously starting to press at your temples.
With a noiseless sigh escaping from his lips, Hanzo moves closer to place an arm across your shoulder and rest his forehead against your head.
"I am sorry for not being there with you. If I were able to change history, I would have gone to great lengths to rescue you."
As you begin to cry at his admission, he places a delicate kiss atop your head.
"I would never ask you to do something that dangerous for me. I couldn't bear it if something happened to you..." You sob out as you bury yourself into Hanzo's side.
Hanzo is quick to wrap his other arm around you, offering a comforting squeeze before ushering you into his lap.
"You wouldn't ever have to ask for my help. I would trade my life for yours if it meant that no more harm would come to you."
Ramattra:
It's uncommon for Omnics to dream- let alone have nightmares- so the first one you have around Ramattra? It comes as a bit of a shock to him.
When he hears you yell, he all but rockets out of his reboot cycle to scan the room for any hidden threats to your safety.
After seeing nobody there but the two of you, he glances down to see you- fast asleep but clawing at the air like a trapped animal scratching at a predator.
He then decides to do a scan of your vitals, just to make sure you aren't in any immediate medical distress. The scan reveals to him that your heartrate and breathing are through the roof.
Just as he's about to cross the room to try and wake you up, you shoot up from your fitful rest with a loud inhale as you slam your hands down onto the mattress below.
Swiftly joining your side on the bed, he cautiously turns your visage towards him as he goes to brush a few stray strands of hair out of your face.
While your eyes try to adjust to the low light of your room, you call out Ramattra's name, receiving a modulated but relaxing shush from his vocalizer.
"Calm yourself, pet, I'm right here. Now, tell me what has happened."
As you take a moment or two to collect yourself and come down from your frenzy, you gaze up to meet the faint glow of his faceplate emitting from his eyes.
"It's Talon; they... tormented me... a long time ago. Had me chained down as a doctor injected chemicals into me before he began flushing them out and started the whole process over again..."
Watching as you barely manage to hold back tears, His joints all seem to freeze in place as fury begins to creep in and take over all his systems.
"They need to suffer for their misdeeds. Who are they?..." He presses, his voice now hauntingly deeper than before .
"I don't know their names, and even if I did, I would do everything in my power to forget them."
An uneasy silence fills the space between you two, staying there for a minute before the large Omnic grunts and lifts you into his arms.
"I am sorry for what you had to go through. Just know that if any pain ever comes your way again, the offenders shall be personally dealt with." Ramattra claims as he rests his faceplate against your jaw.
Relishing in the cool feeling of his metal features against your warm skin, you nod appreciatively before he begins to lightly sway you to and fro.
Watching as you drift back to sleep, Ramattra makes a mental note to hunt down the Talon members who hurt you the next time he meets his allies. He wouldn't and will not stand for the mistreatment of the only human he has ever cared about.
#headcanon#overwatch#overwatch 2#overwatch imagines#cole cassidy x reader#genji shimada x reader#hanzo shimada x reader#ramattra x reader
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Jadie:) i would like to make a request!!
Reader having to spent countless night home alone because Jungkook’s busy working at the studio? They fight and she asks him to love her more than she loves him?
Honestly i feel like JK gets frustrated with fights so he says things that come out in a different way?? Thank you so much!!!!
i went in with the angst on this one 😳 i think most of us have had similar fights before, so i was definitely channeling some of that something here OPE
cw: verbal sparring, major angst, ending is ambiguous/unresolved
By the time his car rolls into the driveway, Jungkook has nothing left to give.
A vampire disguised as a weekday sapped every bit of energy he had left. His reserve tank is empty, and when he’s running on fumes like this, there’s only one way to top up. All he wants — now, then, any time — is to bury his face where your neck meets your shoulder; to revel in your steady pulse and soft breathing; to remember that there’s life here, outside his studio.
He doesn’t waste time getting out of the car, having summoned the last bit of willpower he had to unbuckle his seatbelt and slip from the driver’s seat. Jungkook locks the car behind him and within seconds, he unlocks the door to his home. To you. It feels like forty years have passed since he left that morning, but he can still smell the kimchi from the eggs you cooked.
Did hours always used to feel like decades?
One foot over the threshold, the toe of his boot collides with something in the dark. His eyes strain to see it; and his eyebrows furrow once he does. It’s a weekender. Yours, the one he bought you to take on little getaways when your schedules aligned like planets. It’s packed and ready, but Jungkook can’t put a finger on why that is.
Did he forget about plans again? Fuck. His mind never used to be a sieve, but that’s all it’s been lately. Jungkook has to be careful not to let you slip by.
He toes off his shoes and places them on the mat on the other side of your packed bag. As he heads off to find you, kiss you, breathe you in, Jungkook takes one backwards glance at that weekender. Nothing sparks.
Where were we going again?
There’s rustling down the hall and he follows it. Underneath his timid footfalls, there’s the quiet metallic click of the medicine cabinet door as you close it. Jungkook can’t see you, but he can feel you — you and the upset ebbing outwards from you. Little concentric circles, rage rippling his way like a stone has broken through the surface.
I dropped you, again.
Jungkook reaches the doorway to the bathroom just in time for you to exit. You gasp when you collide with his chest, but that shock dissipates quickly when his hands steady you by your forearms. You clutch the bag of toiletries that you nearly dropped like it’s all you have.
The expression on your face is less obvious now that the surprise is absent — and that scares him.
“Whoa,” Jungkook tries to chuckle to lighten whatever this crushing weight is, but there’s no humor in your affect. Flat. Despondent, like you cried out all you had and there was nothing left to animate your features.
Oh, this is bad.
He needs to fix it, so he tries again, “Where’s the fire, petal?”
Oh, fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Jungkook flipped a switch alright, but it didn’t turn the light in your eyes back on. Ham-fisted and stuck in the garbage disposal as it —
“I don’t know, Jungkook. Where is the fire?” You have that tone when you reply. That rare and terrifying voice where you sound calm, but he can smell the venom hitting dead air.
You, petal, are soft, but you are not calm.
You’re excitable, vocal. Jungkook can count on one hand the number of times he’s heard you speak without your perfect, dizzying rollercoaster of intonation. It’s jarring, it’s whiplash, it’s clear as day that there’s something very wrong here.
What did I do to you?
“I’d love to know,” You carve another slice as you back out of his grip. “Haven’t felt warmth in weeks. What about you, Jungkook?”
He feels concussed, in a way, like this is somehow a sucker punch you’ve hit him with. It feels like a blow when you say his name with that look in your eyes, but Jungkook knows it’s not. He knows exactly where this is coming from and he doesn’t get to pretend otherwise.
Desperate, he tries to hold you, but it’s like running underwater trying to reach you. By the time his lead limbs finally accept the signal and begin to move, you’re skirting around him and out the door.
You’re quick, but so is he. Jungkook’s long strides catch up to you easily, and when you sense him, you wheel back around to look up at him. Now, your face is crumpled and littered with tears. It’s even worse than the nothing you were wearing a few moments ago.
Jungkook pleads, one teardrop away from getting on his knees for you, “Tell me what I missed and I’ll make it up to you, petal. I swear I’ll fix it —”
“That’s the thing, Jungkook,” you sniff as you angrily wipe at your slicked-wet cheekbone. The worst part is that he knows you’re beyond the point of anger when it comes to him; it’s the fact that he’s caught you crying that bothers you the most.
“You miss everything. And you know it, too, because your first guess — your very first thought — was that you must have forgotten about me — again. What does that tell you, Jungkook? What does it say about us that this is an easy assumption for you to make? Because it sounds like a habit to me.”
There’s a montage broadcasting through the silence that settles between you. It’s every ‘I’m sorry I’m late, petal’; every ‘petal, I’m going to be here longer than I thought’; and ‘you don’t have to wait up for me.’ It’s all of those disappointed sighs you tried to swallow when you gave him grace he hadn’t earned.
A soundtrack delineating every instance where you held him up and he let you down.
It’s deafening.
“I just want you —” Your voice gives up on you halfway through your sentence. He knows better than to reach out for you now, but it’s all he wants to do. “I need you — just once — to love me more than I love you.”
There’s that sucker punch.
How could he? How could anyone love harder than you do? It’s impossible, Jungkook thinks, to try to mimic the way your heart holds everyone so completely. Laughable, almost, that no person on their best day could hold a candle to you — even on your worst. He thinks you’re pure magic.
But Jungkook has never been the best at putting the things he thinks into words, so he says, “Petal, I can’t.”
And he can’t backtrack or explain what he meant or beg you to listen because you’re grabbing that weekender off the floor. You’re slinging it over your shoulder, headed to your sister’s for the night. As he watches you leave, Jungkook recalls that there’s one thing he’s even worse at than communicating how he feels:
Sleeping without you.
#jade’s drabbles#jade’s requests#trashlibrary#jjk#jeon jungkook#jungkook#bts drabble#jungkook drabble#bts imagine#jungkook imagine#bts scenarios#jungkook scenarios#jungkook angst#jungkook x reader#jungkook x you#jungkook x y/n#jeon jungkook x reader#jeon jungkook x you#jeon jungkook x y/n#re: the one with jungkook the weekender and the impossibilities
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Love Me Like You Do ~ Part 3
Juice Ortiz X Reader
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
“You’ve got be freaking kidding me!” I yelled out, throwing my hands up in frustration.
“Whoa. What’s wrong sweetheart?” Dad asked from the other side of the bar.
“Everyone I’ve had to come finish the repairs has backed out on me because they were told I was bad for business because of who I associate with.” I leaned on my hands, my fingers winding through my hair tightly.
Dad sighed in frustration. “Give me a minute. I’ll make a call.”
Dad walked out the bar and I left my spot and walked around to make notes on what was left to do. About ten minutes later I could hear the roar of the motorcycles pulling up outside. I was upstairs in the loft area when they walked in.
“(Y/N)!” Opie yelled.
“Up here!” I walked to the banister and looked over. The whole club was there, along with another man I didn’t know.
“Come down. Got someone we want you to meet.”
“I’m busy, Ope. I got too much to do now that every single crew that was supposed to help me fix this place up dumped me all in one day.”
“That’s why we need you to come down. Got a man here that I’m sure can help you.” Jax said from his spot leaning on the bar.
I huffed and walked down. I threw my notebook on the bar and stood before all the men.
“(Y/N), this is Elliot Oswald. A friend of ours and a local business man here in Charming.” Clay said from beside the man.
“Nice to meet you. What happened?” Oswald asked.
“The contractor that was supposed to be here to do some remodels called and said that he couldn’t help because he was told I run with a shady crowd and he couldn’t do that kind of business with me. Same goes for the people working on the kitchen and the ones I had to hook up my sound system.”
Oswald sighed. “I know who that probably was. Jacob Hale. He’s running for mayor and anyone he knows is associated with the Sons he’s trying to run out. I’ll make some calls. Get the guys back in here.”
“What all needs to be done, darlin?” Jax asked.
I slid him the notebook. “This is a list of everything that needs to be fixed before I can move anything in here and set up. I’ve got three months before the fire marshal comes by and does an inspection. If I don’t pass, it’s another six months before I can open this place.”
The guys looked over the paper, then looked at each other.
“Okay. Oswald, you call to get the guys in here for the electrical and finish the kitchen. The rest of us can work on the..”
“Sorry, big brother, but if I’m going to pass inspection, every part of this has to be signed off by a licensed contractor of some sorts.”
“I’ll make those calls.” Oswald walked out.
“Hey, (Y/N). This sound system I can probably help with. It’s tech stuff and that’s what I’m good at.” Juice offered.
“Thanks, Juice, but until I can get someone in here to properly hook everything up, I can’t take a chance on anything right now.”
He nodded. I plopped down on the bar stool beside him and dropped my head onto the bar. He ran a comforting hand over my back and a shiver went down my spine at the contact.
“Good news. I’ve talked to them all. Told them the information they were given was false and they've agreed to come in and take care of everything according to the proper regulations. They also will be doing the work at half what they quoted you for for the inconvenience.” Elliot said as he walked back in.
I sighed in relief. “Thank you, Mr. Oswald. I can’t thank you enough.”
He waved me off. “It’s not a problem. Anything comes up like this again, you let me know. Jacob Hale is trying his hardest to run good people away just because these guys are associated.”
After a few more minutes, Elliot left, along with Clay and a few others. All that remained was Opie, Jax, and Juice.
“Well, I’m glad that things will be back on schedule. Now, I do have a question for you, Juice. How hard would it be once the sound system is up and running to have a program for lights to strobe to the music?”
He shrugged. “Not hard. Depends on the system you want to run and what all you wanted it to do.”
I nodded. “Okay. Do me a favor? Look at all the necessary systems and order them for me? I’ll give you the payment information when you do. I want this place to be amazing! Karaoke nights will be even better with a light system that can vibe to the music.”
“You got it.” He smiled.
I turned to Jax and Opie. “Can you two get me in touch with a local company to provide me with all the alcohol that I’ll need to stock this place?”
“Of course, darlin. We’ll set you up with our guys who provide for the Clubhouse. What do you want?”
“Anything and everything they have. Drafts, too. I’ve got a company I can get the glasses and such from if I make a purchase in large groups. And a company to provide me with a twice weekly delivery of the food.”
Opie wrapped his arm around my shoulders. “Look at you. My baby sister making something of herself. I’m proud of you.” He kissed the side of my head.
“Yeah yeah. For everything you guys have done for me, I’ll let you have two rounds every time for free. After that, ya gotta pay up.” I joked.
“Sounds good to me.” They all said.
“Hey, (Y/N). Look at this.” Juice called you over from where he sat.
You sat beside him and got closer as he showed you all the different systems the site he was on had to offer. The two of you talked and was in your own world.
“They look cozy.” Donna said from behind the other two guys.
“Yeah. I don’t like it.” Opie stated.
Donna chuckled. “Oh come on. They’re cute together.”
“I agree, man.” Jax smirked.
Opie gave them both a look. “Don’t start. I want what’s best for her. Not to be drug down with this club.”
“Oh come on now. I’m with you and we’re doing pretty good. And don’t you think she’s old enough to know what’s good for her? I mean, she was raised with you two and the club. I think she knows what’s good for her. Even if at this moment she can’t quite see it.” Donna explained to her husband, nodding her head to the two of you.
Opie grunted. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
Donna just laughed. She walked over and cleared her throat.
“Sorry to interrupt. We’ve got some hits on the applications. I’ve got two girls coming in in about thirty to talk with us about the bartending job. Then we have two waitresses and then we have three gentleman who put in for the kitchen.”
“Okie doke. Thanks, Donna.” I turned back to Juice. “Go ahead and get that one if you’re certain you can make it work with what I’m wanting.”
“I can. How fast do you want it here?”
“Quickest. The sooner the better so we can get this place some life.”
He nodded. “Express shipping it is.”
I hugged him and gave him a kiss on the side of his head. “You’re the best.”
Juice grinned, then headed off to complete the order, eager to get the place up and running. Donna and I set up a table near my office to interview everyone coming in. We talked extensively with them and made sure they were a fit. After we talked to them and discussed it amongst ourselves, we called them back over.
“Okay. Talia and Willow, here’s the deal. Donna and I agree you both are a good fit. The rules are simple. I’m the owner, Donna is the manager. Everything she tells you comes from me. If you need certain nights off, please put it in in advanced so Donna or myself can cover. If a customer offers you a drink, politely decline. I don’t need my bartenders drunk on the job. If someone orders food at the bar, there will be a system set up for tickets to go straight to the kitchen. Amelia and Cypress, same rules apply for you two as well. Orders can be taken straight to the kitchen and hung in order they were taken. Leo, Remi and Paulo, the three of you will have equal share in what goes on in the kitchen. I don’t expect just you three. I’m hoping we’ll have at least two more join you guys before we open. Same goes for you in scheduling. I’ll make the schedule on Saturday and hang it up by the time clock so everyone knows when they are here. During the week we won’t need as many. Weekends is when I’ll really need everyone. I’ve gone over what pay you’ll each get already. Any questions?”
“What do we wear?” Amelia spoke up.
“Whatever you’re comfortable in. You’ll have a waist apron as your only uniform requirement. If you want to do your job in heels then go for it. I want you all to be comfortable here. My office is just there and here is my number. Feel free to call or text me if something happens or anything that may come up. I want us to be a family.”
“What about the Sons?” Remi asked.
“They are literal family. The tall one with the long hair is my brother and her husband. The blonde is my brother by choice. I grew up with them. They will be treated with respect. And they will be our unofficial bouncers.”
After no more questions were asked, I gave them all a time and day to be back for a run through. They all said goodbye and Donna and I returned back to the bar.
“So, how’s it looking?” Opie asked.
I gave him a big smile as I jumped up to sit on the bar beside where Juice sat on the stool. “Amazing. I want to add one more waitress and at least two more kitchen workers. I don’t want all the pressure in the guys back there.”
“It’ll happen.” Jax patted my leg. “I’m out. Tara is cooking dinner and I want to spend some time with Abel.”
“Tell her hello for me. As soon as this place is good to go, I thought about us having a big family dinner. I know Gemma likes to have them at her place, but this place is going to be big enough everyone can join and we can utilize that huge kitchen back there.”
Jax smiled. “I’ll tell her. I’m sure she’d enjoy that.”
With goodbyes to Jax and both Donna and Opie, it was just me and Juice there.
“I appreciate everything you’ve helped me with, Juice.”
He gave me a heart stopping smile. “It’s no problem. I don’t mind. It’s what I like to do, besides working on bikes.”
I gave him a smile. “What about cars? I’m sure eventually my baby out there will need a tune up.”
He nodded. “I can do that, too. It’s a beautiful car.”
“Yeah. I love it.” And idea popped into my head. “Would you mind coming over to the apartment with me? I need some help changing out the security code on it. The previous owner gave me the code for it but I want to change it because everyone who worked here before has it. He only ever used the space for some storage.”
“Uh, yeah, I’d be glad to.”
“Okay.” I hopped off the bar and headed for the door, Juice following behind me. I locked up and showed him around back.
“Want a beer while you take a look at that thing?” I asked as we walked in the apartment.
“Yeah, sure.”
I went to the fridge and grabbed a couple of beers and joined Juice in the living room. After handing it to him I sat on the arm of the old sofa and watched him work. He changed out the door knob and deadbolt I had laying on the side table and managed to override the old code in the system.
“Alright. What do you want to set the code as?”
I thought about it for a moment. “We’ll use my birthday. The only ones who would know it are my dad and Ope, and now you I guess.” I chuckled. “(Y/B/D).”
Juice entered the code and pressed a button. “All set. Come see.”
I walked over to him and leaned on his shoulder. “When you set the code, press this button, put the code in and press it again. And when you come home, press this button and then the code.”
He looked over at me, his face inches from mine. I could see all the colors swirling together in his eyes, dazzling me into a trance. It was him clearing his throat that brought me back.
“Oh, seems simple enough. Thank you.” I moved back to my spot on the couch. “Come sit down and finish that.” I pointed at his bottle with mine.
He sat opposite me, turning to prop half his leg on the couch. He looked around the place. “This is pretty nice.”
I shrugged. “Yeah. It’s simple enough. I still have some things in the spare room to unpack. Some of the things I threw out that was in here from the previous owner. He told me he didn’t want any of it. I kept a few things. It was sort of a storage slash crashing spot. This couch was already here so I’m keeping it for now.” I took a swig of my beer. “Where do you live?”
“I stay at the clubhouse mostly. I had an apartment but my ex kicked me out. The guys let me crash at their places when I need to.”
“Hmm. Bet that’s a fun life. Never knowing who’s goin to be in your bed when you’re not there.”
He chuckled. “Nah. I keep my door locked. Just me gets in there.”
I nodded. I gave him a questioning look. “So, Juice, what is your real name? I know that’s a nickname you go by.”
“Juan Carlos Ortiz. I’m the most un-Puerto Rican that ever come out of Queens.” He chuckled.
I couldn’t help but smile and giggle at his adorable smile. I kept finding myself staring at him every chance I got. The more I kept staring the more I realized that I wasn’t what he’d probably want. He was cute as hell and, sure, I was pretty, but, let’s face it, I had some meat on me.
“Hey, you okay?”
“Hmm? Oh, yeah. Sorry. Got lost in my thoughts.” I cleared my throat. “Thanks for fixing the system for me. I can sleep better knowing I’m fully secure thanks to you.”
“My pleasure. I told you, you need anything, let me know.”
I just nodded. “Well, I think I’m going to call it a night. Everyone will be here early tomorrow to hopefully get started. You good to get back?”
He nodded to me. “Yeah. I’ll be fine.”
I stood, as did he, and gave him a hug. I then kissed his cheek. “Goodnight, Juice.”
He gave me a look that could make me melt on the spot. “Goodnight, (Y/N).”
With one last look goodbye he walked out. I set the alarm and pressed my back to the door. I let out a breath that I didn’t realize I was holding.
When I heard his motorcycle leave, I headed to bed. Thoughts of a beautiful Puerto Rican man running through my head and that I could only dream of being with him. Let’s face it, my inner self down grading my appearance kept any dream I had with him from becoming a reality.
*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
A/N: my lovely lovely peeps! Thank y’all so much for making this daydream of a story take place and reblogging and everything! I never thought it’d get this big!
#juice ortiz x reader#jax teller#opie winston#plus size reader#sons of anarchy#juice ortiz#juice ortiz fanfiction#soa fanfiction
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So you already have ttb anime opening songs list. Do you have a ttb anime closing songs list as well?
Follow up from here for those curious!
SEASON 1 (Pre-War)
Ending: Fukisusabu kaze no naka de by WAG (Gensomaden Saiyuki)
Running along the edge of the cliff
We decide not to look back
Not speaking even one word
Always without repentance
Looking up at the sky
The pouring rain falls down
And as we wonder if it had let up
It starts falling again on our heads
If we stir up our emotions,
We can easily determine our dreams
Determine our love,
Our friends, our lives
In the midst of the raging wind
Can I really throw away my pride?
The colors of regret and truth
Make my heart dance
In these revolutionary days, I
Always want to stay with you!
I feel like I don't need to explain the reason behind this choice on the account of it sounding like a Badass Ikemen Quartet and the HYSTERICAL amount of MegOP in. If you want men enthusiatically belting out Gay Subtext devotion-in-love-and-friendship rock type themes, Saiyuki's been doing that since the early 2000s. This theme is so Barricade Boys I'm slapping it on any modern iteration of Les Amis de l'ABC. (Also I have Lambros on my mind and it WILL NOT STOP just imagine them, Hotrod and Bee on vocals)
SEASON 2
Ending: Uso by SID (FMA Brotherhood)
Say, the sky we saw that day,
That scarlet sky
Do you remember it from that day?
We made a promise and a vow
While the early summer wind circled us
And we clung close together
Your forced smile
Holds elongated shadows
I pretend not to notice and continue on
All the while waiting for you
To deliver some news at the table
Empty nights and mornings that will never arrive
I could see them from a mile away
Say, the sky we saw that day,
That scarlet sky
I'm sure you'll remember it one day
While holding the promise we couldn't keep
We take our first steps down out own paths
A narrative follow-up from the blow-out between the Rebellion in Season One, who are now divided into the Decepticons and the Autobots. Do you remember our promise and what we fought for? I'm sure you will some day, says OP, even as we walk different paths now.
SEASON 3:
Ending: Mind Game by Tamaki (Tiger & Bunny)
I daydreamed in a corner
Of the city stained ash-gray
And somehow I started pondering
My raison d'etre
But I never know myself & dreams & truth anymore, anymore… more…
In this wretched world, I asked myself,
"Just what can I do?"
Because I got the feeling
that your smile taught me that
Pain like discovering the light touched me:
Yes, that's the feeling I got
In order to attain an ephemeral dream by their own hands,
All people lose sight of even eternal truth
The one who gave light to the indelible, sad tomorrow
Was none other than just one (I want to believe)
We can share both the past and the future, always!
Rung (Past) and Sari (Future). Also fourth stanza is very Sari to Isaac. Also Drift/Ratchet, as Drift defects to the Autobots this season.
SEASON 4
Ending: Every Heart by BOA (Inuyasha)
Tell me babe
How many times I've shed my tears?
Every heart
Every heart is not a gentle one
Why can't I
I can never share my loneliness?
Every heart doesn't know what to say or what to do
Was afraid of darkness
cause I felt like I was left alone
So I prayed for help to a distant million stars
Round and round the planets revolve around the sun
And they always seek after love and peace forever more
Growing, growing whoa baby we can work it out
Look up at the sky, every heart is shining on today
'Every heart is not a gentle one' feat. Sunstreaker/Sideswipe's blowout, Windblade and Starscream's sort-of-relationshing angst (as Starscream tries and fails to show her that the man she believes still lives inside him---that hopeful senator from the past---is dead, when he UGH falls into the trap of being a Decent Man)
Also a lonely LONELY season feat. Mirage with Hound Missing and his Ironhide-induced crisis.
Last stanza hitting the 'Autobots rebuilding On Griffin Rock And Finding Reasons To Hope For Tomorrow Even As It Gets Ever Harder' mood.
SEASON 5
Ending: Alone by Mikuni Shimokawa (Gensomaden Saiyuki)
All of the people coming and going
Bear heavy burdens,
Searching for tomorrow
Within the heat haze wavering in the distance
Feelings like sand
Falling through my hands…
Back then, the words that pierced my heart
Suddenly started to throb with pain, but…
I've searched for pieces of myself,
counting the endless nights all the while.
These feelings are becoming so certain
I almost lose myself
Right now, without fail
I will walk forward
However far
Because I REALLY wanted to end on this BEAUTIFUL note and it's my series kfhsdgfjsdgfjsfh but seriously:
First stanza encapsulates how the war has affected everyone, Decepticons and Autobots alive, who are now working together and genuinely had always wanted a better tomorrow for everyone.
"I've searched for pieces of myself" stanza, like literally 85% of the cast is in goddamn pieces at the moment and are holding on by their Nakama Thread. It's everyone--Megatron, Mirage, Starscream, OP himself, RUNG, the Lambros, Drift, YOU NAME IT.
This version of the song will be used over the finale itself which will show rebuilding efforts/how the cast is doing post-war. Stuff covered will be, among others:
Sideswipe waking up from his coma and his garbled proposal to Strongarm
Windblade visiting Starscream in prison as she tries to comfort Starscream who's messy snotty crying in happiness that she finally managed to pass a bill to outlaw the creation of new CCs so no child will ever go through what he went through.
OP reading/writing with Megs who's in prison.
Laserbeak and Soundwave helping Ravage with his physical therapy as he slowly regains use of his legs.
Wreckers and Springer visiting Kup's grave with Dakshi who is now Springer's dog.
Hound introducing Mirage to his parents
Prowl front row at Jazz's concert.
Bee and Co finally get their degrees.
Lightbright exploring the universe with her new Titan
A decorated mural of the Autobots and Decepticons who died in the final battle against Unicron.
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“Ok you’re on a roll. Favorite guns. GO!”
This is like asking which one of my kids I like the best. Actually, it’s the exact opposite of that but I probably shouldn’t elaborate any further.
Anyway, where to begin?
Let’s stick to a combat operations type loadout (i.e., rifle/smg and handgun).
Rifle: (Disclaimer: an AK-47 is always the answer to this question but let’s pretend it’s not.)
For the purposes of this memoir, I’m gonna go with an H&K 417. Although, an FN SCAR 17 is a very close competitor (and gun safe companion). If you’re not a glutton for punishment like I am, you can’t go wrong with the lighter recoiling M4 (or AR-15 or whatever they’re called when peasants buy them).
For stealth ops, I like a SBR in .300 blackout, suppressed, running subsonic ammo. There are several manufacturer options in this category, but since I can’t remember most of them, I’ll just say H&K G39. For light armor CQB, give me an MP5 and stay behind me.
“Whoa.”
Handgun: (Disclaimer: I love Glocks. A Kimber 1911 is my dream girl. But I’ve never lost a fight with a Colt 1911.)
With the above rifle and sub machine gun selections, I’m almost certainly going with an H&K MK23. It packs a .45 ACP punch, you can run it suppressed since it has a threaded barrel and .45 is already subsonic, and the reliability/accuracy is unrivaled. Plus, it’s just damn sexy.
HOWEVER, if I’m looking for a “combat handgun” (i.e., primary weapon instead of secondary), I really, really, kinda love the STI Staccato Combat Master with high-cap mags. It’s fast. It stays on target. And it holds what seems like ten million rounds of 9mm. Mic meet drop.
Now that I think about it though, I’m not sure I’m ready to answer this question. There are so many great options and so many different types of combat situations. My above answers are SOME possibilities, but not ALL of them. So I guess I’d like to formally change my answer to: undecided.
“You’re my hero…”
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Meddling with Mistletoe | Chapter 1: Chicken n' Dumplings
Pairing: Agent Whiskey x F!Reader
Summary: It’s been two years since you left your home state and one December morning your mom and grandma call to let you know that “Surprise!” they’re coming to visit and are landing in a couple of hours. After starting your day off with one hell of a curveball, life just keeps throwing more at you, but your best friend and neighbor, Jack, saves the day for you more than once.
Rating: T for now, series will eventually be Explicit
WC: ~5.4k
Warnings: Fluff, idiots in love but they don’t know it, mild cursing,
A/N: This “reader” is incredibly self-indulgent. I wouldn’t quite call it a reader insert, but it’s not exactly an ofc either. Second person POV, no y/n, Christmas holiday shenanigans. This is the first of three parts of Meddling with Mistletoe which was born from the wonderful brain of mi esposa, @danniburgh, and also her superpower of just plucking things out of my brain. Part one is more of an intro of sorts, and I hope y’all enjoy!
Masterlist | Series Masterlist | AO3
The crisp, early December morning air greeted you and chased a shudder down your spine as you rushed out your front door.
You huffed out a breath in the cold; the wispy cloud of condensation made visible in the air distracted you from the slick ice that lined your stoop. A surprised yelp of “ope!” leapt from your lips and betrayed your Midwestern roots as you frantically grasped at the railing in a desperate attempt to salvage your fall.
Of course, your very sweet, charming neighbor, –and friend– Jack, had just so happened to be leaving his house at the same time. It was just your luck that his cursed timing gave him an ample view of your flailing.
You clung to the railing like a newborn fawn as you tried to regain your footing, all shaky knees, and a complete lack of coordination.
“Whoa.” Jack’s easy, warm chuckle easily dispelled the chill in the air. He evidently had the foresight to salt his stoop the night before and nimbly scurried over to you. “Easy there, darlin’. What’s the rush?”
You rolled your eyes and dismissed the spark that danced from his fingers to yours as he helped you upright and onto solid ground. You were just embarrassed from nearly wiping out. There was no need to look any deeper into that.
“I just–” you sighed, unwinding the scarf from your neck, then brushing off the light dusting of snow that clung to it. “I just got off the phone with my mom. Her and my abuela are landing at LaGuardia in a few hours.”
“Well, that’s sweet of them t’ visit, darlin’...” The last time that you and he had talked about family, you had spoken with a deep fondness as you recounted the mischief they tended to get up to. “Right?” His voice rose in pitch with the question and his eyes traced your features, trying to pull more information from the stress and mild irritation that creased your brow.
“It is.” You nodded, reassuring the caution in Jack’s demeanor. “I love them and haven’t seen them since I moved here. I just had no idea. ‘Surprise, mija!’” You finished with an amused laugh as you mimicked your mom’s voice and threw out jazz hands to further exaggerate.
Jack laughed, deep and low in his belly, and shook his head. “Family’s got a way of always keepin’ us guessin’.”
“Sure do,” you nodded in agreement as you turned and glared at the patch of ice. It was yet another thing you’d need to take care of before they landed.
“Don’t you worry about the sidewalk, darlin’.” He said, seemingly reading your mind. “I’ll go on ahead an’ salt ‘round here for you, an’ hopefully that ice’ll be gone by the time y’all get back.”
“Oh you don’t–”
“It’s no bother, darlin’, really. An’ if you need any help gettin’ ready for ‘em, jus’ holler.” You had reached your hand out to rest on his arm briefly in a reflexive placating gesture, but Jack was equally quick to wave off your protests. “All I’m fixin’ t do today is makin’ the famous Daniels’ Family chicken and dumplin’s.”
“That sounds delicious, Jack.” Your mouth watered at the mention of Jack’s soup recipe. He had brought some for you the year you had moved in after you had mentioned it was your first holiday away from family. You’d be lying if you said it wasn’t the best you’d ever had.
You looked at your watch and groaned at the time. “I’ve gotta head out, but thanks again for taking care of the ice, Jack!” You pulled him in for a quick hug, then started making your way towards your car, turning around briefly to call out. “I’ll trade you some cookies for a serving of leftovers?” A playful smile and a wink cleared the stress from your features for a moment.
“You bet, darlin’.” He winked back and tipped his Stetson to you. “Jus’ give me a knock tomorrow an’ I’ll have your dumplin’s ready for you.” He called after you, smiling, as you turned around, and waved in acknowledgement, then got in your car and drove off.
It was a little custom between the two of you; trading food and baked goods, but never recipes.
Neither of you asked the other for their recipes, in some unspoken and entirely understood agreement.
Family recipes were more than just annotated scribbles on an old piece of cardstock; they were coated in family history and baked in tradition. They were part of a person, and sharing that would toe the line in the sand that established the two of you as friends. Besides, it gave him an excuse to thumb through the Rolodex of recipes that had been in his family for years in search of something you, his good friend, might enjoy.
His grin softened but didn’t fade as he made his way to the bag of salt he kept tucked away on his porch and thought back to how the little tradition started.
A little over two years ago, the couple that had lived in the townhouse next door to him for years had decided to downsize and travel. Even with the updates that would be necessary, Jack knew the townhouse wouldn’t stay on the market for long; it was priced to sell, and the neighborhood wasn’t bad.
It was only three weeks since the moving truck had left that another one occupied the space on the street; the cacophonous hustle and bustle of the movers intruded on his quiet Friday morning, but he was quick to peer out his window to get a glimpse at his new neighbor. Much to his dismay, he’d had no such luck.
He had been in and out Friday and Saturday, far too engrossed in the latest financial and intelligence reports from Statesman to notice your shy attempts to say hi from the comfort of your front porch. It came as an interesting surprise when he arrived home after a late night at the office and noticed you had wasted no time in unpacking your Halloween decorations; your porch and windows alight with twinkling ghosts and dancing skeletons, just in time for holiday the following week.
The next morning, he had woken up to the sound of knocking. He was still in his plaid pajama pants and threw on an old Henley as he ambled to the door.
“H–hi, um, good morning.” You stammered, seemingly losing your train of thought as you realized he must have just woken up. “I’m sorry if I woke you. I just moved in, a–and I made these for you.” The words tangled on the tip of your tongue and spilled from your lips, and he couldn’t help but find the nervous determination in the way you spoke and fidgeted damn near the cutest thing he’d ever seen.
“Mornin’ neighbor.” He accepted the small container full of cookies you held out to him, then leaned against the doorway. “Don’t you worry about that.” His fingers pried at the lid and his reassuring smile turned to a boyish grin as he fished a cookie from the container. “I was needin’ t’ get on up an’ out of bed anyhow.”
You smiled back at him; it was warm and sweet like the chocolate chips that melted on his tongue as he bit into the cookie.
“My mama’d kill me for sayin’ this.” he licked the smudges of chocolate from his fingers, then huffed out a laugh. “But these are the best chocolate chip cookies I’ve ever had.”
“Well, I promise not to tell if you don’t.” You laughed and, as cliché as it was, the sound was one of the most beautiful things to ever meet his ears.
He knew then and there that he was in a world of trouble. The warmth of your smile and the melody of your laughter permeated his skin, wrapped around his heart, and seeped deep into his bones.
“I’m Jack, by the way.” He shuffled the container under his arm as he stood up from leaning on the door frame and stuck his hand out for you to shake. You gave him your name, and he repeated it, committing it, you, and everything about that moment to memory.
Your bright smile and easy laughter were infectious, and the delicious homemade cookies had disarmed him faster than any honey pot ploy ever run in the history of Statesman.
He had repaid the favor in kind with a knock on your door a few days later and a container of his smoked pulled pork in hand.
Jack sighed as he pulled himself back to the present and plunged the scoop into the bag of road salt, then tossed it evenly over the cement.
Tequila, Ginger and Champ had all teased him relentlessly over his “friend” who had been allowed to share in Daniels’ Family favorites, and every time he corrected them, they laughed it off.
Even still, the other day, Tequila had kept him late after an intelligence call.
“When are you finally gonna make a move, Whiskey?” His teasing smirk brightened the holographic projection of his face.
“What in the hell are you on about now, Tequila?” He had asked, momentarily thrown off after having spent the last hour going over intelligence reports and debriefs.
“I’m just sayin’,” Tequila looked around at Champ and Ginger then took a swig from the metal cup in front of him. “If you don’t make a move on your ‘friend’, she’s gonna get away, my friend.” He tipped his hat and Jack had just huffed then shook his head.
“She’s my friend, Tequila, an’ that’s it.” He ended the call, but not before he saw Tequila roll his eyes playfully at his response.
Truth be told, he had been captivated from the first moment he laid eyes on you. It wasn’t just one thing that took his breath away; it was in everything, big and small details that made you who you were.
It was an all-at-onceness that had washed over him, and there was no denying that he liked you.
He didn’t want to chase you, though, like he had the flings in his past. In fact, he was pretty sure pursuing you at all was one of the last things he should do. You were sweet; the first friend he had outside of Statesman in years, and he liked just spending time with you. It had been a lifetime since he had been able to just sit down and laugh with someone he didn’t work with or wasn’t a mark he was working, and yet you had managed to make it feel so natural, as easy as breathing.
He was a flirt, he’d be the first to admit it, and sometimes those honeyed words would slip loose off his tongue. His breath would catch in his chest, worried he had overstepped, but then you’d laugh, completely unphased. He figured you weren’t into him, and in a way that was almost cowardly, he was relieved.
It was a relief because it meant that you still saw him as your friend; that he hadn’t crossed a line with that mouth of his that he always got himself into trouble with. He valued you and your friendship more than he had cared about that kind of relationship in a long time.
He sure as hell wasn’t going to jeopardize your friendship by following through on any of the idiotic, harebrained ideas Tequila had concocted to ask you on a date.
Jack shook his head to himself in an effort to break free from the path his thoughts were taking. He finished salting your stoop and the path leading up to it from the sidewalk, then got into his car and headed out to grab a few last-minute ingredients for the soup.
The brief calm Jack always left you with disappeared sooner than you would have liked, as was usually the case. He had a way of radiating warmth, and the sudden absence of it was something you were always quick to feel, especially on a cold and stressful day like today.
With flurries in the sky and the ice doing its best to cling to the ground, it was no surprise that an accident had occurred. It was minor, but of course everyone had to get their chance to stare in as they passed, drawing out the delay.
Originally, you had planned to stop at a nearby retail store to get some last-minute things for your mom and abuela then swing by the grocery store to pick something up to make for dinner since you hadn’t planned on cooking for more than just yourself that night. You decided to nix your trip to the grocery store after a glance at the clock on your dashboard once you’d finished at the retail store. At this rate, you’d be lucky to make it to the airport on time.
By some miracle, you did, in fact, make it to the airport on time. You pulled up to the sea of arrivals, heads of waiting travelers bobbing like waves as each and every one of them tried to see if their ride was pulling up to whisk them away from the chaos.
Even if your mom hadn’t called you to let you know where they were waiting, you’d recognize her anywhere; her vivid floral patterned face mask, and her frantic waving were hard to miss. You put your car in park, then quickly hopped out to help them with their luggage.
“¡Ay, mija! ¿Como estás?” [Daughter, how are you?] Your abuela, who was surprisingly strong for her age, pulled you in for a tight hug and quick kiss to your cheek from behind her festive plaid mask before she let you take her luggage.
“Estoy bien, abuelita ¿y usted?” [I’m good, grandma, and you?] You grunted as you hauled the suitcase into your trunk, surprised by its weight, and you wondered how long they were staying. The hustle of the airport had a way of amping up your anxiety, and you were eager to get back on the road.
“C’mon mamá, podemos hablar en el carro. Hay mucha gente aquí.” [C’mon mom, we can talk in the car. There’s a lot of people here.] Your mom opened the backseat door for your grandma, then closed for her and then hopped in the passenger seat.
“It’s so good to see you again, mija!” Your mom placed a hand on your arm excitedly once you were out of the hellish merry-go-round that was the airport pick-up.
You smiled. Despite the stress of their surprise trip, your mom’s cherry personality had the power to light up just about any room and you found your stress slipping away the closer to home you got.
“It’s good to see you too, mamá. How was the flight?” Your mom launched into her response with every small detail of the flight, from what she and your grandma had to drink, to the chisme they had caught while eavesdropping. Your eyes were fixed on the road, but you knew your mom and abuela would talk enough for the three of you.
The rest of the drive went by uneventfully and when you finally made it back home, you couldn’t help but smile softly when you noticed the ice had melted.
Jack really was a life saver.
You rolled your grandma’s suitcase behind you then unlocked and opened the door, ushering them inside.
A feeling of deep pride blossomed in your chest as they praised the townhouse you called your own. Even though two years later, you were still fixing some things up here and there; you were proud that you’d made it, for the most part, in a city like New York.
The three of you spent several hours catching up, and the familiar ache that pulled at your heart when you thought of home settled lightly in your chest. You had missed those moments of sitting around a table, sipping tea and just talking with your mom and grandma.
By the time you looked up from the conversation, the inky darkness had settled heavily in the sky. You found an easy lull in the conversation and stepped away to place an order with a local restaurant, then sat back down, only to find two pairs of eyes locked on you.
“So, mija, tell us, do you have a boyfriend?” Your mom leaned in over the table, eyes wide and sparkling in anticipation.
“Ma…” you drew the word out and rolled your eyes. Really, you were surprised it had taken them this long to launch into this line of questioning. “No, I don’t have a boyfriend.”
“Why not, mija?” It was your abuela’s turn to jump in, and the look of indignation and confusion that drew at her features would have been funny if the topic didn’t make you want to crawl out of your skin.
“Well, we’ve been in a pandemic, abuelita, and things aren’t back to normal yet.” You hoped that their understanding of the need to be safe and cautious during it would be a satisfactory answer.
In truth, you were on a handful of apps, and the best thing you could liken that experience to was a dumpster fire. Not that your social skills had ever been something to write home about, but the pandemic had seemingly done you, and everyone else, the disservice of making things worse. That, and for some god awful reason, unsolicited dick pics taken from even more awful angles were still a thing; but your mom and abuela definitely didn’t need to know that.
Your abuela huffed her reluctant acceptance, but you knew better than to think she’d drop it just like that.
“Are you at least making friends out here, mijita?” Tender concern softened your mom's and abuela’s faces and your abuela reached out to put her hand on yours. “We just worry about you.”
“I am, I promise. Actually, my–” Your reassurances were cut short by a notification going off on your phone. You looked down at the screen, then groaned and cursed under your breath. “Fuck–sorry–” both the curse and the consequential sheepish apology were reflexive given your present company. “It looks like our order got canceled.”
“It’s fine, mija, we can just order from somewhere else.” You nodded along with your mom in agreement and pulled up the app to see what else was open, only to get a screen full of error messages stating that due to inclemate weather, deliveries would resume the next day. Another exasperated groan fell from your lips and you felt your mom’s hand on your back, rubbing it soothingly. “It’s ok mijita, we’ll think of something.”
The calming touch made your thoughts drift to Jack, and how the comforting warmth of his hand on your back or shoulder had a way of stilling the racing of your mind.
You snapped your head up after a moment and while you felt guilty for even thinking of reaching out to Jack; he was your best bet.
“I’ll be right back.” You said quickly as you grabbed your jacket and pulled your shoes on. “I have an idea.”
You left your family sitting at the table, visibly confused as you opened the door, bracing against the brisk winter wind for a moment, then continuing on until you found yourself in front of Jack’s door.
Jack was lounging in his armchair, glasses perched on his nose, book in hand, and his nearly empty glass of whiskey rested on the side table next to him.
The soup was done cooking, its comforting aroma wafted throughout his home, leaving him as warm as his whiskey did. It had been a relatively lazy evening for him, and since he wasn’t in a rush, he had decided to find a good stopping point in his book and finish his whiskey before fixing himself some dinner.
Jack frowned a little when he heard a knock at his door. He wasn’t expecting anyone. Frankly, you were the only one who would show up knocking. He slid an old receipt between the pages of his book to keep his place, then grunted as he stood up.
“Wasn’t expectin’ you…” Jack spoke before opening the door with a smile. “‘Til tomorrow, darlin’, but I was jus’ fixin’ t’ get a bowl. I can get yours now if you’d like?”
He stood to the side, and you stepped in for a quick hug, then slid inside with an apologetic smile.
“Thanks Jack, I um–I actually–” you stammered, suddenly feeling incredibly self-conscious and afraid of imposing despite the fact that he had offered and you knew deep down he’d be more than happy to help.
Jack picked up on your discomfort and his grin fell as his hand came to rest on your shoulder and he ducked down to better take in your expression. “Is everything alright, sweetheart?”
His voice softened with the new term of endearment; he had a knack for reading you, and immediately moved ease whatever worried you. He always made you feel safe.
“I’m ok. It’s just that our takeout order got canceled, and well…” You shifted your weight, subconsciously leaning into his hand on your shoulder. “I was wondering if I could bother you for more than just one serving of your famous chicken and dumplings?” A cautious, verging on teasing smile followed your question and Jack met it with one of his own, the concern falling away as his grin grew.
“Well, of course, darlin’.” He stepped back, hand falling to his side as he turned to close the door behind you; he made his way to the kitchen, knowing you’d follow. “I’m more than happy t’ share.”
Jack took the cowboy printed oven mitts you had gotten him last Christmas from where they hung on a hook and opened the oven, pulling the dutch oven out, then closed the oven with his hip.
“D’you mind grabbin’ the bread on the counter there?” He gestured with his elbow, drawing your attention to the small cob loaf.
You nodded, moving quickly to grab the loaf, then rush on ahead to grab the door for him. Leading the way, you opened the door to your place, and you couldn’t help but think about how boyish he looked without his Stetson as he followed behind you.
“Thank you, darlin’.” Jack’s voice was a bit tense and his steps were overly cautious as he walked through the threshold, trying to make sure the dutch oven stayed level. “Don’t want t’ spill any now, do we?” He said, more to himself than you, then smiled triumphantly as he made it in without incident.
You broke your gaze away from Jack and turned to introduce him to your mom and abuela, only to find them, eyebrows raised and staring intently at him.
“Mom, abuela, this is my friend, Jack.” You gestured to him, somewhat awkwardly. “He’s my neighbor and is being nice enough to share some of his chicken and dumpling soup.”
“Ma’am.” Jack nodded to your mom, then repeated the same with your abuela; his signature disarming charm in full effect. “It’s a pleasure t’ meet y’all.” He continued on to your kitchen, setting the dutch oven down on your stove top and then pulled bowls out from your cabinet with a familiarity that did not go unnoticed by your family. “I’ve heard so much about y’all. It’s nice t’ put faces t’ the names an’ stories.”
Your abuela turned to you with her eyebrows raised, mischief in her eyes, and a million questions on the tip of her tongue. The wink she gave you before she turned her attention back to Jack was a new level of terrifying you had never experienced before.
“You made this?” Your abuela asked as she peered curiously under the lid, freeing captive tendrils of steam and releasing the warm aromatics into your home while Jack threw the cob loaf into the oven to warm it.
“Sure did, ma’am.” Jack looked up to see you making your way to your wine rack and reached to bring down four wine glasses, unasked. “This here is a famous Daniels’ Family recipe, an’ a favorite of mine come this time of year.”
“It’s delicious, you guys are going to love it.” You confirmed as you opened and poured the wine, handing a glass to your mom and catching the pointed look she and your abuela shared.
"Why don't y'all go on ahead an' get comfortable?" Jack’s suggestion pulled you from your thoughts. “I'll bring the food over once the bread’s done.”
You ushered your family to the table and had barely sat down when your mom leaned in and practically stage whispered, "he's nice." Her leading and suggestive tone spoke volumes in the silence that followed.
"Yes he is," It was obvious what your mom was hinting at and you weighed your words carefully, trying not to panic that your mom was bringing this up with Jack practically in earshot.
It was the last thing you wanted to talk or think about, because Jack was nice, in all the ways your mom implied, and in all the ways that mattered.
You valued him; the way he knew you, how he could intuit and read you. The way you could sometimes communicate without saying anything at all. You valued the way he was able to still the chaos you sometimes got caught up in. You liked his cocky smile and easy laughter. Jack also flirted, a lot, but you knew him, knew he was just a flirt, and that there was no way there was actually any intent behind his flirtations.
You liked him though, and that really was the problem.
The day you had moved in had been chaotic, and you were unpacking your kitchen late into the evening when you had looked up to see him strolling up the path to the house next door to you. He was attractive, and despite the weariness from the day that clung to him, he moved with the confident swagger of someone comfortable in their own skin.
Then, when you were delivering him the batch of cookies you’d made, he’d opened the door in that Henley that hadn’t settled properly, exposing a bit of his tummy. Your attraction quickly turned into mortification when you realized you had woken him up and it was really earlier than was polite to be knocking on someone’s door on a Saturday morning.
With a wave of his hand, he had dispelled all of that, and then within minutes the two of you were joking around. The friendship and effortless familiarity between the two of you had blossomed quickly and vibrantly. It was something you were eternally grateful for, especially since you were new to the city.
“That’s why we’re friends, mom.” You whispered back sternly, narrowing your eyes slightly and hoping that your mom accepted your less than subtle hint to end the conversation.
“I’m just saying, I think–” Your mom threw her hands up in something you were sure was meant to show her exasperation and placate at the same time, but you didn’t stick around to find out.
“Jack!” You practically leapt out of your chair and out of the conversation with your mom, then hurried over to where he was trying to balance bowls in his hands. “Let me help.”
“I said I had it, darlin’.” Jack tutted, but didn’t stop you from relieving him of two of the more precariously balanced bowls.
“Sure you did, Jack.” You chuckled and would have swatted his arm if your hands weren’t full.
Once everything was served, you and Jack finally sat down. There was a well-deserved air of pride about Jack, as your mom and abuela praised him for the meal and his cooking skills. Once everyone had eaten their fill, you and Jack cleared the table and rejoined your family to finish off the bottle of wine.
“So,” your mom started, glancing at you briefly and taking a sip from her glass before turning her attention to Jack. “What do you do for work, Jack?”
“I’m the CEO at Statesman Distillery, ma’am.” Jack leaned forward and topped your glass off, occupying himself and giving a more casual delivery to the news. “We’ve got, pardon my language, damn near the best whiskey on the market.” He looked so much younger to you then, chuckled bashfully at swearing in front of your mom and grandma, while his eyes gleamed with mirth.
“Ay, mija!” Your abuela’s indignation jostled you from your thoughts.
“¿Mande?” Came your startled reply as you turned to face her, wide-eyed, worried you’d missed something in the conversation.
“That’s your papá’s favorite whiskey!” You let out a small sigh and shook your head, the revelation a lot less serious than her tone had made you think it might be.
“Is that right?” Jack pushed his long empty glass to the side, then leaned back. “Well now, he sounds like just the sort of man I’d sit down an’ have a drink with!” You rolled your eyes at your mom. The both of you knew your father could get long winded, especially if there was alcohol involved.
“I reckon, I ought t’ be able t’ snag a bottle of our Statesman Reserve next time I swing by the office, an’ you can bring it with you when you visit over the holidays, darlin’.” He sprawled further back in his chair and shot you a playful wink.
A week ago, you had mentioned to him that you still hadn’t figured out what you were going to get him, and now here he was saving you twice in one day. You mouthed a thank you to him, then took another sip of your wine.
“Do you have plans to see your family too, Jack?” Jack blinked as he turned to answer your mom.
“Sadly no, ma’am.” The playfulness faded slightly, and a small frown tugged at the corners of his lips. “Mama Daniels is takin’ care of my aunt, an’ even though she’s on the mend, we’re holdin’ off on gettin’ the Daniels Family together again for another year.”
“You should come with mijita and spend the holiday with us!” You and Jack shared mirrored initial looks of shock at your abuela’s suggestion and you nearly choked on your wine. Jack was the first to recover, albeit shakily.
“Well…I–I’d love t’ spend the holiday with y’all,” Jack started treading carefully, yet honestly. “But I reckon that’d be up t’ your granddaughter. I don’t want t’ impose on y’alls time together as a family, what with her havin’ been gone an’ all.” Jack’s gaze flickered over to you, not wanting to put you on the spot more than you already were and trying to give you an out if you wanted it.
Three pairs of eyes were suddenly trained on you, but the only set you were truly focused on were the tender melted chocolate ones that were fixed on you, full of curiosity.
It really was sad that Jack would be stuck away from home again for the holidays. He was an absolutely devoted son and an equally rowdy uncle to the gaggle of nieces and nephews he told you stories about. You thought about how grateful you had been to have a friend like Jack to spend the holidays with while you were away from home and decided to repay the favor.
“Y’know, I think it’s a great idea, abuelita.” Your answer was directed towards your abuela, but you kept glancing at Jack, trying to make sure that you hadn’t misread him and he was regretting your answer.
“No one should be alone for the holidays, and besides, I’ll need someone to keep me sane.” You chuckled, rolling your eyes playfully and tacking on the last bit as a teasing dig.
They all laughed, and Jack winked at you. “It’d be my pleasure, darlin’.”
Your smile remained as the conversation steered towards what your mom and abuela were planning on making for the holidays, speaking animatedly to Jack like he was already part of the family. The initial shock at the suggestion had long worn off as you sat back comfortably in your chair and watched them talk.
Having your best friend fly with you to spend the holiday with your family would be perfect.
What could go wrong?
Thank you for reading! Parts 2 and 3 are coming soon!
#Agent Whiskey#Agent Whiskey x you#Agent Whiskey x reader#Agent Whiskey x f!reader#Jack Daniels#jack daniels x reader#Jack Daniels x you#Jack Daniels x f!reader#Holiday fic#Meddling with Mistletoe
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High School Reunion 2
Summary: Someone at the reunion has a big mouth.
Characters: Jensen x Reader, Jared
Warnings: Fluff
Word Count: 2,087
A/N: Inspiration struck out of nowhere and this piece was born. I have a very rough outline for a small series, maybe about 6 parts? We'll see. It's gonna happen randomly, no planned schedule for this one.
PART 1
Y/N bit her lip in excitement and saw a message from Lana. She immediately opened Skype to call her best friend…and thank her.
"Hey you! How was the reunion?" Lana smiled as her face appeared on screen.
"Oh my fucking God I can't believe you!" Y/N screamed, though it was mostly excitement as she blushed profusely.
"So…I take it you had a good night then?" Lana grinned cheekily.
"How could you not tell me you met Jensen Freaking Ackles?! I thought we were friends?" Y/N pouted dramatically as she plopped back on her couch, phone still in hand.
"Do you have any idea how hard it was to keep it from you?" Lana screeched in response, "You remember my last night at the convention, I went to that place for dinner that had the amazing burger?"
"Yeah, I remember. You said you loved the place, that it was a perfect ending to the trip," Y/N remembered, "Now I get why."
"Ok, yeah, so I'm sat at the bar with my burger and a beer and he comes in and sits with a chair between us. I instantly recognized him, but was trying to keep my cool, you know. But he remember me! From the photo op! So we just got to talking and you had just split with Chase and I was so worried about you-"
"Oh Lana, you didn't," Y/N groaned.
"I was just venting about how much I hated that douchebag and what he did to you and what you were going through and how I was so worried about the reunion but thought it could be a good thing for you after Chase-" she rambled on, her words quickly tumbling forth as she pleaded her case to her best friend.
"You're not mad, right?" Lana asked timidly.
"How can I be?" Y/N shouted, "He walked in there all suave and shut down my high school bullies - who were trying to start some shit let me tell you-"
"No!" Lana gasped, "Amanda?"
"And the others," Y/N sighed, "And they were trying to cut in on me and I was gonna run, I'm not gonna lie," Y/N chuckled lightly, "But then he was just there. And she introduced himself as my boyfriend….Oh my god, Lana! What if that gets out?" Y/N sat bolt upright on her couch in a panic.
"Whoa, Y/N, calm down," Lana insisted, "More important than that…he introduced himself as your boyfriend?!"
"Lana!"
"I'm just sayin'-"
Y/N sighed dreamily, "Then we danced. Then he took me for a drive and we parked up at the spot and ate burgers while chatting and watching stars," she sighed again, as if it were a scene from a romantic film she had just watched.
"That sounds like a date," Lana helpfully noted.
"I thought that too!" Y/N squealed, "But that's just the fangirl right? I mean, there's no way."
"How many times I gotta tell you you're a catch, woman?" Lana laughed, "I'm not surprised at all. In fact, I'm taking credit. You're welcome," Y/N groaned once more and Lana chuckled.
"Did I mention we exchanged numbers?" Y/N added with a grin.
"And now I hate you," Lana huffed.
"Yeah, love you too you meddler."
Y/N sighed happily to herself once more as they ended the call. She tossed her phone on the coffee table as she relaxed back into the couch. Her eyes fluttered closed as she replayed the evenings events in her mind.
She had to be dreaming. There was no way this was real, right?
Too tired and content to carry herself off to the bedroom, Y/N laid down on the couch, settling into the plush cushions and dragging the throw from the back of the couch to cover herself, falling asleep quickly and dreaming of shimmering green eyes.
Jensen groaned as he slowly came awake to the incessant ringing and chimes of his phone. He opened his eyes, grabbing for the phone and peeking at the time.
6am.
He and Y/N were out past midnight. After he made it back to the hotel, he had spent the better part of an hour sipping on a beer as he thought over the night he had with her.
He wasn't sure what compelled him to talk to Lana in the bar that night. He could tell she was a nervous fan, and he remembered her from the photo op, just as nervous and shy. But after a beer or two with her dinner, she relaxed and their conversation flowed. It was nice, to be chatting away with someone new, different.
When she went on about her best friend Y/N, Jensen felt something. Apparently the way if affected her friend was severe enough to have Lana in real turmoil over it. Jensen knew what that was like. He'd worried over Jared a time or two just the same.
When Lana gave him a picture, however, his heart skipped a beat. She was beautiful, with a charming smile. But he could see her eyes were sad and guarded.
When he realized the reunion was a few hours drive and a few days ahead of his schedule to be at another convention, he decided to make the stop to see Y/N at the reunion. At the very least he could chalk it up to a memorable fan moment.
Jensen rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he reluctantly sat against the headboard, checking to see why his phone was blowing up.
It took only a quick glance through the various calls and text and emails from various persons all talking about the same thing. Jensen opened the text thread from Jared, scrolling through the messages and clicking on a picture that was include.
It was him and Y/N dancing together at the reunion the night before. She looked as amazing as he remembered. Her smile was bright and genuine, but so was his. Apparently word had spread from the reunion that he and Y/N were together. That's when he remembered introducing himself to those girls as Y/N's boyfriend.
He wasn't so bothered by the turn of events, which surprised him. He had decided the night before that he wanted to ask her out on a date. Their chemistry was too intense to not pursue.
What bothered him was how she'd react. They'd literally just met and had a friendly, albeit great, evening and now she was possibly going to be bombarded with paparazzi and everyone in her business.
So much for that date.
He knew it was early, but he wanted Y/N to hear from him first. He opened the new message thread between them, seeing her text from the night before and smiling once more, before typing out his message.
Hey, Y/N. Hope you slept well. Was hoping to talk to you about something.
He sent the message, noting the time, and figured he'd give it some time. He didn't know her schedule, or anything about her really. With a groan, Jensen hit the green button to return one of Jared's missed calls.
"Dude!" Jared exclaimed as he answered after one ring, "I've been trying to get ahold of you for two hours!"
"Yes, Mom, I'm aware," Jensen said with a yawn.
"Did you see the picture?"
"Yeah."
"And?" Jared pressed for more, "Why aren't you freaking out about this?" Jared scoffed. Since his last major relationship ended, Jensen hadn't been with anyone really. An occasional date here and there for an event. But he hadn't seemed interested in anyone at all, and was quick to shut down any insuinuations to the contrary.
"I guess I should of seen it coming," Jensen shrugged, "I did introduce myself as her boyfriend after all."
"You what?" Jared was shocked, trying to wrap his head around it, "Why would you do that? Is there something you aren't telling me? Have you been dating her for a while? Who is she anyway?"
Jared fired off the questions in rapid succession like an excited puppy.
"I gotta talk to her first," Jensen said, "I'll see you at the convention in a couple days. You can interrogate me then."
"I want all the details."
"Don't you always?"
Jensen ended the call, taking a deep breath. He felt so stupid for what he did. He wasn't sure why he did that other than to shut those girls down. He really hated bullies.
He decided to get dressed and grab a couple of coffees on his way to Y/N's house. A quick look at his social media had told him that picture was blowing up. She was bound to find out sooner rather than later. He had to tell her first.
Y/N slowly roused from her deep sleep on the comfy couch, hearing an incessant rapping coming from her front door. She stretched, reaching for her phone on the coffee table and finding it dead.
She rolled her eyes as she threw off the throw, climbing from the couch and shuffling to the door and she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
She flung open the door, the morning's cresting light just bright enough to assault her eyes. It took her a second to focus, but then she saw Jensen, a small smile on his face and two tall coffees in hand.
"Jensen?" she asked, so very confused and wondering if she was still asleep.
"Hey, uh, I know it's early. But I really needed to see you this morning."
The smile he gave was sweet, but she could tell something was up. Was he worried that maybe she'd go blabbing about their night together? She'd never do that. But she guessed he didn't know that.
"Sure, come in," she smiled warmly, stepping aside and gesturing him into her home. She accepted the coffee as Jensen passed it to her on his way in. She shut the door behind him, taking a whiff of her drink before taking a long gulp, closing her eyes and sighing at the flavor.
"So, what's up?" she asked, shuffling on her feet, "Thanks for the coffee, by the way."
"You're welcome," he smiled, now genuine and inviting and Y/N's heart stuttered slightly at the sight, "I was hoping to talk to you, about last night."
She shook her head, "I won't talk about it with anyone, I promise. Well, other then Lana. I had to call her last night. Yell at her a little," she blushed.
He laughed, nodding his head, "No, I get it. But I wasn't worried about that or anything," he was quick to correct, "Actually, someone else already did."
"Did what?"
"Someone got a picture of us on the dance floor last night and might have said I mentioned I was your boyfriend," he said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Oh," she responded, clearly shocked and not sure what to say.
"I just wanted you to hear it from me first, you know? Before seeing it online or whatever."
"Online-" she echoed, her eyes going wide, "So, you can just post a Tweet or something that it's a mistake."
"Okay, well, to be fair, I did introduce myself as your boyfriend to those other women last night."
"Yeah…why'd you do that again?" Y/N smirked despite herself.
He shrugged, "Seemed like the right thing to do. Shut 'em up didn't it?" he grinned, "Besides," he chanced, stepping closer to her," Feels like we had a date last night."
She blushed hard, ducking her head before meeting his eyes once again, "Yeah, it did."
"And I was hoping you'd like to do it again."
"Really?" she asked. She couldn't help the dreamy look in her eye. She still couldn't believe this was happening.
"Yeah. So if you say yes, then we'd be dating, which is practically boyfriend and girlfriend," he explained casually, "So I think we should just keep doing what we're doing and let it ride. What do you think?"
"I think you might be a little bit crazy," she nervously laughed, "Let's start with a second date," she grinned, seeing him brighten up, "And go from there."
"And the press?" Jensen chanced.
"Let them think what they wanna think," she shrugged.
"You're freakin' perfect," he chuckled, tucking a stray hair behind her ear, even though she still had bedhead. He smiled at the cuteness of it.
"I should go freshen up!" she realized, seeing him look over her disheveled state, "Uh…be right back." she rushed off down the hall and Jensen laughed to himself.
He had a good feeling about this.
Forevers:
@sis-tafics
@lyarr24
@calaofnoldor
@hobby27
@spnbaby-67
@fangirlxwritesx67
RPF:
@smoothdogsgirl
JENSEN TAGS:
@akshi8278
@jerkbitchidjitassbutt
@slamminmine
#high school reunion#jensen x reader#jensen ackles#spn rpf#supernatural rpf#spn#supernatural#reader insert#fluff
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you & I (just meant to be)
Author: @rosegardeninwinter
Prompt: This silly, silly ditty was inspired by two (count ‘em! two!) lovely prompts which are as follows “Peeta can’t stop staring at Katniss in her costume :0” and “Everlark meeting at a fancy dress party dressed as a ‘matching’ pair, although they don’t each other - maybe a famous couple but who don’t need the other … Joker and Harley Quinn, Batman and Robin or my favorite: Anna and Elsa from Frozen … Peeta would make a wonderful Anna” - I thought these two went well together, and took a couple of creative liberties to make them jive. Hope you lovelies like! [submitted by @deardiaryithinkiamaghost and @wendywobbles]
Rating: T, for implied Everlark shenanigans
Author’s Note: Thank you to my dear @archersandsunsets for her second pair of eyes on this one and to all the lovely moderators and coordinators of @seasonsofeverlark, the true MVPs. It’s been a busy month, so I apologize for any incoherence. Sometimes, the heart just wants goofy modern AU fluff. Alrighty, Chatty Cathy is done … enjoy!
____________
“Katniss, I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Prim exclaims, though it sounds pretty pathetic with her congested, pinked nose. “You make the perfect ice queen!”
“I don’t think that’s usually a compliment,” Katniss says dourly, plopping down on the couch where her sister is situated with several fuzzy blankets, a box of tissues, and a large bowl of ice cream. She can’t taste it very well, but it’s the spirit of the thing that counts. Prim is in denial.
“I wish I could go,” she whines, holding the “o” in a long, dramatic note.
“I wish I could stay,” Katniss shoots back, holding the “ay” just as long.
“No you don’t,” Prim shoos. “You love our friends.”
“I do,” Katniss sighs, plucking at the silver sequined sleeves of her—well, Prim’s—Elsa costume. It’s too long on Katniss, with her sister’s good half inch on her, but it’s all they’ve got. Her original plan was to pull the classic black top and pants plus cat ears, but when it became apparent Prim wasn’t budging from the couch this Halloween, the real snowy blonde princess of the family had insisted Katniss take her outfit.
“You can’t show up to Finnick’s in a slapdash, last second costume, Katniss,” she’d said. “The man lives for Halloween. Don’t insult his extravagance with plastic headbands and tails.”
“I do love our friends, but … I don’t want to go out tonight. I’m tired.”
“Just half an hour,” Prim says. “Snag me some candy, make some pleasantries” — “okay, Jane Bennet” — “and then come home. At least one of us needs to show up. Just pretend to have a social life for thirty minutes, okay? For me.”
Katniss rolls her eyes as she gets up from the couch in a twinkling of blue overlay and snowflake hair pins in her braid. She does a quick once over of her shadowy makeup in the hallway mirror as she grabs her car keys. “What do you want?”
“Chocolate. Anything with chocolate and peanut butter. I’ll save it for when I can experience taste again,” Prim calls back. “Oh, and if Delly’s cousin is there, all of the cupcakes he brought.”
“Mmkay. All the chocolate and cupcakes, coming right up,” Katniss says with a resigned smile. On her way out, she clicks on her phone. It’s just now eight. She resolves to be firmly ensconced in bed by nine at the latest. She gives her sister a wave, keys jangling. “I’ll be back. Soon.”
At ten thirty, Prim looks up from her Harry Potter induced doze to find she’s received a text from her sister.
Staying a little later. Fifteen minutes maybe. Have the treats.
Prim checks the time stamp. The text was sent forty five minutes ago. This might be cause for alarm were it not for the text underneath Katniss’s, from Finnick. It’s a photo, taken in front of a makeshift photo op with purple and silver and orange streamers in the background and cutesy little bat and pumpkin and vampire fang cardboard props for people to hold up. It’s captioned “You can’t marry a man you just met!”
Prim brings her hand to her mouth to catch a laugh before it turns into a cough. Her sister, Elsa costume sparkling in the flash, is pretending to shake her finger disapprovingly at her “Anna” counterpart. The laugh breaks free this time. Prim grabs for her tepid tea to soothe her throat as she cracks up over the really incredible image of Peeta Mellark, Delly Cartwright’s stocky older cousin, in a red braided wig, and strikingly accurate green rosemaled gown, sitting quite comfortably, if amusingly, over his athletic build. He’s pretending to gripe back at Katniss about why exactly he can marry Hans of the Southern Isles. Their mock scowls barely contain smiles.
Prim quickly fires a text back to Finnick: How??? Did that happen???
Finnick’s text comes through a second later: The Lord works in mysterious ways! Idk!
Okay but like?? Yes??
I know!!!!
Some people are worth melting for????
Her cold never bothered him anyway? *finger guns*
Omg.
Katniss arrives back at the house at five to midnight, and Prim pretends to be asleep, watching with one eye cracked half open as her sister unstraps her silver heels and dumps them by the front door, drops her keys into the bowl. Sets down a full bag of what Prim can only guess are cupcakes and sweets.
She’s humming under her breath. It sounds like the chorus of “Love is an Open Door.” Prim wonders if it’s possible that her folk and indie music loving sister actually listened to a Disney album on the way home. Katniss unbraids her hair and shakes it loose, dropping the pins on the side table as she sinks into the squashy chair kitty-corner to Prim’s couch. She curls up, knees to chest, making her look like some sort of ice mermaid as she takes out her phone and taps something on it, still humming. Prim watches her chew her cheek pensively, as if deciding to send the text. She takes a deep breath and taps one final time on the screen, then drums her phone nervously against her lips for a moment. Prim’s nerves are firing with anticipation.
They wait a silent minute. Two. Three. Three and a half —
Katniss’s screen lights up again and she flips the phone up to stare at the reply. Her whole face softens. Eyes, brow, edges of her mouth. Katniss bites her lip and closes her eyes, letting her head fall back onto the chair cushion with a contented sigh. “‘You know what’s crazy?’” she sing-songs in a mumble under her breath. “‘We finish each other’s sandwiches … I’ve never met someone who thinks so much like …” She yawns. “Me.”
“You know,” Prim says, and Katniss shrieks, sending her phone flying to the carpet, “Peeta Mellark strikes me more as a Kristoff than a Hans.”
“Prim!” Katniss yelps, going red. “Wha — what? What do you mean?”
“So we’re done with stupid plastic cat ears for Halloween then I take it?”
[the very next Halloween]
“Whoa. Okay.” Peeta sits up from the pile of cushions at the head of their bed, eyes wide and staring in approval, pupils gone dark. “Katniss Everdeen in cat ears is not something I knew I needed until this moment.”
“Oh sure,” Katniss laughs. “Because it’s definitely the cat ears that are doing it for you. Not these.” She hoists one stockinged leg up onto the bed like a mountain climber posing for a magazine.
“Well, those are certainly part of the appeal,” he teases, reaching for her leg, running his hands up and down the silk tights. “As is this lovely number.” He toys with the hem of her dress, a strapless black velvet thing that falls just above her knee. “Where’s this from?”
“Jo,” Katniss sighs. “She says if I’m going to be a cat, I need to be a Gretchen Wieners level cat.”
“For whose benefit, I wonder?” Peeta muses, cheek nuzzling gently at her lower thigh.
“You wonder?” Katniss laughs, taking her leg away and flopping onto the bed. She glances over at him, eyes sly and somehow soft at once. “I don’t.”
“I can’t help thinking,” he muses. “that this is something of a counterproductive plan on Jo’s part. Because now, I have a sudden and distinct interest in staying in tonight.”
“Oh?” Katniss raises a come hither eyebrow and pushes up on her elbows to accept the kiss he plants on her lips as he crawls over her, urging her back to the headboard. “Is it the cat ears?” She reaches up to give the (already molting) plastic and faux fur ears a flick.
“The Kat ears,” he says. He nips softly at her real ear and she shivers. “The Kat nose.” He kisses that too. His nose nudges her head back, inclining her neck at the perfect angle for him to plant a stretch of kisses down it. “The Kat neck.” His mouth wanders down the front of her dress and he scoots down the bed with it. “The Kat’s cradle.”
“You have that,” she says, hiking her legs up to hug around his middle because her arms can’t reach to hold him. “You’ll always have that.”
“A piece of that Kit Kat bar.” He kisses her stomach. “The whole Kit and Caboodle,” he teases and she laughs loudly, but on a dime his tone is changing, from silly and playful into husky and dangerous, as he moves lower. “Kitten,” he murmurs and her fingers curl in the bedsheets at the name. “Grab my phone,” he tells her, hooking his fingers around the band of her tights, “Tell Finnick we’re going to be late.”
An hour or so later finds the cat ears lost somewhere among the remains of their costumes and a hasty snack of pepperoni rolls cooking in the convection oven. Peeta, festooned in boxers and an old apron, presides over the food like it needs a baker’s supervision. Katniss perches on the counter, wrapped chest to toes in the white sheet she pulled from their bed, feet batting absently at the cabinets.
“This is a good look too,” he tells her, gesturing with the salad tongs he’s using to handle the pepperoni rolls.
“What is? This sheet?”
“I was thinking more along the lines of sexy ghost.”
“Or sexy Roman senator,” she laughs, tossing one edge of the sheet over a bare shoulder. “Sexy Julius Caesar.”
“You’d make a good Julius Caesar,” he says.
“Why?”
“You’ve got that “came, saw, conquered” vibe. Least that’s how I felt that night at Finnick’s party.”
“Conquered?”
“I was gonna say seen, but — yes. Conquered too. I couldn’t stop looking at you.” He snaps his fingers. “Sexy ice queen? Definitely.”
“I’m not exactly sure what kind of Freudian analysis one could make on falling in love with the guy dressed as your fictional sister but — ”
Peeta shrugs as the timer beeps, and he sets to fishing the pepperoni rolls onto a plate for them to share. “I choose to think of it as a metaphor for how the two people you love most in the world are your real, actual sister …” He sets the rolls beside her on the counter and sets his hands gently on her sides. She lets the sheet fall and pool slightly around her waist to cup his face as he leans in to kiss her forehead, very gently, thumbs rubbing circles on her hips. “And some loser who has the luck of … oh, I guess having the same first initial and hair color as she does,” he jokes.
“And the same beautiful heart,” Katniss corrects in a whisper. “I mean that.” She’s rarely so sentimental to anyone except him. She smirks. “And I haven’t even started drinking yet.”
“Well, my pretty kitty,” he starts, wrapping both his arms around her middle and hoisting her off the counter. She rolls her eyes, even as her hands card through his hair. “The night is still young.”
#everlark#everlark fanfiction#autumn#autumn 2020#rosegardeninwinter#submission#octoberlark 2020#octoberlark
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notable moments from The Bank Shot Job
leverage 1.05
I decided I’m also going to start highlighting meta material in these posts for reference reasons (like for fics, headcanons, meta, etc)
I’m colorcoading by what character the meta pertains to btw
Clerk: Hello, Judge Roy.
Judge Roy: [slaps her ass] Hey, sweetheart.
Frank: Can I help you, your honor?
Judge Roy: Yes, Fred. Her phone number?
Frank: It's Frank. And she's 19, sir.
Judge Roy: That's too bad. She got a younger sister
diSgUsTiNG
- - - - -
Hardison: No. No more. We gotta talk to Nate. No more rip deals. They take too damn long.
Parker (ripping paper): That's why they're called "Rip Deals". You have to convince them they're getting a deal before you can rip them off.
Hardison: Two weeks. Two weeks sleeping in crappy hotels. Two weeks eating in crappy diners. Two weeks having my soul sucked dry. It's 107 degrees. Who lives where it's 107 degrees?
Parker: Juan's not so bad. I kinda like this town
I wanna see that domestic shit of them sharing hotel rooms and eating the continental breakfasts and dingy diners and everything about them living in rundown hotels for two weeks
- - - - -
Hardison: You know, I had to retask two satellites just to get a lousy internet connection. Took more than an hour to torrent the last episode of Doctor Who.
Parker: Hey! Illegal downloading's wrong. (lights paper on fire in trash can)
that’s it. that’s their relationship.
- - - - -
Hardison: How we coming on the breakdown?
Eliot (loading truck elsewhere): Fake addresses are shut down. Post office boxes are closed. The phones are cleared. Five more minutes, we never existed
bruh those props ??? I wish I had a screenshot but wtf where they DOING for the con ???
- - - - -
Hardison: Want me to call the Delgado family, tell them the news?
Eliot: Nah. Soon as I clear county line I want to do it. I just wish we could do more than bankrupt that corrupt son of a bitch
eliot is so good you guys im-
- - - - -
Nate: Get out. Now.
Hardison: Is he talking to us?
Parker: An unmarked van parked across the street from a bank that's being robbed? Yeah. I think he's talking to us.
Hardison: Yeah, well, five more feet and he would have been in the clear. What the hell was he thinking?
Parker: Don't be an idiot, Hardison.
Hardison: What?
Parker: Sophie was still in there
parker knows nate loves sophie and would never leave her behind because she may not always get people, but even she can see how much nate cares for sophie
- - - - -
Derrick: Everyone empty your pockets. Wallets, purses, watches, everything you've got, throw it over here.
(everyone throwing stuff to center of floor)
nate threw his fucking toothpick
- - - - -
Deputy Arnold: No, right here, right here, and we need ...
(Eliot crosses police line)
Deputy Arnold: Whoa, whoa, I need you to take a step back, sir.
Eliot: Tell me what's going on in there.
Deputy Arnold: I'm afraid I can't do that, this is an active crime scene, and you need to ...
Eliot: (to cop) I'm not talking to you. (to Nate) How many are there?
Nate: Yeah, you're right. Clearly amateurs, these two. Yeah. The younger one, looks like he's never handled a gun before.
Eliot: Is judge blow-hard next to you?
Nate: Yeah, uh-huh. Yeah, definitely amateurs, That's what makes them so dangerous.
Eliot: Alright, 2 guys, both armed, neither one a criminal mastermind. You want me in there?
Deputy Arnold: Sir, we can't have you going inside the bank ...
Nate: Probably, uh, a good idea just to sit tight, don't you think? You know, and see where these guys' heads are
at, you know?
Eliot (backing away): Alright, your call boss.
Deputy Arnold: Thank you
poor deputy arnold + eliot being done with local law enforcement
- - - - -
Sophie: Okay. So what is the plan, Stan
“what’s the plan, stan” adorable.
- - - - -
(Eliot leans against a building across the street and watches Hardison and Parker pull up in a sedan)
Eliot: Nice ride.
Parker (taking notebook and removing badges): It's embarrassing. Everyone knows you don't rob a bank without an exit strategy. These two deserve to get caught. 42 seconds. (tosses notebook back to Eliot)
Hardison: What?
Parker: To rob this bank. One security guard who has never fired his gun before, 2 closed-circiut cameras outside, 1 inside, and a Glen-Reader safe built in the 50's whose default combination is the birth date of the manager's wife! Get in, get out, 42 seconds.
Hardison: Seriously
parker was so angry that she chucked the binder at eliot and he was like ??? we good ???
- - - - -
Hardison: Seriously? (to Bill) I'm Agent Leonard. This is Agent Elmore. We'll be taking over this crime scene,
Sheriff ...
Bill: Bill Hastings. Nice to meet you. You guys sure are quick, just called this in 20 minutes ago.
Hardison: Well, we were coming back from a little border skirmish. Patrol unit came under attack from a pack of Chupacabras.
Bill: Chupacabras? I thought those things were urban legend.
Hardison: You're adorable
I love it when hardison fucks with people it’s hilarious
- - - - -
Hardison: Whoa, what's going on?
Bill: Cut power to the bank. Standard operating procedure.
Hardison: Standard ... it's standard op ... it's standard? Where do you getting that bull-hockey from son?
Bill: Deputy Arnold, he took a seminar in crisis management last year.
Deputy Arnold: It was an online seminar. We got certificates.
Hardison: Certificates? Magic kits come with certificates. Does that make it cool for kids to saw their parents in half?
Bill: We're just going by the book.
Hardison: The ... the book? The book got a good man killed. I can't ... my blood pressure.
Parker: Ex-partner. Probably shouldn't mention the book again. Or propellers.
parker is doing so well with grifting considering and I’m so proud of her
- - - - -
Sophie: They are not cops, I promise you, they're friends of mine, you can trust them.
Derrick: Why should I trust you? I don't know who you are.
Sophie: I am a thief.
Derrick: Okay, I'm not sure what to do with that.
that’s it guys. that’s the show.
- - - - -
Nate: I didn't say it was going to be easy. But nothing's impossible, especially when you have the world's greatest thief on your payroll. Parker, have you ever robbed a bank that's being robbed?
Parker: There's a first time for everything.
her SMILE YOUR HONOR
- - - - -
Parker: The bank was built before 1980, before computers. Means it's got a larger than normal night deposit chute.
Hardison: 'Cause business had to drop off ledgers with their daily hauls. What, you thought my genius was only limited to ones and zeroes?
Parker: I'm thinking the chute's my way in. Only problem is, it's in the alley on this side of the building
the way she looks at hardison like damn boy you know my stuff
- - - - -
Hardison: I can take care of that, but, we actually have bigger problems.
Eliot: What's that?
Hardison: Well, Sheriff Coltrane over here called the FBI, the real FBI. Now the closes office is in San Diego, so they should be here, in about, um, give it 45 minutes.
Nate: We can't worry about that now.
Hardison: When do we worry about it?
Nate: In about 45 minutes
hardison, internally: lord give me strength
- - - - -
Hardison: Hold on ... Excuse me. (answers phone) Agent Leonard. We will do whatever you need us to do, just please, don't hurt anybody. Okay. (hangs up) Guys ... Boys, boys, come on, gather 'round. Now boys, that was THE call. The call we were waiting for. Now look, they have a list of demands. First off, they want 12 large pizzas. One cheese, one Hawaiian, extra pineapple. Two pepperoni and black olives, two meat lover's, t ... Seriously? Nobody's writing this down? Seriously? One triple-shot half-caf vanilla latte, tall,
(Parker goes down alley and opens deposit drop box)
Hardison: …three of the latest copies of the Hall and Oates CD. I know, right? Exciting stuff I didn't know they were coming out with a new one either. We're gonna need steaks. Steaks and a grill. They're trying to tailgate. Okay, they need your overalls, I don't know why. They need some kibbles n' bits, we need an Etch-A-Sketch, somebody in there likes to squiggle okay ... Are we good? Let's go people. Everybody. I need you guys moving. Everybody get out. Go. (hardison points at an officer) You stay. We need to talk about Hall & Oates.
I fucking loved this monologue,,, hardison is VERY GOOD at improvising
- - - - -
(Derrick opens night deposit box)
Parker: Hi.
Derrick (hands her the briefcase): There's a lot of money in there.
Parker: Yeah, I know.
Derrick: My wife's life depends on that money getting where it needs to go.
Parker: I understand. Sometimes bad guys are the only good guys you get
parker’s face softened and you can see that she understood. parker didn’t get people in the beginning of the show, and sure her values and ideas aren’t typical, but she was ALWAYS a good person. she cared and understood what was at risk and she consoled him.
also, this is yet another piece of evidence that parker was the main character all along!!! I’m not gonna go super into it because there are already posts out there about it, but she had three (3) episodes dedicated to her character in season one alone AND had her say what is basically the mission statement of the show here in this scene
- - - - -
Sophie: Things could be worse.
Nate: Worse than me getting shot and you blowing our cover?
Sophie: No, no, you're not gonna lay that crap on me. We wouldn't even be in this mess if you'd just walked out with the cash when you had the chance. I would've been fine.
Nate: I know.
Sophie: Yeah, I can take care of myself. I've been doing it a long time. Since way before I met you. I'm just saying.
Nate: Yeah, you're right.
Sophie: Okay
nate knows sophie is a strong independent woman and that is one of the only things I stan about him lol
- - - - -
Sophie: We lost communication.
Nate: Yeah, we did.
Sophie: Hardison, Parker, and Eliot ...
Nate: That's right, they are on their own. Yup.
they ended up doing great on their own, but also, can we acknowledge what a glow up it was building up to the rundown job ???
- - - - -
(Mom gets out of truck and tries to run)
Meth #2: Where the hell you think you're going, old lady? (pulls mom back) Where the hell you think you're g ...
Eliot (catches Meth #2’s arm): Hey, what smells like crank and screams like a girl? (Takes his gun and breaks his knee)
Meth #2: AAHH!
Eliot (kicks car door closed before Meth #3 can get out, empties the bullets from gun): That's the right answer. (throws gun into car at #3, hits #1 as he approaches) Come on. (fights #1, kicks door shut, beats #1 more, kicks door again) Stay in the car. (beats the hell out of #3 and #1, kneels down near mom and removes her gag)
Mom: Who are you?
Eliot: Well ma'am, we'd be the cavalry.
this entire fight scene always has me ROLLING it’s so funny
also I’m not sure if this should go on the List Of Non-Weapon Objects Eliot Uses As Weapons but eliot DID use the car door in the fight
- - - - -
Sophie: Just let the paramedics take him. The rest of us will stay.
Judge Roy: And give up my leverage
*sophie and nate look at each other*
both, internally: tHATS OUR WORD
- - - - -
Nate: Hey, listen. She's gonna be alright. Everything's gonna be alright
Derrick: Your people ... they're good?
Nate: Yeah. The best.
nate’s smile when he says that??? proud dad alert
- - - - -
Sophie (looking at replay of tape): You're still a geek.
Judge Roy: They're trying to ruin me.
Hardison: Geek power, baby. Stay strong!
in other words: age of the geek, baby
also- kudos to 2008 hardison editing video like that. I can’t do that shit with today’s tech lmao
- - - - -
Bill: Go home now. Bank robbers are in custody, hostages are safe. FBI's got the whole thing wrapped up.
Taggert: Do you have any idea what?
Mcsweeten: Just go with it.
Deputy Arnold: Mr. FBI guys, can you help me here?
Bill: My, my. Look at this. Our local drug boys, both with outstanding warrants. It's incredible.
Taggert: Damn, we're good!
mcsweeten and taggert stumbling onto the leverage crew’s cons and directly profiting off of them is iconic. they have no idea. too pure for this world
- - - - -
Sophie: Hey, thanks Parker.
Parker: Whatever.
Sophie: No. It was an excellent performance.
Parker: Yeah, I think I can act okay when I'm yelling at people and bossing them around.
Sophie: Well, it's a good start.
proud mom!sophie + grifting parker
Nate: Listen, we have to make sure we get the cash to the Delgado family. Ow!
Eliot (tending Nate’s wound): Oh! Settle down. You act like you've never been shot before.
Nate (glances at Sophie): So, uh, pizza boxes, huh?
Hardison: Yeah, I know, I know, You could have done better.
Nate: No, no, no. No I couldn't have.
eliot casually stitching up nate’s wound bc no hospitals but also can we talk about how much nate has to trust eliot to literally operate on him
+
nate giving praise to hardison ??? rare af I don’t know her
#leverage#the bank shot job#leverage 1.05#leverage 1x05#mine#notable moments#leverage season 1#season 1
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Midnight Striga: Fairy Tail/Owl House Cross Fic Episode 3 Part 2
Hello all, once again I arrive to bring you the next part to Midnight Striga, Episode 3! Everybody Clap Your Hands!!
“Willow, I heard.” Luz chuckled. “Speaking of names, mine’s Luz.” With that said, she held out her hand, open for a shake.
Willow blinked, before, with a beaming grin, reciprocated the handshake. It wasn’t often that people were this openly friendly to her! “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Luz! I-” Willow’s voice cut off as she focused on a detail she had missed prior; Luz’s ears, her very noticeably round-tipped ears. “So circly…” She murmured in fascination, only for her hand to be lightly swatted away by Luz. “Oh! I’m sorry, but, it’s just, you, you’re a human!”
Luz grave a slightly irked grin. “Yup. Been one all my life.”
Willow rang her hands, flustered. “Oh my Titan, I can’t believe I lost control around a human. Are you sure you’re not hurt?” She asked again.
Luz was a little ticked at the implication that she was fragile, but kept it in, smiling at the girl’s concern. “Like I said, I’m fine.” She spread her arms, showing off the lack of damage to her limbs and body. “Might have a few aches and pains in the morning, but other than that, I’m good.”
“A-are you sure?” Willow pressed. “I mean, I know humans are more frail than Witches-” Willow’s voice cut out, suddenly intimidated by the sharp glare on Luz’s face.
“Humans. Are not fragile.” Luz bites out. Breathing in deep, Luz lets out a sigh, calming herself. Forcing a smirk on her face, she asks Willow, “Besides, if we were, could I do this?”
Willow gasped as Luz proceeded to do the “this” in question; summoning a chair made of light, and plopping herself down in it, a cocky smirk on her face. “But. Magic! How? And you!! What is-” At that point, Willow’s legs gave out, causing her to slowly topple over.
“Whoa there, don’t go falling on me now!” Luz yelped, quickly moving to steady the other girl. As she managed to keep her Willow on her feet, Luz let out a relieved sigh. “And, there we go!”
“Thanks.” Willow gasped out, steadying herself. “Now, where was I? Oh yeah!” Willow snapped her fingers in realization, pointing at Luz dramatically. “YOU JUST USED MAGIC!!!”
Luz gave Willow a flat look in response. “Yes. I did. Is that a problem?” Luz asked as calmly as she could. Don’t get her wrong, Luz liked this girl, but she was still a bit salty about the incident from four days prior with the deliveries.
“Oh, nonononono!!” Willow frantically denied. “At least, not with me. It’s just really, really shocking.” Luz gave a shrug at that, not contesting the point. Willow sighed. “I’m sorry if that sounded rude, it’s just, all my life I’ve been told that Humans can’t use magic, that it was a gift for us Witches and Demons. I didn’t mean to offend you.” Willow finished, offering a shallow bow in apology.
Luz snorted at the display. “Pfft. Don’t worry about it!” She flippantly stated, a cheeky grin on her face. “I’ve gotten used to the whole “humans don’t have magic” speech already. It’ll probably grate on my nerves when it comes up, but it doesn’t bother me. Honestly, what concerns me more was that little display with Little Miss Perfect.” Willow snorted at the not-inaccurate description for Amity, a little surprised at someone being so dismissive of the girl.
Clearing her throat, Willow broached the topic on her mind. “I’m not going to ask how you can perform magic, and I must say that your spell looks amazing, but why were you hiding in the bushes?”
Lus flushed. “I was actually looking for… something I lost earlier this week. I overheard you talking to yourself, and saw the whole exchange between you and Miss Minty.” Again, Willow held in a chuckle at the flippant nickname. Luz’s face grew serious. “But, I gotta say, as someone who specializes in Construct-based Magic… your Abomination?” She phrased it as a question, continuing at Willow’s answering nod. “It literally made me cry to see.”
Willow grew downcast, sorrowfully mumbling. “It’s not like I haven’t heard that before.” Willow shyly twisted her foot against the ground.
Luz clapped her hand on the Witch girl’s shoulder, snapping her out of her funk. “Hey, don’t talk like that.” She held Willow’s face in her hands, much to the other girl’s bewilderment. “That Abomination is for a presentation or something, right?” At Willow’s cautious nod, Luz grinned, continuing. “Then I can help you! In exchange for a peek inside your school, that is.”
Willow was dubious. “I don’t know, do you even know how to make an Abomination?” She doubted it, but it was better to ask than to assume.
Luz grinned challengingly. “Do you have a textbook detailing this?” She gestured to the Abomination goop. With a slow nod, Willow brought out the textbook in question, one she routinely poured over every night, desperate to understand what she was doing wrong. As Luz flipped through the book, she marveled at the detailed notes covering each page; clearly, this girl was no slacker, so how was she doing so poorly? Unless… as Luz took a closer look into the Pot, she gained an idea as to what the problem was. She piped up. “Hey Willow, do you think you could summon this for me?”
“Uh, sure?” With a nervous flick of her wrist, Willow called up her Abomination, internally cringing at the admittedly poor result. She was slightly puzzled, however, by Luz crouching down to get a better look, and grew a little worried at her chuckling.
Snickering to herself, Luz decided to voice her thoughts on the situation. “Willow, would you say that you like plants?” She was sure that it was an understatement, but it was best to make sure.
Blinking, Willow nearly shouted in response. “ARE YOU KIDDING!? I LOVE PLANTS!!” The gleeful cheer ripped through the clearing, leaving no doubts to her opinion on the subject. “If I had any real say, I’d much prefer learning Plant Magic than… Abominations.” She continued at a much more sedate volume, spitting the last word with a surprising amount of venom.
Luz cocked an eyebrow, amused. “Well, considering that thing with the vines,” Willow flushed in embarrassment at the memory. “I think I know what your problem is.”
Willow paused, uncomprehending. Then, she rushed deep into Luz’s personal space, an almost manic gleam in her eyes. “Really!? Do you mean it?!?” She demanded, roughly shaking the human.
“Y-Ye-e-e-ss, now-w s-sst-op sh-shaking-g m-meme!!” Luz garbled.
As Willow sheepishly released her, Luz straightened out her clothes, voicing her theory. “My best guess is that you have too high an affinity with plants and plant magic. That’s why you struggle so much with making these things,” She kicked the Abomination Pot, “despite having so much knowledge on the topic.”
Willow’s eyes blinked rapidly, confused. “Affinity?”
“Do Witches not really work with those?” Luz asked. At Willow’s still confused nod, Luz pondered the information. “Huh, that explains a bit. Well, to simplify, a Magic User’s affinity, whether Witch, Human, or Demon, is the representation of the magic closest to their soul. Every mage has an affinity, heck, the strongest mages often have several, but everyone’s got at least one.”
“Okay,” Willow replied slowly. “But what does that have to do with me and my Abominations?”
“Everything.” Luz bluntly stated. As Willow flinched in response, she continued. “I’ve seen magic react to its wielder’s emotions, heck, it’s usually a good way of checking a fresh mage’s magical affinity, if they're strong enough to handle it, but I’ve NEVER seen a reaction as powerful as that one.” Willow blinked, not quite processing what Luz was implying. “Girl, you have to have some of the singularly greatest potential for Plant and Plant-based Magic I have ever seen in my life, and the power to back it up.”
“B-But I’m the bottom of my class,” Willow stammered. “I-I was a late bloomer!”
“If anyone told you anything like that, they didn’t know what they were talking about.” Luz calmly stated. “If you got labeled a ‘late bloomer’ or anything like that, it only reinforces my theory.”
“How so?” Willow softly asked, still trying to process it all.
“Easy.” Luz shrugged. “Your affinity for Plant Magic is TOO powerful. Your magic naturally seeks to become Plant Magic and spells, so if you attempt anything else, it backfires. You’ve got incredible power, and can do insane things with Plants, but the trade off is that you can ONLY do things with plants, at least alone.”
Willow’s legs wobbled, and she fell to the ground. She was so confused. All this time, she was never a Half-a-Witch? She wasn’t a late bloomer, just too good at one thing? “Then, what am I supposed to do? I’m in the Abominations Track, I’m not supposed to use Plant Magic!” She was mostly trying to convince herself at this point. “My parents said I’d have better prospects in Abominations!”
“If they said that, then I’m sorry to say that they have no clue what your prospects are really like.” Luz coldly replied. It was harsh, but it needed to be said. “It doesn’t matter if the field itself has great prospects or opportunities, if you can’t even do the bare minimum successfully, you’ll never be able to benefit from them. Keeping you in Abominations is just going to cripple you in the long run.”
Willow cried, tears softly running down her face. “Then, then, what’s the point?” She cupped her face in her hands. “If I can’t even benefit from a Track I hate, then what can I even do?”
“Hey, hey!” Luz lightly chided. “No talking like that! You may not have a future in Abominations,” She ignored Willow’s bitter agreement, “But we can at least get you a grade good enough to tide you over until we find a solution.”
Willow looked up at Luz’s daring grin. “How?” She asked challengingly.
“Treat it like a plant.” She said.
Willow blinked. “Huh?”
“If you can’t get it right as an Abomination,” Luz began, “Then try it again, but this time, imagine forming your Abomination the way you would have a plant grow.”
“Would that even work?” Willow was skeptical. It was admittedly a smart reaction, as what Luz was suggesting came very close to mixing magic from what she could tell, but she couldn’t deny it was enticing.
Luz gave her a reassuring grin. “Of course it will. Here, I’ll even help guide you through it.”
“O-okay.” With a shuddering breath, Willow slowly began forming her Abomination, Luz calmly walking her through each step.
As Luz oversaw Willow’s work, she briefly wondered what Eda and King were getting up to.
A massive crowd of Witches, Demons, and guards alike all cheered at the sight before them; a ring of fire in an open clearing, Eda the Owl Lady riding on the shoulders of a Bipedal hulk of light, a sword raised over head, her demon companion riding his own hulking mount, a spear clutched in his adorable fist. With matching bloodthirsty cries, the two goaded their servants to charge, weapons bared, while the crowd roared in delight behind them.
Luz shrugged, reasoning to herself that they couldn’t have gotten up to anything too crazy. As she saw Willow’s finished product, she couldn’t fight the genuinely impressed grin. Now, she was ready.
Amity Blight was annoyed. That was nothing unusual, not truly; the life she lived was a passionless one, save those few moments of genuine enjoyment she gained reading to the kids at the library, or when she could escape into her books. Even her scholastic achievements only brought some measure of satisfaction, and it was truly minor in the end. What currently was igniting her frustration, however, was the Witchling she was being forced to deal with.
“For the last time, Skara,” Amity growled. “I don’t care if Boscha is being aggressive. She’s ALWAYS aggressive!”
“But it’s different this time!” Skara, one of the Witches she was forced to endure on a daily basis, insisted. “Ever since she lost that fight, she’s been super different!” She glanced over to see Boscha, roughly pinning a Demon student against the wall, an ugly smile spread across her face.
Amity blinked, confused. “Boscha lost a fight?” That was certainly unusual. The arrogant Witch, though it wasn’t often unwarranted, was exceptionally aggressive in terms of combat-based magic, and thrived on competition. “How?”
“Well, we were walking through Bonesburough, when Boscha spotted the absolutely cutest demon!” Skara started, gushing slightly at the mention of the demon. Amity fought the urge to roll her eyes; Boscha’s weakness for cuteness, a stark contrast to her tough girl image, was an open secret, not that anyone was foolish enough to try and use it against her. Skara continued talking, “But before we could get in any cuddles or pics for Penstagram, the little guy’s minder took him back! And, she totally gave Boscha the brushoff!”
Oof. Amity would freely admit to herself, that took an incredible amount of nerve; even those who didn’t know or know of Boscha found her presence intimidating. For someone to completely ignore the girl would take an impressive amount of nerve, and would’ve infuriated the feral jock to no end. “I’m assuming Boscha took exception to that?” Of course she did, but, for the sake of her sanity, it wouldn’t do to undercut the frustrating girl before her.
Skara nodded, oddly grave; Amity took notice of it for later. “Yeah. It was BRUTAL. This girl not only caught one of Boscha’s punches like it was nothing, but she blocked one of her best fireballs with a Light Spell of all things!” And at that, any interest Amity had in the conversation vanished.
With a scoff, Amity turned on her heel. “If you’re going to make up something new for the rumor mill, the least you could do is make it believable.” With a huff, Amity started walking to her class. She had better things to do than indulge the biggest gossip in school looking to stir up trouble.
“What!?” Skara yelped. “But Amity, I’m being serious!”
Amity stopped, turning to give Skara a Look. “Uh huh, right.” As if she’d buy that.
Skara huffed, a hint of red coloring her cheeks. “It’s true! Boscha got into a fight, she lost, and now she’s being super weird! How hard is that to believe!?” She flapped her arms in emphasis, desperate to gain some focus on what she was saying.
Amity crossed her arms, chin turned up in faux-thought. “Well, nothing you said was implausible…”
Skara started to cheer, only for it to die in her throat as Amity continued.
“But the fact that you claimed Boscha was beaten by a Light Spell, the absolutely most basic of magic spells Witches are taught, makes me think you are just trying to stir up drama. Like you always do.” With a disinterested sniff, Amity continued on her way.
“B-but Amity!” Skara cried.
Whirling on the other girl, her temper almost breaking, Amity growled. “No. Buts.”
Skara was instantly cowed, any words being swallowed as her face flooded with heat. “Y-yes, Amity.”
With a small smirk at the end to this latest annoyance, Amity walked to class, heedless of Skara’s efforts to pry Boscha away from the rapidly bluing Demon she was gripping around the throat, only for Boscha to freeze, releasing the Demon, as she slowly turned towards the center of the school, her eyes glowing a bloody red. The sooner Amity’s day was over, the better.
#the owl house#fairy tail#owl house au#fairy tail au#owl house crossover#fairy tail crossover#luz noceda#willow park#eda clawthorne#king the owl house#amity blight#boscha the owl house#skara the owl house#magic
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Suspended Animation
Phic phight 2020
Submitted by @ectopal: Sam finally asks Danny what he's going to do with himself after noticing that he as a halfa is not actually aging with his friends and family.
Warnings: swearing and mild panic attack. But there's also fluff.
Summary: It's been two years since Danny's accident and he hasn't aged a day. Sam wants to know what he's going to do about his future.
Word count: 2661
Danny was late. Which wasn't so surprising, but he was supposed to meet Sam at the park an hour ago and she hadn't even gotten a single text from him. She wondered what, or who, was holding him up. The Box Ghost? Skulker? Johnny and Kitty? Maybe Ember started an impromptu concert on the other side of town.
The idea made her shake her head and scoff. Yeah, right, as if any of those guys could keep Danny occupied for a whole hour nowadays. Maybe Johnny and Kitty could, but only because they had fallen into the habit of using Danny like a marriage counsellor, and that was just too damn funny.
For Danny to be this late, he was either caught up in something really dangerous or really stupid. Since the city wasn't exploding, or being sucked into the Ghost Zone—for the sixth time—it was probably the latter.
"Sorry I'm late, Sam. Johnny–"
Definitely the latter.
"It's fine," Sam said, cutting Danny off as he swooped into the clearing. Getting caught up dealing with the ghostly couple's relationship issues was better than being shot at by them, or anyone else.
"Still, sorry." Danny settled onto the grass next to her, crossing his legs. He quickly scanned the area, making sure they were alone. Sam had chosen a secluded spot, hidden by a copse of trees on one side and a low stone wall on the other. There were lots of little spots like this hidden all throughout the park, but this one was the best because it rested on top of a small hill. On the other side of the wall sat a pond, so no one could sneak up on them from behind.
Satisfied with the level of privacy, Danny transformed from Phantom back into Fenton. The temperature dropped for a moment as the transformation rings washed over him. Sam was forced to close her eyes against the bright light, blinking away spots when she opened them again.
"So, what'd you want to talk about?" he said. "And why out here?"
Sam looked up at the open sky. Once the sun finished setting, they would have a great view of the stars. Danny always said he felt more relaxed when the stars were out.
"No reason," she said.
Danny shrugged. "Okay. You sounded kind of serious in your text, though."
A stoic "We need to talk," probably wasn't Sam's best choice of words, but it was serious. Worrying her lip, she nodded and turned away from Danny. She reached into her backpack, discarded on the grass next to her, and pulled out a photo album. She had a lot of photo albums dedicated to a lot of different things: family, nature, animals, friends. This album was special. It's purple cover was decorated in glow-in-the-dark ghost stickers. Silly phrases like "Beware!" and "Ghost Zone's Greatest" were written across it.
This album was for Danny's, Sam's, and Tucker's eyes only, and it chronicled their ghost hunting adventures.
"Whoa, I remember making that," Danny said with a grin. He eagerly snatched the album from Sam's hands and flipped the cover open. The very first picture was of all three of them in the Fenton's lab. Sam, being the tallest at the time, held the camera out, Danny in the middle, Tucker squeezing in at the edge of the photo.
"Do you miss being the tallest?" Danny asked teasingly. He flipped through the album to the more recent photos and picked out one of Sam and Tucker lounging on a bench, picking dried ectoplasm out of their hair. Even while sitting, Tucker had a good few inches on Sam. If they had been standing, that gap would have been even bigger.
Sam slapped Danny's hand away and teased right back, "at least I'm not the shortest." She pointed to the next photo over
Another one with all of them together, lying down on the roof of Fenton. None of them were looking at the camera. Jazz had taken the photo without them knowing, peering down at them from the Emergency Ops-Centre.
Tucker, on the right, was focused entirely on his phone, holding it so close that the screen's soft glow lit up his face. Sam lay on her side in the middle, chin propped on her fist, reading a book. On the left, Danny had his arms folded behind his head as a pillow and was just staring up at the sky.
Their heads were all level, but looking at their feet showed they were arranged from tallest, to shorter, to shortest.
Sam remembered that moment. They had been hunting for a ghost that could bypass Danny's ghost sense. Using the advanced sensors in the Ops-Centre, they were waiting to get a ping back that the ghost had been located. It took almost an hour, but the wait wasn't so bad. They needed a nice, calm moment every now and again, when they could just be together in silence.
Two years ago, they probably would have wasted a whole afternoon looking for the ghost themselves. A lot had changed since then. In the grand scheme of things, two years wasn't much, but it was a long time for teenagers. Both Sam and Tucker had grown, shooting up a few inches. Sam's hair was longer. Tucker had a bit of stubble on his chin. Their faces were more defined. Their arms were visibly muscled.
But Danny hadn't changed at all. He was half a foot shorter than Sam. His cheeks still carried a bit of youthful roundness. Despite being the most physically active of all three of them, his arms and legs were the same thin twigs from when he was fourteen years old.
"Hey, have you seen how tall my dad is? I bet I'm gonna have a foot on both of you," Danny said, holding up his hand to show how tall he would be. "Just look at Jazz. She's taller than our mom now! And Mom's not exactly short, either."
"Danny," Sam said softly.
"Don't even get me started on Aunt Alicia."
"Danny!"
He stopped talking. His hand dropped into his lap, fingers curling into a tight fist, and he ducked his head. "Please tell me I at least fooled you a little," he said.
Sam reached over and took the photo album back from him. Removing the picture of them on the roof, she flipped back to the front of the book, holding the photo up against the first one of them all together. Danny looked exactly the same in both.
"Not even a little," she said.
"Damn."
Sam closed the album and set it aside. Scooting closer to Danny, she bumped their knees together, making him look up through his hair. Even that hadn't changed. Sam couldn't remember him getting a single haircut since his accident.
"Danny... what are you going to do?" she asked.
His hopeless expression broke her heart. "I don't know, Sam," he said. He ran his fingers through his hair, hands shaking. He was looking straight ahead, eyes wide and unfocused. "I don't know. I'm not– I haven't changed at all. What does that even mean? Am I not aging? Am I fourteen forever?"
Folding his hands over his head, he hunched forward, fingers digging into the back of his neck. "I don't know."
Sam reached out and touched his hand, trying to comfort him. But the moment she made contact, Danny flinched away, lurching to his feet. The sudden move startled Sam. She stared as Danny paced across the clearing, still holding his head.
"I'm just, I'm stuck, Sam! Everyone's leaving me behind! How can I graduate like this? Or go to college? Or do anything? You're all just going to keep going growing up and I'm going to stay here like, like this!" He gestured to his body. "But you want to know the worst of it? If this is my life now, then... one day, you're all really going to leave me behind."
The implications of what Danny said had the blood draining from Sam's face. She knew it was a possibility, but she hadn't seriously considered. Her, Tucker, Jazz, Danny's parents. Everyone. They were all going to keep aging, and getting older, and one day they would die. One by one, Danny would lose everyone he loves, and he would be left alone.
When Sam asked him here today, she just wanted to ask what his plans were for after high school. How would he deal with college, if he could even go? What would he do about work? What would he do about his parents?
But now he was spiralling into a panic and Sam didn't know what to do. The conversation went wrong so fast it gave her whiplash. She had to get things back under control.
"Danny, hold on," she said, rising to her feet.
He wasn't listening. He just kept pacing and panting.
"You need to take deep breaths, you're going to pass out."
"Don't you get it, Sam? I don't need to fucking breath! It's just a goddamn reflex at this point! Look, watch, see?" Danny pressed his hands against his chest, and he stopped breathing. Thirty seconds passed. Forty. One minute. Two.
They stood there, facing each other, neither one saying anything. Sam kept waiting for Danny's face to turn red. For him to suddenly gasp and suck in a big breath of air, like she did after holding her breath for too long, but he didn't even twitch.
"Danny," Sam said.
"What?" he snapped harshly. He started moving again, chest heaving, hands shaking.
Sam asked the only thing she could think of that would calm him down. "Where's Orion's Belt?"
Danny blinked at her, hands dropping, and repeated, "What?" It was less bitter this time.
"Orion's Belt." She gestured to the stars, which were now out on full display. "Where is it?"
"Um..." Danny's voice was shaky, but when he turned his head to look at the stars, his eyes looked less wild. "It's just above the trees."
He pointed. "There. The, the three stars."
Sam followed his hand, gaze searching the dark sky, and nodded when she found them.
"You can't see his knees right now. But, um, if you look up, just a little. His shoulder is– his shoulders are right there. And you can see the lion he's holding." As soon as Danny moved on to the other stars, Sam was lost, unable to see what he saw. But he kept talking, and she wasn't about to stop him. "Um. Jazz. Jazz told me it was a bow, when I was little, because she didn't know the story. Some people think it's a shield. It could be any of them, I guess. But. I like the lion."
He looked calmer. Still far from relaxed, but less like he was about to collapse. Sam approached him slowly, in case he wanted some space, watching for any sign that she should stop. When she saw none, she reached out and pulled Danny into a hug, pressing his head into her shoulder.
"Sam, have I always been dead?" he asked. His voice was steady, and he didn't sob, but Sam could feel his tears staining her shirt.
"I don't know," she answered honestly. Danny still bled, and he healed, and he ate, and he slept. "I don't think that's something we can know until..."
Until everyone else grew old and died and Danny didn't.
They held the embrace until Danny stopped shaking. He sniffed, rubbed his eyes, and pulled back, chuckling when he saw the dark spot on Sam's shirt.
"I swear, if you got snot on this, I'm gonna take the most embarrassing photo I have of you and plaster it all over the school tomorrow," Sam said. She almost meant it, too. This shirt, a dark grey t-shirt covered in bat-shaped lace, was one of her favourites.
The threat managed to pull a stronger laugh out of Danny. It was watery, but bright, and his lips twitched into a smile as he rubbed his eyes again.
"Are you.... are you okay?" Sam asked.
"No," Danny said. "But, I'm not bad either."
They sat back down, hip-to-hip, shoulder-to-shoulder, and looked up at the stars together. Sam squinted, trying to pick out more constellations, but she didn't have Danny's skill for it. Even after him pointing them out to her time and again, she always forgot where they were. Already, she had lost track of Orion's belt. But that was okay. She liked it better when Danny showed them to her.
"Oh, damn," Sam said, suddenly remembering something from freshman year.
"What?"
"I just realized. It's a good thing I don't have a crush on you anymore, you're way too young for me."
"You had a crush on me?" Danny asked, a mischievous grin spreading across his lips.
Sam blushed. "Oh, shut up. You're my best friend, okay? I thought I like liked you."
Danny tipped his head back and laughed. "Would you believe it if I said I had a crush on you to?"
"No way." Sam gaped at him. "Seriously? Tucker and I always joked that you were clueless because you couldn't tell I like you. Was I clueless too?"
"Tucker knew?" Danny's voice rose to a shriek.
Sam burst out laughing. "Oh my god! That was adorable!" She clutched her stomach and fell over onto her side, shoulders shaking. "I can't– oh my god– please."
Danny scowled down at her, crossing his arms and pouting. It sent her into a whole new fit of laughter, until her lungs ached, and her flushed cheeks felt too hot. Fanning her face, she pushed herself back up and struggled to get her breathing under control.
"Okay. Okay, I'm done. I swear," she said. A final giggle slipped out.
"Asshole," Danny muttered.
"Asshole that you had a crush on," Sam said. "I can't believe I missed my chance to date the Danny Phantom."
"Damn, and I could have dated Casper High's queen goth. Too bad I don't date older women."
Sam snorted. She looked back up to the stars, feeling a sharp pang in her chest. "Sorry you can't be an astronaut, though."
"Hey, maybe they need a scrawny teenager out in space, you never know," Danny said, grinning wryly. He picked at the grass, sprinkling it over Sam's leggings, just like they used to do when they were kids. With Danny's baby face, he still looked like a kid, but Sam knew he had been through so much more than anyone they ever know.
"But I think... I think I'm okay with that," Danny continued after a moment. "I can fly, and I've even been to space before. Without a helmet! How many people can do that? Besides, I'm years ahead of NASA?"
"Oh, yeah? Why's that?" Sam asked, brushing the grass off her knee.
"I've already perfected suspended animation," Danny answered. He wiggled his eyebrows and knocked his foot against hers.
It took Sam a couple seconds to get what he meant, but when she did, she groaned. "That was so bad."
"It was comedy gold."
"I'm ending this friendship."
"You wish. You're stuck with my forever. Everybody is, apparently."
Sam's expression turned somber. "Danny, I hope you know, we'll always be here for you. Even when we're gone. We might not become ghosts, but we love you. We're with you."
Danny looked away. For a second, Sam thought he was going to have another panic attack. But when he looked back at her, he was smiling. It was soft, and sad. If Sam could only use one word to describe it, it would be resigned. It was the smile of someone who knew what the future held for them and would face it head on, even if they weren't ready for it.
"I know," he said.
Danny was right before, Sam thought. It wasn't okay, but it wasn't bad, either.
#phic phight#phic phight 2020#Danny doesn't age#danny phantom#danny phantom fanfiction#phanfic#hurt/comfort#mild panic attack#tumblroneshots
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Dreams of Drowning: Chap 13
AO3
Please Reblog!
It's finally time, for... The Arcadia Job.
“We understand Jimbo.” Toby waved from the ground. “Go do your hero thing. We’ll back you up if you need it. As soon as the world comes back into focus.”
Toby laid on his back in the middle of the street trying to catch his breath as Jim’s car turned the next corner out of sight. His arms felt like they were full of lead. Even lifting his head took more energy than he had.
“How does Jim do this magic stuff all the time?” He asked to no one in particular.
“He’s had his magic longer than either of us have.” Barbara said.
She was also sitting on the ground not far from Toby, her legs splayed out in front of her. After a few deep breaths she tried to force herself to stand. She got to her feet a little unsteadily.
“Is anyone injured? I can-whoa.”
Barbara took one step while she was talking and would have fallen flat on her face had Zelda not dove to catch her. She carefully held Barbara for a moment before lifting her up into her arms in a bridal carry.
“If anyone is hurt we can heal on our own. You need to rest before you do anything else.” Zelda said as she carried Barbara to the house.
She stepped carefully over the wreckage of the living room to set her wife down at a chair in the dining room. Toby watched them go, then rose with a groan and dragged himself to the house. Strickler stepped up to him and threw an arm over his shoulder to help him to the door. He kept his phone pressed to his ear with his other hand.
“Yes I know I haven’t called in forever, will you just listen?” Strickler was saying into the phone. “Angor I’ve got a problem I need your help with. What do you mean you’re not in the country any more? Cambodia! Why are in you in Cambodia?”
Toby zoned out of the conversation as he sat at the table next to Barbara. He rested his head on his arms, Jim’s mom seeming equally exhausted. Zelda was bustling around the kitchen, quickly getting some food for Toby and her wife. When a small plate of food and some tea was put in front of them, Barbara smiled up at her, exhaustion and love showing in every line of her face.
“Thank god one of us can cook.” Barbara said. “Thank you my love.”
Toby took out his phone while Barbara slowly took a sip of her tea. He fiddled with the phone idly while he thought. Some how he would have to tell Darci about what happened. Tell her that he had magic. Also explain that the truck was probably totalled from Bular flipping it. As he was about to call her he froze. To his right Barbara gasped, her cup slipping from her limp fingers to shatter on the ground.
“Something’s wrong.” He said.
“Jim-” Barbara whispered.
The two of them looked at each other. They could feel Jim’s fear and anger. Then a wave of pain and exhaustion washed over them. Zelda dashed to Barbara’s side as she groaned and steadied her as she wavered in her chair. Toby’s vision faded to a pinprick for a moment as he struggled to stay conscious.
And then the scream. It tore through his mind, shutting down the entire world. He couldn’t hear it over the scream in his head, but he was screaming out loud as well, his scream tearing its way out of his throat.
Time stood still. Toby could see through his own eyes. He could see the floor of the Lake-Nomura house where he had collapsed. He could feel Strickler’s arms on him keeping him from hitting his face on the floor. Brilliant orange fire roaring around him.
He could see through Barbara’s eyes. The navy light that shone from her, was mixed with a neon green light. He could see through Zelda’s eyes, her skin shifting and changing like rocks sliding down a cliff, revealing different skin tones in flashes of green. They held each other while they both screamed.
He could see through Darci’s eyes. Her magic moved like a whirling wind pulling her dreadlocks. She screamed by herself, alone, on the floor of the Domzalski house kitchen. Her hands were desperately wrapped around her belly, as her magic picked up to what seemed like a cyclone.
Toby could see through Jim’s eyes. He could see his best friend and first love get pulled slowly toward a pool filled with some strange dark material. He recognized that it was somehow linked to the corrupted heartstone that Jim had been so afraid of. Toby realized he couldn’t sense Claire at all in that moment.
Time suddenly returned to its regular pace. The fear disappeared like it was swallowed by the sun. Toby struggled to catch his breath. His throat hurt from the force of his scream. His hands were shaking as he grabbed Strickler’s arm for support. He could hear the ragged breathing of the Lake-Nomuras as they too recovered from what happened. Barbara was the first to speak.
“Is Jim…?” Even though she didn’t finish her sentence the others knew what she was trying to ask.
“I can’t sense Jim at all now.” Toby said. He stood, expecting to be exhausted, but instead he felt energized. He felt better than he had in years, probably since being a teenager. He flexed his arms and his flames roared to life around him. Strickler took an astonished step back. Barbara was shining with her navy light and beside her Zelda’s skin continued to shift and change like tectonic plates. Each shift was accompanied by a flash of green.
“We have to go after Little Gynt.” Zelda said. Though her voice currently sounded like Coach Lawrence and her body looked like Strickler’s. Her voice followed her body, slowly slipping into Strickler’s posh British accent, while her body shifted again to look like Toby. “Whatever happened, whyever we can’t feel him, we need to try and rescue him.”
“And Claire.” Barbara said. She let the light fade from her eyes, though it still shown and moved under her skin. “Jim was willing to risk his life to save her, and whatever else we can’t let anyone else suffer these feelings, especially not someone we love.”
Toby snapped his fingers.
“That reminds me! I have to call Darc!”
He looked to where his phone had fallen when he collapsed. He lifted his hand and orange flames whirled around the phone and brought it flying to his hand. However before he could even dial the phone announced an incoming call. He answered it quickly when he saw who it was.
"Hey Darc-"
"Is something wrong with Jim?" Darci interrupted. Toby blanched at the tone in her voice.
"No! There's nothing wrong with Jimbo!"
"Don't lie to me! I can tell when you're lying!" She hesitated and Toby could feel the wind pick up around her as if he was by her side. “I can tell when you’re lying.”
Toby took a deep breath. There was no point in playing around any more.
“Ok, so Jim lost contact with Claire and went to go check on her. I awakened my magic powers about an hour ago when Bular came to try and kill us again. Now you and Zelda have awakened your powers as well. I can’t feel Jim at all, and we are going to have to go in and save him with only a half baked plan and marginal chance of success. So do you want to come over and kill me yourself before I get arrested?”
Darci was silent on the other end of the line for a few moments.
“I’m on my way. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Toby hung the phone, then stared at the screen for a moment.
“Good news, bad news time. Darci is on her way, and her magic is awakened as well. On the other hand she didn’t clarify whether or not she was going to kill me when she arrived.”
Several minutes, one hurried explanation and multiple calls later, Darci was up to speed on what had happened and what their plan up to this point was. Toby thought it would take a bit of convincing to get the police to leave, so they weren’t left doing paper work for the rest of the night, but apparently along with being a human lie detector, Darci could now tell any lies she wanted and they were believed without question. Once she was caught up, and the authorities mislead about the gunfire that had been heard, they all left for 49B.
“Alright, just to review everyone’s jobs one last time.” Strickler said as he drove. Zelda was next to him in the car, while Darci, Toby and Barbara were crammed together in the back. “I’ll be in the car running mission ops. I’ll keep you updated on everything from here. Zelda, you and Mrs. Domzalski are on infiltration. Get in, find out what’s become of Young Atlas and get out. Meanwhile Barbara and Mr. Domzalski will be targeting the generator room that Jim trashed. Apparently its tied to whatever equipment they used to keep Claire in captivity, and possibly now Jim as well. Once the generator is destroyed and we know Young Atlas’s whereabouts we, well, improvise to extract him and his lady fair.”
“Just what I like in a plan. A massive question mark right in the middle of the operation.” Zelda growled to herself, before her body shifted to take on the appearance of an industrial inspector.
They pulled up to 49B far too soon. Toby cracked his knuckles nervously as he and Jim’s mom stepped out of the car. Barbara wore Zelda’s motorcycle helmet to hide her face. Toby wore a pair of welding goggles and a bandana from his truck. Zelda’s identity was already hidden by her transformation. The only one exposed was Darci. Toby glanced nervously at his already visibly pregnant wife.
Toby and Zelda stared each other down. “Take care of her.” “Keep her safe.” They spoke over each other, both anxious about being separated from their respective wives. Barbara put her hand gently on Zelda’s chin for a soft second before they both turned away. Toby moved to follow Barbara and he felt a tickle of air flutter around him. He smiled and in an instant all four minds were connected.
Toby could feel their fear flowing easily, fear of failure, fear of capture, fear of what had happened to Jim. He could also feel the hole left by Jim’s absence. There was a very clear spot where he belonged in the fabric of their minds. A place where his love should be. A place where he would have been able to steady them and encourage them to move forward. The hole ached in Toby’s mind.
He and Dr Lake-Nomura quickly reached the rear door. He paused for a second, watching in his mind’s eye as Darci and Zelda approached the main entrance. The wind picked up around Darci each time she lied to the guard to get their way in. Then once they were out of sight of the first guard Zelda changed to look just like him as she escorted Darci.
“Look at the card reader.”
Toby refocused on his current surroundings at Barbara’s words. The card reader that employees normally used to unlock the door had a small burn mark, like it had been shorted out. He tried the door itself and found it open. He pulled his hammer from his back and opened the door slowly.
There was no one at all inside. They quickly ran down the hallway until they were outside the door to the mechanical room Jim had trashed earlier. He paused, and glanced through Darci’s vision. She and Zelda had just made it to the security office. Zelda had incapicated the guard inside and assumed his form.
“TP, All the cameras for the facility are already off. They didn’t want anyone to know what they were doing today.” Darci’s voice slipped into his mind.
“And it looks like all security officers were ordered to avoid the basement level.” Nomura’s thoughts followed Darci’s. “Classified experiment on Entity 001 and Entity 002. Per orders from Gunmar Black.”
“That must be Jim and Claire!” Toby cheered. “We’ll trash the generator then head down to get them out.”
“Stay safe you too. It’s about to get dark.” Barbara thought.
The door to the mechanical room was locked, which wasn’t too surprising considering what Jim had managed to do to it last time. However it was the work of a moment to push some of his fiery magic into the key hole and in a moment it was unlocked. He opened the door for Jim’s mom to step in.
“Would you like to do the honors?” Toby asked, gesturing to the array of recently repaired machinery.
Barbara hesitated, her thoughts whirling through their shared connection. She wanted to take a small revenge by destroying the equipment, but was terrified of someone getting hurt and wanted to reserve her magic for saving Jim if that was necessary.
Toby nodded his understanding, putting a comforting hand on her arm. He double checked that Darci and Zelda were safe, they had locked the security office, Zelda sealing it by warping the concrete around the door frame, then he ignited his hammer.
Orange flames whirled around the room and it only took a few precise hammer blows for the lights to fail again, but that wasn’t enough. He was getting his best friend out of this facility and no one would ever use it to hurt people again. Broken sheets of metal flew into the air as he hammered away. Each piece floated for a second before joining a growing sphere of metal that was forming in the center of the room.
He focused, putting the full might of his gravity magic to the task. The sphere grew as more metal and debris were pulled to it, then compressed as he forced the material into one solid. Before too long he had a sphere just a touch taller than he was, all of solid metal. He strained, putting more and more magic into lifting the ball up to the ceiling. His arms were shaking, and sweat poured down his brow, only to evaporate in the heat of his magic. Finally when he couldn’t take the strain any more, he slammed the sphere straight down into the floor.
The floor of the mechanical room gave way like wet paper before the concentrated weight of the sphere. A rumbling crash echoed through the room as it impacted, and passed through the floor below them.
Toby didn’t hesitate to jump down into the pit he had created, Jim’s mom right behind him. He used his magic to slow their descent. They both landed safely in a hallway that was now completely filled with dust. They both dimmed their magic so they wouldn’t give themselves away prematurely. They froze at the sound of coughing ahead of them.
“The entities must have outside contacts” A woman’s voice could be heard through the dust. “Get to the security booth! I’ll make sure they don’t break containment!”
They both recognized the voice of Dr. Le Fay, the woman who had imprisoned and tortured Claire and surely orchestrated Jim’s capture. Toby waved his hand in the air and the orange flames of his magic swept forward, settling the dust instantly. Barbara was already charging the woman in gold.
“That’s my son you bitch!” Navy light shone from her fist as she punched Le Fay in the face.
Gunmar turned with a growl, but before he could do more to react Toby had cocked his hammer back and threw it with all his might and magic. It hit him right in the chest and blasted him backwards through a wall.
The rumbling that had started when Toby had dropped his meteor, suddenly picked up again, shaking the whole room. Barbara stumbled as a horrific growling filled the room. The noise seemed to go on and on without stopping, and it was coming from the room Gunmar had just been flung through. As they watched a massive hand burst through the ground. Another followed shortly after.
Something emerged from the hole. It was massive, had stone skin and incredible horns that swept back from its head. It opened its mouth, revealing huge tusks, and roared. The roar was powerful enough to shatter glass. Toby and Barbara crouched their hands over their ears as the roar rumbled through their bodies. Finally the roar ended and they could both breath again.
Toby stood, drawing the thing’s attention. Blue eyes glowed in the darkness, and blue flames licked out of the creature’s mouth and nostrils.
“Jim? Is that you? Jimbo?” Toby called to it, a tremor in his voice.
“Please Jim, we’re here to free you!” Barbara stood next to him, reaching out her hand for whatever this thing was.
Instead of answering the creature, that towered over them both, growled, more flames pouring out of his mouth. Toby reacted on instinct, grabbing Barbara and pivoting with her so he took the brunt of the fire on his back, sheltering her. If this was Jim, what had they done to him? If this wasn’t, then they had no chance of saving him.
#jim lake junior#claire nunez#Barbara Lake#toby domzalski#darci scott#zelda nomura#dreams of drowning#writing emerald#tales of arcadia#Trollhunters#please reblog!
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NCIS: Los Angeles Season Eleven Rewatch: “Knock Out”
The basics: As the team deals with NCIS without Nell, they assist the DOJ in the investigation of an arson incident at an FBI safe house.
Written by: Jordana Lewis Jaffe wrote or co-wrote wrote or co-wrote "Honor", "Patriot Acts", "Dead Body Politic", "Paper Soldiers", "Unwritten Rule", "Big Brother", "Iron Curtain Rising", "Exposure", "Savior Faire", "Beacon", "Defectors", "Exchange Rate", "Black Market", "Payback", "Battle Scars", "Mountebank", "Vendetta", "Where Everybody Knows Your Name", "Pro Se" "Heist", "Born to Run", "Provenance" and "Commitment Issues"
Directed by: Tony Wharmby returns. This is his first episode since Kensi and Deeks got married. Tony Wharmby directed "Legend" part one, "Predator", "Callen, G." (season one finale), "Special Delivery", "Deliverance", "Archangel", "Harm’s Way", "Lange, H.", "Honor" (written by Jordana Lewis Jaffe), "The Watchers", "The Dragon and the Fairy", the NCIS: Los Angeles end of the Hawaii Five-0 "Touch of Death" crossover, "Dead Body Politic" (written by Jordana Lewis Jaffe), "Gold Standard", both "Red" episodes, "Reznikov, N.", "Iron Curtain Rising" (written by Jordana Lewis Jaffe), "Zero Days", "One More Chance", "Humbug", "Fighting Shadows", "Getaway" and "Til Death Do Us Part".
Guest stars of note: Kate Orsini returns from “High Society” as FBI Agent Audrey Rush, “Moon Bloodgood is back from “Commitment Issues” as Katherine Casillas and Wiley Pickett returns from “Where Everybody Knows You Name” as FBI Agent Munger. Krizia Bajos as Patricia Ruiz, Alyson Reed as LAFD Chief Jefferson, Brandon Soo Hoo as Rick Lim, and Hugo Medina as Miguel Perez.
Our heroes: Are hanging with the FBI and without Nell.
What important things did we learn about:
Callen: Willing to talk about his vacation if Sam asks.
Sam: Not willing to ask about Callen’s vacation.
Kensi: Faux Patricia Ruiz.
Deeks: Found Perez’s team through Ops osmosis.
Eric: Thinking of his own departure from NCIS.
Nell: A beam of light who will be missed.
Hetty: Absent.
What not so important things did we learn about:
Callen: Likes the cherry-flavored energy drink.
Sam: Throwing the “A-Bomb” (arson) around with Chief Jefferson.
Kensi: Responsible for Deeks’s injury.
Deeks: Broken toe.
Eric: Gets monthly job offers from the FANG companies.
Nell: Absent.
Hetty: See Nell.
Who's down with OTP: Kensi is in Deeks’s dog house for leaving heavy objects where he’s walking but he’s really not that angry. Eric misses Nell but is still working hard. Proud of Nell’s leap, Eric is thinking of making the same jump.
Who's down with BrOTP: Double the banter with the Callen-Sam and Deeks-Eric mix.
Any pressing need for a young FBI Agent: No. There were enough problems with the FBI.
Who is running the team this week? Callen.
Fashion review: Medium blue long-sleeve tee for Callen. Long sleeve charcoal grey tee for Sam. In the gym, Kensi is wearing a sleeveless workout top and blue-green exercise tights. Later in the case, she wears a white long-sleeve thermal tee and then Patricia Ruiz’s blue and tan print dress when she’s undercover. Eric is wearing a tan and off-white pullover sweater over a medium blue dress shirt.
Music: “Know Me Better” by Madd3e featuring Bluesforthehorn is playing while Kensi and Fatima are working out. “Start It Up” by Ziggy Marley is playing in the bar when Kensi talks to Callen about his trip with Anna. “Running” by Heldo Negro is playing when Sam goes to see Katherine.
Any notable cut scene: Nope.
Quote: Eric: “Don't get me wrong. I... I love it here. I love what we do here. But Nell taking this big leap has kind of gotten me thinking maybe I could, too.”
Deeks: “Whoa. All right, let's not start talking crazy.
Eric: “Crazy? What's so crazy about that?”
Deeks: “I don't know, like, w-what would you do? Where would you go?”
Eric: “Where would I not go, Deeks? Did you know that at least one of the FANG companies recruits me on the monthly?”
Deeks: “No, I did not know that.”
Eric: “I could have been CTO of Dollar Shave Club. I fixed last year's FaceTime bug. Hell, I was in the room when Kevin created Instagram. And now my friend from SF, he wants to create this... company with me. I'm just really proud of Nell.”
Deeks: “You're on a first-name basis with Kevin Systrom?”
Eric: “That's your takeaway?”
Deeks: “No. My takeaway is that you're incredibly talented and you could be working anywhere making millions of dollars, but instead you choose to work here because you want to make a difference. And I appreciate that, and, more importantly... I appreciate you.”
Anything else: A guy is sitting his car as two friends break into a home. The police drive by but race past the getaway vehicle. When the friends get out of the house with a sack each of stolen goods, they stop dead in their tracks. The house across the street from where they broke in is engulfed in flames.
Callen returns from vacation with little reaction from Sam. He’s surprised by Sam’s lack of reaction. Callen is waiting for Sam to say something so Sam catches Callen up. Sam’s good with Roundtree, who is a little green. Nell took an unofficial official leave of absence. This is not what Callen was looking to hear. Sam isn’t sure where Callen’s going – he’s hoping to his desk.
Callen tells Sam he’d like to get this over with. Sam doesn’t know what “this” is. Knowing Sam has questions about his vacation with Anna, Callen wants to answer them now. “For the next five minutes.” Sam asks if they had a good time. As Callen discusses the vacation, Sam cuts him off – “I’m good.”
Kensi and Fatima are working out in the gym with Kensi reminding Fatima they shouldn’t overdo it – they have a full work day ahead of them. She also jokes that Deeks would have bailed on Fatima’s work-out routine right away. Kensi enjoys working out with Fatima – changing it up. Fatima thinks Kensi and Deeks are always changing things up. No, Kensi tells her. Work is always changing things up for them. At home, “we are, like slow and steady monogamous lifers.” They are NCIS agents by day, accountants by night. Fatima jokes about keeping it between them. Kensi thinks that’s a good idea, Deeks isn’t her biggest fan right now.
A limping Deeks – foot in a walking boot - walks into the office through the back entrance. He sees Eric and tries to avoid him by hiding in the burn room (Nell did that in the last episode). That plan is partly successful until Deeks leaves the burn room and hits the hard floor with the walking boot. Eric hears him.
Deeks asks how Eric is doing. When Eric says great, Deeks tells him not to change the subject. Eric doesn’t think he’s changing the subject, which was the “obligatory morning salutation.” Since Eric isn’t ready to talk, Deeks isn’t ready to talk about how he broke his big toe. As things get weird, Eric gets a call that they have a case.
The case is the fire in East Hollywood, Eric tells an arriving Callen and Sam. There is no connection to NCIS. Instead, they are being brought in because the DOJ wants to know why the house – an FBI safe house – went up in flames. The concern is for a mole or leak. Eric has Kensi and Fatima talking to the FBI Agent in charge of the case in the boat shed. Callen asks about Deeks, who broke his toe. Callen and Sam are off to the crime scene.
A now not pregnant Agent Rush walks into the boat shed. Her son is “an adorable little dictator.” Rush is going to pump breast milk while they discuss the case. Rush is not sure how the fire started, she tells Kensi and Fatima as the pump starts. Fatima is a little distracted but Rush thinks if she can ignore what’s going on with her body, so can Fatima. Kensi, by the way, equally distracted and has questions. Fatima steers the conversation back to the fire.
Nobody was hurt during the fire. There were two agents in the house with Patricia Ruiz, a Venezuelan political activist seeking asylum in the US. Ruiz is in a new safe house – Rush is not sharing her location.
Coming up the badly burned safe house, Callen and Sam meet LAFD Chief Jefferson and the woman is a delight. Since she was at site of the fire for hours “and I’m old,”, she’s loading up on energy drinks – “no judging.” Callen tells her that her choice of energy drinks is his favorite. Jefferson is fine with that but knows Sam is judging. Callen agrees.
The safe house is an old building. When the fire began, the electrical in the building went up right away. So did all the wood and paneling. Since LAFD knows what they’re doing, the fire was out in 34-minutes. Callen asks if the Chief knows how it started. Still early but nobody got hurt and none of the other homes on the block caught fire – that’s a good thing.
Sam brings up possible arson since it is an FBI safe house. Oh, Chief Jefferson is not having any of that. Sam can’t just throw around the “A-Bomb” (arson) until her crew has a good look at the fire. When Sam asks if they can hang around while the crew looks at the fire, Chief Jefferson is on board. Even comes up with energy drinks for Callen and Sam, aka “the big fella”, since the “poor thing looks parched.” I love her. When she leaves, Callen asks why is Sam throwing “A-Bombs”? “I’m parched.”
Kensi and Fatima watch as Agent Rush struggles to put on a girdle/back brace. While Rush uses the restroom, Kensi calls in an update to Callen. While Callen is on the phone, Chief Jefferson, goddess of fire, returns. She found evidence of an accelerant – it looks like arson. Callen thinks it is also an attempted murder.
In Ops, Deeks is giving his “buddy” Eric a shoulder rub. Deeks wants Eric to know he’s there for him during the springtime of his discontent. Eric tries to work as Deeks goes on about the Ops not having the same vibe without Nell. Trying to get Deeks away from the topic, Eric calls Nell a beam of light who will be missed. Deeks wants to share more of Eric’s feelings. Eric is going to work but Deeks can talk about Nell as much as he “wants-slash-needs.” Having seen “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”, Deeks knows that this is not how the healing process works. Eric gets things back on track asking Deeks about his toe.
Walking Rush back to her vehicle, Kensi really pushes that NCIS wants to help on the case. Rush appreciates the help but her bosses want this to be an in-house case. Before Rush gets into her car, Fatima asks to see a picture of the baby. Saying that she doesn’t like to force people to look at her son, Rush pulls out her phone with lots of photos.
The photos are funny, as is Rush’s narration. While this is going on, Kensi puts a tracker on Rush’s SUV. When she slides back into the conversation, Fatima asks what is the boy’s name. Cash was not named for Johnny Cash but for all the money he is going to cost. She and her husband feel it is their personal PSA. As Rush gets in her car, Kensi asks what motherhood is really like. Rush calls it the best thing she’s ever done. That’s what Kensi thought.
As Rush drives away, Fatima asks Kensi if the tracker was really necessary. With Rush blowing off their offers of help, Kensi thinks it is since she could be the mole.
A relocated Eric – now in the gadget room – is found by Deeks, who wants an update. Patricia Ruiz is a college professor and a vocal part of the resistance against the Venezuelan government. Deeks thinks she has a lot of enemies. Ruiz entered the US four days earlier under an alias and has been with FBI since she arrived. Stuck in bureaucratic limbo, Ruiz is waiting for asylum but obviously someone from Venezuela found out where she was hiding.
Pulling video from surveillance cameras, Eric found the fellow in the car and his burglar buddies. Rick Lim was the getaway driver. Lim is on his way to the boat shed where Kensi and Fatima are waiting. Deeks wants to talk some more about Eric’s feelings but Eric’s phone chirps – Agent Rush stopped at a house in Venice. Eric is going to update Callen and Sam with Deeks following right behind.
Lim begs Kensi and Fatima not to tell his Mom – he’ll do whatever he needs to if it makes things go away. And he’d like them to know he was just the driver. He sells out Chris and Anthony as the burglars. Kensi and Fatima are a little confused. Seems Anthony works in landscaping and knew that the homeowners would be away for a week. Kensi tells him things make so much more sense – “why nobody called in the robbery.” Now “Ricky boy” is confused so Kensi clears things up.
When Ricky asks why he’s there, Fatima wants to know about the fire. Assuring Kensi and Fatima he had nothing to do with the fire, he saw nothing. He remembered the police cruiser and he remembered a dog. All of a sudden, he remembered a man by the fire. A large man – 220 pounds of so – walking toward the fire after it started. Rick thought the man was going into the fire to rescue someone but he didn’t.
Callen and Sam pull up in front of safe house number two. They’re torn – the FBI doesn’t want them to be part of the case and the DOJ does. Callen is willing to sit there and let the moment take them – much like his vacation. An annoyed Agent Rush comes out of the house to confront Callen and Sam. She asks if they followed her or worse, did Kensi put a tracker on her car. She finds that possibility low and cruel. When Sam brings up the DOJ wanting NCIS involved, Rush assures them the FBI has it covered. A scream and the sound of broken glass comes from the house.
Callen, Sam and Rush make their way into the house. Sam finds a body in the kitchen when there is another scream from the backyard. Two masked men are pulling Patricia Ruiz into their pick-up truck. The men run when they see Callen and Sam. Rush attends to Ruiz. The kidnappers split up with Callen following one, Sam the other. Callen runs into a group of surfers and loses his target. Sam’s chase is stopped when he is hit by a car.
Ruiz is grateful that Callen and Sam saved her life. Sam asks Rush if the FBI really does have this under control. Ruiz and Rush are going to the boat shed with NCIS Agent Paulo Martinez. With the abduction of Ruiz likely being a state-sanctioned action, NCIS can’t find out who is running things. Sam thinks they have someone inside the FBI. Two safe houses were compromised.
Walking into the boat shed, Rush admitted the FBI messed up again. Kensi introduces herself and Fatima to Patricia Ruiz. Kensi and Ruiz have similar haircuts. Kensi tells Ruiz she’s safe now. It is a statement Ruiz has heard before. As Fatima makes some coffee for Ruiz, Kensi talks to Rush who calls the FBI’s handling of the case “triage”. Since NCIS has been ordered to help the FBI, Rush wants to know what Kensi needs. Kensi wants names of everyone involved with the Ruiz case. “Screw my chain of command, I’ll tell you everything.”
Driving, Sam has questions. Today’s attempt on Ruiz was a kidnapping to bring Ruiz back to Venezuela. Yesterday’s fire was arson, which would have killed Ruiz. Callen thinks the fire was more to smoke out Ruiz and grab her outside. Sam is worried about a reward – if Venezuela has a bounty on her return, teams of people may be hunting her.
Rush’s list is long – “the FBI does not travel light.” While Kensi is worried the list is a stall tactic, Rush assures her “we are as bloated and inefficient an agency as this list would indicate.” The list is 216 agents.
The list and the level of bureaucracy at the FBI annoys Eric. “They’re obviously not the lean, mean fighting machine we are here at NCIS,” Deeks tells Eric before wondering if Eric is transferring his unhappiness … Deeks’s phone rings. There’s been another fire.
A factory is on fire. Chief Johnson is handling the fire with several firehouses’ worth of firefighters. Asked how her crews are holding up, the fire is big but nothing like the wildfires they’ve worked over the last few years. Johnson confirms this too was arson with the same signature as the safe house fire. Eric calls Callen – the factory has no connection to the FBI.
Deeks and Eric on their way to Ops again. Using surveillance cameras in the area, Eric has footage from all the blocks around the second safe house. Since the kidnappers got away on foot, they can send photos of all the pedestrians in the area to Ruiz to see if she recognizes any of them. As for the factory, it was last used in 2016. Nobody was inside. The safe house fire had three people inside. The methods of arson were the same but the fires were different.
Eric found similarities, however. Both the house and the factory are the same distance from the same fire house – just in different directions. Both fires were called in by the same male voice – probably the arsonist. Deeks starts asking Eric how the fires and the attempts on Ruiz are connected. Loudly, Eric doesn’t know – he was just excited about matching the 9-1-1 calls while Deeks is asking insightful questions. Deeks tells Eric he misses Nell too. When Eric is ready to talk about it, Deeks is there. He’s also there for a hug but Eric isn’t.
At first, Ruiz isn’t having much luck looking at the pedestrians until she comes across a man who smiled at her from her car while she was being brought from the first safe house to the second one. Rush is not pleased. While Fatima goes to run the image through facial rec, FBI Agent Munger walks into the boat shed. Rush knows she’s in trouble. Munger wants to know what agency’s facial recognition program will be used because this case started with the FBI and will stay with the FBI.
In Ops, Eric has ID’d the man Ruiz recognized as Miguel Perez traveling with five others – four men and a woman – to LAX. They all work for the Venezuelan Armed Forces.
In interrogation, Munger is yelling at Rush as Ruiz sits between them. Kensi and Fatima are watching this on the plasma in the main room. Kensi is uncomfortable watching but Fatima can’t look away. Kensi gets a call from Eric about Perez. While Eric is updating her, Munger leaves with Patricia. Rush couldn’t stop them.
Rush gives Kensi and Fatima a rundown on Munger’s vehicle but doesn’t believe he’s the leak. As Eric is searching for the car, Deeks arrives with a table. “After a short and sweet decade of watching you and Nell work in this dark and uninviting cave,” he figured out where Perez and his team are staying – the downtown Marriott. They may not have Ruiz’s location, but they can take out Perez’s team.
Callen and Sam take Kensi, wearing Ruiz’s dress, to a meet on the beach with Perez and his team. Fatima is in overwatch. Perez is not happy Callen and Sam found him, especially since he doesn’t know Callen and Sam. Sam tells Perez they are friends of the cause. Perez wants to see Ruiz. Callen pushes Kensi to the ground. When she looks up, Callen and Sam yell “federal agents” and the usual happens. This is a more fighting than shooting set-up. Sam takes out two of the four men, Callen one, Kensi gets Perez.
Back in the Armory, Callen gets a text that Ruiz was given asylum. He also tells the team that the fires had nothing to do with Ruiz. The arsonist did not know the safe house was a safe house. He set the factory on fire “because that’s what arsonists do.” LAFD found the arsonist in-house – he was a firefighter “with a very complex relationship with fire.” It is a twisted case of hero syndrome.
Eric is grateful for Deeks’s help. Deeks is surprised Eric took Nell’s departure so well. Eric isn’t. He loves what they do but Nell is taking a “big leap”. Eric would like to take that leap. Deeks wants to know where Eric would go. Saying he gets job offers once a monthly from the FANG companies, Dollar Shave Club offered him their CTO job, he fixed a big bug for Facetime, he was in the room when Kevin went live with Instagram. With friends looking to create a company with Eric, he’s proud Nell is brave enough to move on. Deeks tells Eric he’s “incredibly talented” with lots of opportunities to make million but he chooses to make a difference. Deeks appreciates that and he appreciates Eric. The two hug. Eric is off to the bar.
Kensi apologizes to Deeks but he doesn’t want to talk about it. She is really sorry she left a heavy box in the middle of the hallway. Despite being athletic, he couldn’t see it and…. Kensi makes a cute face which Deeks promises her he’s not falling for “those reindeer games.” Kensi promises he will.
At the bar, Kensi wants to know about Callen’s vacation. As he’s opening up, Sam leaves. Deeks trips behind the bar. Kensi begs Callen to say he left the bottles of wine in the middle of the bar. Deeks is yelling for Kensi.
Sam walks up to a home on the beach. Katherine is there with a nice scotch. After some banter, she invites him inside. Sam has been looking forward to seeing her all day.
What head canon can be formed from here: I get the feeling Eric is right behind Nell when it comes from the door. This is the second episode where Eric’s San Francisco opportunities are calling.
I’d like Chief Johnson and bookstore lady Carla to met.
Episode number: Episode 20 of season 11. Episode 260 overall.
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Suppose a Kid... 1 | Hortensia Saga 1 | Kumo Desu Ga 1 | 2.43 1 | Cells at Work!! 1 - 2 | Cells at Work: Code Black 1 | Back Arrow 1 - 2 | Praeter 1 | Horimiya 1 | Tomozaki 1 - 2 | Wonder Egg Priority 1 | IChu 1 | Kemono Jihen 1 | YuruCamp 2 1 | Dr Stone: Stone Wars 1 | Sk8 1 | Mushoku Tensei 1 | Design-bu 1 | Wave!! 1 | BSD Wan! 1 | Ex-Arm 1
After much watching...I cut it down to 5 anime and 1 short.
Suppose a Kid… 1
I am not writing out that full title every time! Anyways, here’s the first “real” debut of winter 2021.
For some reason…this series reminds me of Pokemon. Probably how at the start, Ash tries to get along with Pikachu by doing all sorts of things like what Lloyd is doing here. (<- learnt protag’s name through synopses)
The name “Shouma” rang a bell and I was right – Shouma is voiced by Souma…Saito.
The Japanese title has “monogatari” on the end there…so it probably doesn’t fully translate into the English title.
These orange flecks in Lloyd’s eyes are kinda distracting…
Isn’t Kunlun in China, though…?
If this is just going to be Marie yelling…I don’t see why I should stay. (<- turned volume on for everything so far)
*facepalms* Lloyd is so dense…
That fight scene’s not very good…
…oh great. Selen’s fallen in love with Lloyd already…*sigh*
The missing princess is certainly going to be a plot point later.
Wow, that tiger looks impressive! If only they could’ve done that for the fight scene…
…oh great, Selen is a low-key yandere…
Didn’t Lloyd say he sucked at combat…? Anyways, I’m not keeping this. The designs are colourful and the tiger was good, but it’s meant to be a comedy and it’s not funny.
Hortensia Saga 1
Here for Ume! He’s voicing a guy called Defloitte Danois.
I-Is that CGI? So early on into the anime???
*a dude gets bitten into by the werewolf*…welp, at least this series isn’t afraid of its own gore.
I had a sinking feeling our real protag was Alfred…and I was right, according to the OP.
Huh? The song goes silent for a second near the end…what the heck?
The book appears to use English, albeit English so faintly inked in you can’t quite tell what language it is.
Alfred, governing Albert…? Isn’t that a bit redundant?
I swear all the female voices in this anime are squeaky as all get out…
All these high fantasy anime – or heck, any high fantasy series full stop – ever justify why the country is worth fighting for. It’s why I find war stories pointless and senseless.
You can tell from the voice and short stature “Marius” is Mariel��but she uses boku, which is why Alfred can’t really tell the difference. (Also, he wasn’t privy to the fact Mariel cut her hair.)
This almost smacks of a game tutorial. The CGI is still there…it’s not as bad as other examples I’ve seen, but you can tell it’s CGI when you look at it.
Roy’s kind of pretty, in a generic way.
A close-range archer! Ho, you’re kinda impressive yourself, Roy. (The feeling of a game tutorial has disappeared by this point.)
Hortense…of Hortensia…how confusing.
The scruffy guy you keep seeing with the dark hair is Defloitte. Keep an eye out for him for me, would you?
The ED seems to consist mostly of…anguished pop screams. *cringes slightly*
Anyways, this anime isn’t bad. It’s quite average though and its CGI could easily get worse.
Kumo Desu ga 1
…you know I don’t like 1st person cam, yeah?
…this is just Kumoko (as I’ve heard her being called) yelling so far…plus there’s quite a bit of CGI.
I like how the ED has an English overlay and the style they’ve used for it. The music, though…? Nah.
Wait a second? Millepensee? Shin Itagaki? That would explain the CGI!
“…a spider that just happens to have my memories.” – A butterfly dream, huh?
…well, at least this anime is well aware of the genre space it inhabits. Maybe you could say…it’s an isekai light novel, so what? *groans from the audience*
…well, you didn’t really “bring” your “brother’s” (?) corpse in case of an emergency, now, did you?
…welp, to have guts, you must eat guts. I guess that’s how it goes.
What’s a “skanda”?
This anime’s quite monologue-y (as expected of an LN). I can live with it, but I don’t know if it can carry the entire thing through the season.
…humans? Haven’t seen them almost all episode. What are they up to?
These designs sort of look like SAO’s. They’re not a dealbreaker yet, but they could be down the line…
This ED seems to take cues from Cop Craft’s OP (same studio). It also has some…“Aggretsuko rage”, I guess you could call it.
2.43 1
…Another confusing title, I see. I normally don’t do sports anime, but I’m here for Ume.
*sees the colour of the volleyball* - Basically anything volleyball has to collaborate with volleyball maker Mikasa, doesn’t it?
This anime seems to like putting characters’ thoughts on the screen for dramatic impact. The CGI is sort of visible, but not a dealbreaker.
I’d thought I’d heard of this OP artist before, but it turns out I haven’t.
This series has a nice sense of force. You see those moments where the ball squishes, or when Yuni presses against the wall without thinking? Those.
LOL, way to burn Yuni, Chika…
These transitions are a bit hard to detect. I think I like Akudama’s more overt ones more.
LOL, Dr Popper (sic).
The serves are nothing special. Haikyuu does the same thing from the episode I saw of it. (You know I don’t like Haikyuu, yeah? Dropped it after 1 episode because everything I heard the fans talking about caused me to connect the dots.)
The way Yuni blushes…it’s more than someone usually would, even if it is out of embarrassment. It may just be the entertainment I consume, but I could swear that’s going somewhere in more of a BL manner.
I get the feeling Chika has a bit of Virgo or Taurus in him somewhere. The sort of guy who nags at everyone to do stuff his way is probably like that.
Pocari Sweat (unaltered).
I gave myself dimples by puffing up my cheeks and poking them until they became permanent. I guess you can do the same thing with ambidexterity…?
For some reason, I can detect Chika’s jealousy when he discusses blocks and natural talent.
…wow, this anime is pretty serious for a volleyball anime.
The ED scene where the face is replaced with flowers is pretty creepy. Like Jigokuraku or something.
Cells at Work!! 1
What are these blob creatures you see in the OP, anyway…?
I think I remember reading something that the numbers assigned to the cells aren’t arbitrary – they’re hexadecimal colors, e.g. RBCs get shades of red as their numbers.
D’aww, Platelets warm the heart. They really do.
Platelets have a master…? I thought they were all just lil’ kids.
“What the cell’s going on?!” – Oh, I remember seeing a tweet about this. I love that pun! Kudos to whoever was responsible for that.
LOL, no. 4989 dancing in the background.
Hmm…those nets look like CGI.
…uh, I did not need that shot of the Megakaryocyte’s camel toe…that’s distubring.
Wait, Backward Cap is a she?!
Aw, lookit WBC being a dad. That’s cute.
Backward Cap = Ushiromae-chan.
Is that…a construction worker holding a giant pudding?!
Cells at Work Code Black 1
This anime is called “black” due to black companies. It’s Code Black to avoid being racist, I guess. I’m looking forward to it because it’s undoubtedly going to show a dark side to the main series…
…and there it is, the RBC complaining.
I assume OJT = on the job training.
I knew “pespin” (sic) was a typo. It’s pepsin.
Now that I’ve been working at customer service for two years (give or take COVID), I can see where the senpai RBC is smoothing over the relations.
…that also means I know where to suppress my emotions. I’m not a person who opens up to people easily without getting used to them, so people never see me as suitable for customer service anyway, but it’s the only experience I have so *shrugs*.
…oh gosh. I haven’t seen these words since…the time I was still learning biology.
…*sigh* Rookie RBC is worried about boobs.
The fact Senpai lost his iconic hat…is kinda sad, actually.
“Don’t let his resolve be for nothing.”
Hmm…does the male WBC from the main series wear black fingerless gloves?
I thought I’d heard of this artist before…but turns out I just can’t distinguish really autotuned artists from each other…(lel)
…and stuff goes ka-blam. It’s the spiritual successor to HypMic, even if I wasn’t asking for it. (LOL)
Back Arrow 1
…I heard you said “hot guys”? (Yes, I am predictable as all get out.)
What’s with that episode title…?
Stereotypes, eh? I kind of expected as much from the promo, but where’s the title character…?
…was that yuri fanservice? I can’t quite tell because it was the aftermath of an action scene, but I can see the shippers gearing up in my head.
…after a bit of waiting, there he is. Back Arrow himself. He kind looks like Takuto (Star Driver).
“I’m not trying to hide anything!” – Well, that’s…true.
…*sigh* Why do girls always have more feminine-looking mechs? (Plus this one has boobs…*sighhhhhhhhhhhh*)
So it seems mechs in this anime are the form of one’s conviction and they have skills along those lines, eh? An interesting concept.
…you do realise I abandoned an entire anime based on a joke about lucky underwear? However, this anime is so absurd and just keeps running with the joke that I just can’t say no to it. If there’s one thing I’ve learnt from volunteering at a charity store, it’s that when it comes to selling stuff, you can’t say no to a lot of stuff…including selling potentially used underwear, so long as it’s not dirty or stinky.
Whoa! Those things break?!
Why does the title card mention the wall...?
Anyways, I…like it, surprisingly enough. Let’s keep going.
Back Arrow 2
…eh? Didn’t expect inflatable clothing, LOL.
I suspect Shu Bi is scheming something.
What’s the long thing…?
“…tomorrow might not come.” – A good reminder to have in these times of COVID.
Peath = Peace. (Heh. What a stupid name…*thinks about the name “Quattro Bajeena” suddenly* Okay, “Peath” pales in comparison to that.)
What is that creature that circles in the sky…?
I know this is meant to be a serious fight, but…that attacking guy’s hat seriously looks like a bamboo stalk and so I keep seeing it and trying not to laugh.
I only just now realised there’s CGI. CGI these days is getting much better than it used to be.
Tomozaki 1
LOL, Yontendo. It’s clearly Smash Bros + Nintendo Switch and the character designer was also around for Iroduku, so that’s why this style looks familiar.
…lemme guess, since this is a romance, it’s likely NONAME is Aoi. Or some other girl.
I would pay for a romance where it’s the girl building the guy up to be presentable, instead of a girl building other girls up to be presentable a la Ageha 100%.
Didn’t the anime show us Tomozaki reflecting to himself, though…?
“…rules working in combination.” - Well, there’s social norms (e.g. knock before entering a room), laws, contracts, societal standards (e.g. in Japanese society, you bow to others as a greeting or apology)…(continues to blabber on for a bit)
I think Aoi said something like “onitadaku”, but I’m not sure what the joke is there. Oni is in there, sure, but what’s the original phrase she’s playing off?
…LOL, it’s a good time to remind people to wear a mask.
LOL, Krout.
Anyways, this seems decent. I like how it’s going the way I want it to.
Tomozaki 2
“…make sure I’m nearby…” – Okay, that’s just being pushy, Aoi.
Minami and Hinami…so confusing…
*Minami chomps on Natsubayashi’s ear* - …okay, that’s not a thing girls do in real life unless they’re lesbians. This is likely trying to take the fanservice route.
They didn’t even show why the “kiss” was broken up…meaning they were doing it to make potential girl-on-girl look hot. Just great.
*Aoi touches Tomozaki’s butt* - Dude, that’s groping…
I didn’t think we’d get the story on Aoi’s “hexactly” so soon.
…well, that episode just made me feel mildly bitter. I’m dropping it here.
Praeter 1
…aw s***. Only a few seconds in and this looks like a terrible game…
It’s like someone barfed paint across Durarara…
The only time the background buildings look any good are when there’s a fight scene…
These Seals (or whatever those designs are called) seem to act like mini shields. Update: They’re called tattoos.
That transition was a bit fast for my liking…
Seems like the series is mildly peppered with Greek terms.
“To Infinity and Beyond” by…some author I can’t really read the name of.
Suddenly, they throw in more characters…?
Where does Eiji keep those bullet cases of his…? In his jacket?
Having a guy die in the 1st episode is cheap. I mean, we don’t quite care for him yet – it’s too early in the anime for that.
Now there’s Norse terms on top of the Greek ones…
Even more characters? You kidding me?
Lemme guess, Eiji gave up his tattoo because Yamato inspired him and now he’s a goner.
Welp, the weight of the world is in your hands, Yamato. Including that dead dude on your back. (<- sarcastic)
Sk8 1
I’ve been hearing good things about this anime! Let’s go! (<- about a week late to the debut)
That politician is probably relevant…probably someone’s dad, if HypMic taught me anything.
LOL, a beef. They call this stuff “beef”? Where’s the chicken? (<- joke from HypMic)
Haemanthus…apparently a flowering plant from S. Africa.
That’s rare, you don’t see Canadians in anime all that much. I was just thinking as I came home from volunteering how you know British people all have fancy names like William and Australians are Johnno, Danno etc., but Canadians? No clue. Update: Apparently you’d call one Arnold or something just as generic…?
Why are all foreigners in anime half-Japanese with the mother being the Japanese side, anyway?...Because people can make their character speak Japanese while looking foreign. Right. Moving right along.
Ahh…I understand your plight all too well, Reki.
…Hmm. It seems Reki’s surname is written kiya, but read “Kyan”. His name literally translates to “history (calendar/age) of bravery (military might)” Update: Turns out his surname is 3 characters (read “kiyan”, although I’ve never seen that final character ever being read as “n”) and his first name is one, so his first name is just “history (calendar/age)”.
Even I suck at balancing on bikes and stuff (…yeah, I still can’t ride a bike even though I’ve done so many other things in my life) and I know you have to support yourself with one foot on the ground before you do things like trick flips. I may not have observed Tony Hawk all that much, but he was on the periphery of my knowledge.
“What’s your hourly wage?” – Ouch, I feel ya, Langa.
Koko ni netete actually means “Lie down here”, but…okay.
These eyecatches are cute.
That’s a cute fox.
Yikes! 60 mph = approx. 97 km/h!!!
Random umeboshi, LOL.
Aghhhhhhhhhhh! Cherry Blossom’s so pretty~! I love him already!
Thank you, based Bones!
Something that can be enjoyed, even without sound: this is why I enjoy both action and comedy anime!
Okinawa? We’re in Okinawa?
Well, that was cool! I didn’t even ask where the location was until the end. Update: Why is this anime sometimes called Sk8 the Infinity anyway…?
Horimiya 1
Horimiya…I’ve been aware of this series for a while. There’s even a Chinese volume of it at a library close to me, although due to contact tracing I haven’t bothered to check it out.
Oh, I bet Hori is the otaku!
Ooh, Marketing Script!
Because I’ve been behind on the premieres, I’ve seen enough to know this boy with the chain is Miyamura.
…argh! Miyamura is cute! Y’all were right!!! (<- likes blushing bois)
I bet there’s going to be an emergency meeting!
“Sorry, it’s egg time!” – Oh, I’m laughing so hard! So that’s the context behind the Wonder Egg Priority meme!
“…see these?!” – Well, it’s not like you have a tattoo or some-*Miyamura shows his tattoos* Never mind…
Oh, I just realised they even animate the minute movements of the eyes Miyamura does…cool.
Notice how Miyamura is blocked from the other guy due to the window.
Miyamura goes “Ishikawa-kun” but “Hori-san”…hmm. No wonder he’s letting Ishikawa get Hori.
The problem I find with romance series is that they’re generally tied to heteronormativity. Hori is coded with red silhouettes and Miyamura with blue…*sigh* Whatever happened to gender ambiguity?
Good heavens, what is up with this ED?! It looks like Pocoyo! (…Does anyone else know that cartoon…?) Aside from that quibble, this anime is great though.
Mushoku Tensei 1
Apparently this is the grandad of all isekai. Why it took so long for an anime of this…who knows?
…and of course this guy’s a loser virgin. Go figure.
*sighhhhhhhhh* He’s just ogling this woman’s boobs…
…oh, sorry. I was so distracted by the man candy, I didn’t care about Rudy.
I-It’s actually quite refreshing to not have an OP protagonist from the get-go for once. (Or maybe I’ve developed such a disdain for isekai since SAO rolled around that everything here suddenly feels fresh.)
You can see the birthplace of isekai without having watched any of the others right here, it looks like.
“…what’s the point of incantations?” – To make it easier for you to cast spells, I gue-spoke too soon.
…wow, they shamelessly showed off Rudy’s privates. I know he’s still young at this stage, but that reminds me of how I dropped Dragon Ball around the time Goku was shown the same way (which is…very early on, by my own admission).
I believe, based on the name of the spinoff I see in the 7 Seas emails, the magic tutor is called Roxy.
You’re thinking about marriage?! At your (reincarnated) age?!
Oh no! The tree again!
LOL, Rudy’s acting like a kid who’s been in COVID lockdown for a while.
I think what most of the isekai that spun off from here missed is that the loser is job age. Losers at life at job age are relatable and high school geniuses are relatable (albeit sometimes insufferable), but losers who become NEETs for no reason whatsoever and then get banged up by Truck-kun are not.
Anyways, this was good, but a risky kind of good, since it seems like this male gaze will continue to be around as Rudy gets older.
Update: Dropped after learning Rudy was a paedophile in his past life.
Update 2: Apparently the anime toned down this paedophilic tendency of Rudy’s, so...now the verdict is that I move on while I let other people tell me if this is true of the anime or not.
Kemono Jihen 1
“Kemono Jihen” means something like “creature incidents”. I wonder why Funimation didn’t change the name…?
Kabane means “summer wing”.
Kanoko Villa, I’d assume, is named after the deer (the name means “deer’s child”).
My experience with Sho Aimoto (creator of this manga) is reading a bit of Hokenshitsu no Shinigami. (That, by the way, reminds me of Nube, but it’s nothing spectacular.) However, Hokenshitsu no Shinigami has a very detailed artstyle…That’s why I’m pretty shocked Kemono Jihen has such a scratchy one…
Ooh, edamame!
Oh, I see…this is like Furuba or a werewolf story, huh? Rather than a Natsume Yuujincho sort of thing.
…I thought Inugami and Dorotabo had seen everything of each other because of bathing together…I guess not, then.
…is Yataro going to die?
It seems the “immortal demons” are oni, so…why subtitle them as “immortal demons” and not just “demons”?
Ohhhhhhhh…this shite’s good. It seems to have a throwback feeling to it, moreso than even Yashahime or a lot of the sequels I’ve seen recently.
Cells at Work!! 2
I was going to move right along to Wonder Egg Priority because I’m really behind on the debuts right now, but I accidentally opened this up while I was cleaning up so I might as well watch another episode or two before setting it aside.
He’s dead, Jim. (<-joking)
…gosh, these walls look like Hover all over again and that’s from 1995…
LOL, these background cells don’t even have any details. They’re basically stick figures with fat bodies…
I think that phrase that appeared, “Take good care of B Cell!”, may be a pun on Give My Regards to Black Jack (written with similar Japanese, “B Cell wo Yoroshiku!” vs. “Black Jack ni Yoroshiku!”).
LOL, “you sure have the guts”…while they’re in the guts.
The certificate says something about it being presented to someone in the face of bravery, I think (<- just looked at it briefly).
“You have a good head on your shoulders,” says the T cell as WBC struggles with the disguise…stuck on his head.
Wonder Egg Priority 1
I’ve been hearing this series is surreal, but no more surreal than Flip Flappers. So…I don’t know if I’ll like it or not.
What’s this K?(?96…?
There’s a sunflower on her raincoat…so that’s why I saw a post called “You’re the sunflower”. Personally, that just reminds me of Post Malone.
Those Seeno Evils…they’re CGI, aren’t they?
As Boueibu once said (but I may be paraphrasing here), “nothing is more scary than free”.
…to be honest with you, I haven’t had a best friend for at least 2 years now. I only really feel close to people who are like me and who I have sustained contact with over many years, so I end up cutting contact with people after we part ways and never trying to fix it.
I always find it slightly absurd when anime girls get a little pudgy and go, “I’m so fat!” (See, for instance, the Dumbbell series.) Or, in this case, Ai’s going, “I’m so ugly!” when there’s nothing wrong with her. She’s only a bit different from everyone else due to her heterochromia - she doesn't have any physical or mental difficulties.
IChu 1
Here for Ume and, of course, dem bois. Bring it!
I seem to remember one of the magazines called an “Ichu” “an idol egg” (i.e. a fledgling idol)…More egg puns for me, then.
I found him! Ume! He’s Akira Mitsurugi! Update: Turns out that’s Toshiyuki Toyonaga…Oops. (Ume is actually Lucas from I*B.)
Huh? For a second, I imagined Akira with a dubbed voice. Of course, I could only be dreaming, because idol anime normally don’t get dubs, but…it was interesting to think about.
LOL, “Onsta”.
This Akio-type character is popular lately. The sort who’s timid but has an outstanding talent they themselves might not see.
…uh, but Kocho means “Principal”…?
An idol bear?!
Torahiko is crazy…(Note the tigers. Tora = tiger.)
Specifically, that’s black coffee with no sugar.
As much as I want to keep watching this, I’ll hit pause on it here. There’s much better offerings this season.
YuruCamp s2 1
…grandpa’s writing is so…neat.
*glares at CGI car…*
This OP just doesn’t compare to Shiny Days, y’know…?
OOPArts.
Talking pine cones! They’re back!
Curry rice! Literally had some of the Japanese-style stuff the other day. It was great.
All this talk about jobs…I personally don’t like jobs because I like to work at my own pace (hence one reason why I’m working on being a translator), but…money…I’m jealous, girls.
I’m trying not to rely on the subs for those texts that appear on the screen so that I can keep my reading skills up…I kept up with them for the most part…but then I got distracted by the croquette sign at one point…
“…buy you some local food?” – That’s omiyage, normally translated “souvenirs”. “Local food” actually does make more sense in that gap, though.
…man, I’m jealous that the girls all got jobs suitable for their personalities and everything. Lil’ ol’ antisocial me sucks at retail, even after 2 years.
Design-bu 1
LOL, that man and his bunny. Update: That’s Unabara-san.
…geez, these utaite are everywhere now. I’ve seen 96neko, USSS, Eve and more being more central to anime song creation…
Thise characters in the OP seal (<-the stamp, not the animal) are saiyou, meaning “recruited”, or in this case, “accepted”.
OEM = original equipment manufacturer.
Hrm…you can tell it’s a giraffe by description, but…that “base everything on the horse” is interesting as you could count several things as horse derivatives. Also, the angels’ names are all standard Japanese names with natural components to them (Ueda = upright rice field, Shimoda = frost rice field etc).
Is this pink-themed guy…a guy? Or a crossdresser? Update: That’s Kanamori-san.
I like how the suits have little wing-like flaps. Also the wings on Shimoda’s back.
…I never thought an anime episode would make me so concerned about giraffes.
That guy in the green I remember from the Wave x Tendebu (Heaven’s Design Team) collab, his name is Kimura.
Oh, so there is a bird like that!
The random wiggling the chibis do in these short segments…it’s a bit disorienting. (<-Just a small quibble of mine.)
Oh! Galapagos effect!
Agonistic: “polemical; combative.” I thought they meant “antagonistic”.
Oh man, that punch line was great! It took me a while to get into the spirit of it, but this anime is great!
Update: Oh, that’s where those nature names come from! They’re actually meant to be gods! (Or…named after gods…?) Also, Ueda vs. Shimoda (the “shimo” could be the kanji for “below”).
Ex-Arm 1
I’ve heard this anime looks bad…even well before its debut. How bad? Let’s find out.
*stifles laughter* From the first pan, I know this anime is doomed on my list. Even Praeter was better than this!
*stifles laughter again* This OP really does look as bad as the stuff I was seeing prior to winter 2021! Like a game I shouldn’t take out of my archives! (It’s not as bad as Hover’s graphics, but still…that’s from 1995. Cut it some slack.)
That’s the 2nd Kimura this season…
Yugg is just…ugly. Never try to render elaborate eyelashes in CGI again, people.
Dimension High School was better than this because at least that had puzzles. This is even jankier than that!
Wait, why is Akira 3D when his dad is 2D? It’s not that obvious, but I notice these things. Update: That’s not his dad…but close enough. (That’s his brother.)
…and here comes Truck-kun! (LOL)
This would be good…if it weren’t rendered in the jankiest CGI known to man…
Alma’s gun strike doesn’t have a lot of force to it.
The fire is rendered so terribly…*stifles laughter*
This part with a disembodied Akira is what I assume I got up at 6 am for…but I can’t hear it, due to background noise. Remind me to confirm this later. (Minami’s mouth is rendered so terribly…augh.)
No force to any of these recent motions, either.
LOL, this censorship.
Wave 1
Ever since this project was announced, I’ve been watching developments unfold on Anime News Network. I knew it would get an anime or something similar I could follow…and now here I am. I mentioned in the Sk8 comments I have basically zero knowledge of surfing, so…this is very unexpected, in one sense.
Was that a drone…?
“Wizard of the Waifu Board”?! Are you kidding me?! (LOL)
There seem to be shots where I can see the CGI here, but…anything’s better than Ex-Arm. Let’s say that.
Actually…yappe is a derivative of yabai, meaning “cool” or “crap” (in an ironic sense). So it would probably be better to translate it as “Surfing’s the greatest!” or “Surfing’s the coolest!” Anyways, what I was thinking before I was going to say this was that the waves are so enticingly animated, it feels like a summer anime. Basically the only other anime I’ve ever said that for is Grand Blue.
If I’m understanding where Isokichi’s name comes from right, “iso” is the character for seashore or a rocky beach (磯).
LOL, the teacher just wrote “Show must go on.”
Hayama, Kanagawa. Kanagawa’s capital is Yokohama, so it’s not quite Tokyo, but somewhat close.
“Murphy”? I have zero clue what that means.
Oh, I see. The title is translated that way due to context. Now that I can accept.
I just burst out into laughter when I realised Nalu hasn’t dropped or put down his ukulele once.
BSD Wan! 1
Here comes my past to haunt me…aside from me being a fan of BSD, I’m here because I influenced this series. How so? Once upon a time in the now-distant year of 2016, I was a scanlator for a brief period. Most of the work I’ve done hasn’t influenced the world at large, but this is the most influential manga I had a hand in working on.
Oh no! They’re starting with the dog AU?! (That comes from pretty far into the manga, IIRC. Further than my work was on it, at least.)
It’s Rashomon, but Rashoken (that last bit means “dog”). Hence Ruffshomon.
Basically, they just insert dog-related words everywhere…don’t make me explain every one!
Ouch, I can only imagine how much pain it was to translate Inu Shikkaku. Literally, it’s “No Longer a Dog”, but how would anyone make it in line with the other puns…?
I wasn’t fully aware of how the dog AU was connected to the main Wan series because I haven’t really looked at it after I quit due to aggregators, but…that was a nice fakeout. Also, I was concerned as to whether this was going to be a full-length ep or a short…seems like it’s a 10 minute short, so I have more chances of taking it.
…oh gosh, that pose! I remember it! I worked on this one! (Now that I know it’s a TV short, I won’t cover future episodes, but I want to at least finish this one because I started it.)
I think they added a bit there. I remember Kunikida’s and Yosano’s were in the manga, but not the other members or Fukuzawa going “the wind is smiling” + Kenji working on the roof at the start.
Oh yeahhhhhhhhhhhhh, I remember Rampo. I think I had to approximate how he would say stuff with Pocky in his mouth, but Slug (current scanlator) went the extra mile and stuck food in his mouth to do the same panel.
It seems to make a short ep., they strung a bunch of the chapters together. Also, I don’t think we ever found out what Yosano’s puddle was and that was…probably for the better.
Oh yeah…I think I remember this one.
Now I remember it! I remember having fun explaining what a youkan was.
Whoa, Higuchi scrapped the SFX! That wasn’t in the original…
The ED seems to be an Atsushi cover of Namae wo Yobu yo.
Oh noooooooooooo! The flower gazing episode! That’s the one I remember most, because I was trying to figure out how to translate 移動 while making it smooth-sounding English…(I remember the final result was something like, “Move! Move~!”
Dr Stone: Stone Wars 1
Final debut! Let’s go~!
The last time this series was on the air was about 1 year ago. I can remember that far back…
I like how that recap is framed as Gen talking to the kids.
Senku overcomes every problem with science.
…not much to comment on here.
#simulcast commentary#Dr Stone: Stone Wars#Cells at Work!!#cells at work: code black#kemono jihen#IChu#2.43: seiin koukou danshi volley-bu#wave!! surfing yappe!!#sk8 the infinity#mushoku tensei#kumo desu ga nani ka#I'm a Spider So What?#Back Arrow#Scar on the Praeter#Bungo Stray Dogs Wan!#jaku chara tomozaki kun#suppose a kid from the last dungeon boonies moved to a starter town#Hortensia Saga#Horimiya#wonder egg priority#YuruCamp 2#Ex-Arm#tenchi sōzō design-bu#heaven's design team#Chesarka watches Sk8#chesarka watches Wave!! Surfing Yappe!#Chesarka watches Kemono Jihen#Chesarka watches Horimiya#Chesarka watches Back Arrow
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Steve’s Playlist
Written for @the-sad-hatter’s Weird and Wonderful Challenge. This is the first fic I’ve written with a first person narrator. I tried to write it fully as an inserted reader, but that was just too weird for me, so I tried to make the first person as neutral as I could.
Prompt 26: I Put a Spell on You, Nina Simone
Steve’s Playlist
Rated T/PG
It’s a few minutes before 1700 and Director Fury shouts my name as I turn off the light in my cubicle.
“Agent, before you leave, can you take this to Rogers?”
I swallow hard, trying to play it cool. “Captain Rogers?” As if there is another one. Well, there is a Rogers down in accounting but I’m pretty sure the Director has no idea he even exists. He barely knows I exist. Though he did call me by name, so maybe it’s not a good idea to underestimate the Director’s pulse on the plebes of S.H.I.E.L.D.
“Yes, that one.” Bingo “Do you know where his office is, on the 3rd floor?” Everyone knew the Captain had chosen an office across from the hanger bay. It faced the interior of the Triskelion, meaning its window looked out mostly on the walls of the other two buildings; nothing but concrete and glass. It was the kind of office some middle manager would have, not the leader of the Avengers. But the Captain liked being close to the hanger, often eating lunch in the Machinists Lounge with the ground crew.
“I do. Just that then?” I held out my hand towards him.
He passed me a 11”x 17” Manila envelope, about an inch thick. “That’s all. Good night.” He turns away before I can wish him a good night back.
As I get off the elevator, I can hear the steep trumpet crescendo of the opening stanzas of Sir Duke playing. Normally, the halls are quiet, but someone must be using the after-hours nature of their work to play music. S.H.I.E.L.D. rules prohibit connecting to any streaming services on company computers, so whoever it is has brought in speakers and must be playing it off their personal phone. Turning down the hall brings the music even louder.
Music is a world within itself, it’s a language we all understand, with an equal opportunity to sing and dance and clap your hands.
Stevie Wonder’s distinctive rhythm filled my ears, getting louder as I walked. My mom used to play this song on her Hits of the ‘70’s CD. You can feel it all over. You can feel it all over, people!
By the time I round the corner to the inverted half-circle that makes up the interior of the uniquely shaped office complex, the source of the the music becomes obvious. It’s pretty loud now and I can see him standing at his elevated computer desk, his feet stepping in time to the music as he types that is rather adorable, but I tamp such thoughts down hard. This is Captain America for fucks sake. My knock clearly gives him a slight startle and I feel bad.
“Oh, hey.” He reaches over quickly and taps pause on his phone.
“You don’t have to stop on my account. I was told to bring you this.” I hold the envelope out for him, still standing just outside the doorway like a dumb-ass. It’s just an office, but it’s an Avenger office, which feels more sacred.
Steve chuckles, “There’s no magic force field there you know. You can come in.”
Crossing the threshold, I can’t help but look around. He keeps his office pretty sparse. There’s a whiteboard on one wall and to the left of his desk, a framed picture of what looks like Benjamin Franklin holding a large balance scale with an old-time baseball player standing on half. Over the top of the players’ images are the words “Brooklyn Dodgers” on the left and “New York Yankees” on the right. Looking closer, you can see it’s from the 1941 World Series.
“Whoa, is that original?”
He raises his eyebrows and whistles slightly. “Man, I wish. No, it’s a replica poster. But I had the playbook from that series. Went to every game and managed to get signatures on it from everyone but Riggs and Frank. I’d left it at my mom’s place when I enlisted but now it’s lost to time. If it survived, I’m sure it’s in some collector’s wall safe by now. You follow baseball?”
I shrug. “Not like that. I’m always up for a Nationals game if I get a chance. There is an energy watching live games that I enjoy, especially with good friends. But I don’t ever watch on TV.”
He nods. “TV wasn’t an option when I was a kid, just radio. But I agree with you. I still listen to games sometimes, but I don’t like watching them on TV. ‘Course, they aren’t in Brooklyn anymore, so they aren’t my Dodgers anyway.”
I looked down at the only picture on his desk. It’s a plain, pine framed image of three people sitting in what might be a large restaurant booth, but it’s hard to tell. They look happy, and maybe a little drunk. The woman I recognize immediately because her portrait hangs in the main foyer. Margaret Carter, one of the founders of S.H.I.E.L.D., though she’s much younger in his picture. The other two men I don’t know, though one is kind of familiar. “That’s Director Carter, right?” I ask, pointing at it.
Steve picks it up and hands it to me for a closer look. “Yeah. Spring 1944. Peggy. Howard. Bucky.” He points to each face. “That was taken at this restaurant Howard knew. No matter where we were, he knew the best places to go that hadn’t been bombed or raided and every waitress knew him by name.”
Now I knew why the man in the middle was familiar. His picture hung downstairs next to Director Carter’s, but he looks so good this picture. Now that I’ve made the connection, I can see the Stark resemblance.
“Woah, Mr. Stark didn’t age real well.” The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them and I wanted desperately to take them back. “I’m so sorry. That was...sorry.”
My stomach clenches and temples throb with embarrassment. Who the fuck am I to criticize his friends? These people are portraits on a wall to me, but to him, they were drinking buddies. Best friends. The heat of my emotions races under my skin and I can’t bring myself to look him in the eye.
“It’s OK.” He takes the photo back, looking at it as he speaks. “Howard was so full of life and playful energy when I knew him. From what I understand, that changed as he got older. This is my memory of him though. And I’m glad I have it.”
His words shift my embarrassment to shame. “I’m glad you have it too. Can I ask...” He places the picture down and looks at me with such kind eyes I continue. “Where did you find it? I mean, it’s more personal than any S.H.I.E.L.D. photo I’ve seen and you said your stuff didn’t seem to stick around.” I was trying to cover my embarrassment with curiosity, seeking some neutral ground again.
“Tony gave it to me. I shot the photo, but I’d never seen how it turned out.”
I’d heard that he and Iron Man didn’t always get along. Mostly gossip about how they bicker and would annoy the agents waiting to deploy on an op, so the Director had stopped sending them to the same places if he could help it. In this moment though, it was clear that Tony was a strong conduit to Steve’s past and it was hard to ignore the wave of loneliness that rolled off him. “It’s a great one. They look so happy.” He nods, continuing to look at it. I don’t want to step on his reminiscence so I turn to leave him to his thoughts.
“Agent?” I stop and pivot just a little towards him. “The envelope?” I realize it’s still tucked under my arm and I look towards the ceiling in a desperate plea for The Powers of All to save me from any more stupid moves in front of this man ever again.
“Right, sorry.” I say, hoping some old-time stage hook will just come drag me away.
“Thanks. And you don’t need to apologize all the time. You work here, same as me. You have as much right to be in this office as I do.”
O, Captain, that is not at all true. Thankfully, my brain stops my running mouth before I straight up contradict a superior, though I appreciate that he wants that to be true. “Good night, Captain.”
“Good night.” As I leave the office, the music starts again; this time playing playing Earth, Wind, and Fire’s September.
******
In any other context, I might object to being tasked as Director Fury’s delivery person with ever increasing regularity, since I’m an analyst, not a messenger. However, the only person he sends me to is Captain Rogers, so how can I complain? Yeah, he’s the 8th level of Dante’s Inferno kind of hot, but these end-of-work assignments have let me see Steve Rogers for who he is, not just a magazine cover story. Most of our conversations only last 4 or 5 minutes, but they are the best part of any day they happen. He’ll ask about my work and genuinely seems interested the data analysis I do. I don’t ask him about the rumors of missions he goes on because my security clearance is slightly above the kid who delivers our sandwiches at lunch time so I stick to topics of life outside of work. Surprisingly, he never seems to hold back personal stories. Especially ones of his past. Something extremely rare in this building.
Every time the elevator doors open on the third floor after 1700, I can hear the music play. Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind, and Fire, Aretha Franklin, Al Green, Otis Redding, Stevie Wonder, ...he definitely has a specific taste for 60′s & 70’s R&B. Today as I approach, the song plays slow and melancholy.
You know I can’t stand it. Your running around. You know better, daddy. I can’t stand it, ‘cause you put me down. Yeah, yeah. I put a spell on you, because you’re mine.
Something made me stop just outside his office this time, listening. I can see him sitting with his arm resting on his desk, playing with a metal coin of some kind while looking out the window. The coin is bigger than any currency I’ve seen, and thicker, like a medal or medallion. He idly flips it through his fingers, lost in thought as the trumpet plays a jazz rift.
I love you, I love you, I love you, I love you anyhow. And I don’t care if you don’t want me, I’m yours anyhow. I put a spell on you, because you’re mine.
A deep, mournful scatting ends the song so I knock lightly, knowing I’m interrupting something. He turns his head a little and nods, so I enter. As I get closer, I see wetness in his eyes. Not falling, just holding a firm tension at the edge of his lids.
“You OK, Sir?”
He sits up a little and shifts his chair so he’s fully turned towards me from behind his desk. “No need to call me Sir. And yeah, I’m fine.” He taps the coin on the desk and lays it down as he reaches over and pauses the playlist, which had shuffled to Bring It on Home to Me by Sam Cooke.
“Please. Sit and talk to me for bit.”
This is the first time he’s asked me to sit during one of these after-work deliveries, making me wonder if he really is OK. “I’m sorry for interrupting, I just needed to bring you this.” I slid the folder with the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo on the front towards him. This one wasn’t classified, or I never would have been asked to bring it in an open file folder.
“You really gotta stop apologizing for things that aren’t your fault or responsibility. You’re here because you were ordered to by Fury.”
“I don’t mind, really.”
“Well, it’s not exactly in your job description to bring me files. It’s probably my fault you keep getting asked. After the first time, I was talking to Nick about the information you’d given me and I told him that I enjoyed talking to you.”
My ears feel warm at the compliment. “I enjoy talking to you too.” This feels so awkwardly intimate that I have to shift gears to ease my nervousness. “What is that?” I point to the coin.
He hands it over. It’s about an inch and half in diameter; punched brass in deep relief. The edges are slightly worn down but readable. The words “107th Infantry” along run along the outer edge with two crossed rifles in the center.
“It’s a Challenge Coin. They became a thing with the OSS during the war, but after all they’d been through with Hydra, the 107th felt they deserved them too. So the junior officers had their own made.”
“Was that your unit?” I wished I recalled more from 10th grade history class.
“Not exactly. I was kind of my own unit, but I ran missions with the 107th and a few others once the Howling Commandos came together. That,” he gestures to the coin in my hand, “was Bucky’s.”
I glance at the photo on the desk. After our first encounter, I’d Googled Bucky Barnes so I wouldn’t make any more asshole remarks about his friends and learned he’d been a Sergeant in the 107th. “Wasn’t he enlisted though?”
Steve raised an eyebrow.”You’ve been researching. Yeah, but he was also very good at placing bets he knew he wouldn’t lose. Won it off an LT we both didn’t like very much.”
Remembering his other stories of items lost to the past, I ask, “However did you find it?”
“Never lost it. The night before the mission where...” He paused and took a breath, “before he died, Buck had given it to me. It was still in my uniform pocket when they thawed me out.”
The question floated in the silence and I wasn’t sure if it was one he wanted me to ask or not. In all our conversations, he was profoundly honest, and he’d brought it up, so that seemed like a green light.
“Why did he give it to you?”
“I’ve thought about that over and over since the day he fell. At first, I thought maybe he knew somehow...that he wouldn’t make it back. In the years since... it seems more of a promise. Not sure what he was promising exactly, but that feels more right to me. Bucky never believed a mission would fail, so it makes no sense for him to give to me as a goodbye.”
“And that song? The one playing before I came in? I know it’s an oldie, but I didn’t think it went back to the ‘40s.”
He chuckled. “What’re talking about? To me, Nina Simone’s a baby.”
“That was a woman singing?” I’d heard of Nina Simone, but realized I didn’t know which songs she was famous for.
“Yeah. Don’t you just love her voice?”
“She’s amazing.” I agree. “You listen to the blues a lot, I’ve noticed. Doesn’t that make you sad?”
“You think my music is sad?” He asks, not accusing, but with genuine interest.
“Well, isn’t that what the Blues are? Songs for when you’re feeling down?”
“I read a quote once by Etta James, ‘When I’m singing blues, I’m singing life.’ I know a lot of folks around here think my life is sad; ‘cause of what I lost. And there are times I am. But when I listen to the blues, I don’t even think about the time since I woke up. I think about times before. Brooklyn. My mom. Breadlines around the block. Not enough coal to keep the room warm. Bucky. The War. These songs, they feel like mine, even if it’s music from a later generation. Ya gotta listen to them with your heart. They aren’t sad at all really, just honest. The blues is life. Thanks for this.” He slid the folder over and placed it in his in-box.
I hand the coin back to him and he places it in the front pocket of his cargo pants. “You’re welcome. Thanks for sharing. I always learn something when we talk.” I stand up to leave.
“You’re easy to talk to. That’s a real gift. You ever thought of field work?”
I shake my head firmly. “No way. I learned real fast in academy that I’m as likely to shoot you or the wall as any target. I suck at firearms.” He laughs and bestows on me smile that reminds me why everyone loves him. “I like the work I do and I think I’m pretty good at it.”
“Gotta love someone who knows their strengths and weaknesses. You don’t have to limit your visits to delivering Nick’s paperwork, y’know. Come by anytime.”
I nod. “G’night Captain.”
“Good-night.” He’d touched the music back on before I’d even turned around.
If you ever change your mind about leaving, leaving me behind, Oh baby, bring it to me
The lyrics followed me out the door and down the hall as I pulled out my phone to start making a new Spotify list.
#the-sad-hatter#steve rogers x reader#canon-compliant#Captain America fic#Zandra_Court#fic challenge#Weird and Wonderful Hatters Challenge#Pre-Winter Soldier
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