#I was horrified so I wrote something like a fix-it scenario and then I got ahead of myself and wrote a whole thing.

[vonehrenfest]

DCxDP: Dead guys stick together

(A Batman 138 fix-it)

After Bizarro becomes King of Hell he watches the mortal world and is distraught to find that his brother/best friend/sorta father-figure has been hurt very badly and is calling out for help.

Distraught, he goes to another lord of the netherworld who he's heard has access to a portal (and subjects a bit more compatible with the act of helping someone). He asks King Phantom would he please please help him protect his brother/friend, and if he does Bizarro will owe him a favor and leave his realm alone.

When the inferno had initially breached the Ghost Zone Danny had thought he was going to have to deal with f*cking Trigon again, but as it turns out that guy's been replaced and the new guy is pretty nice. After a brief cosmic battle and a clearing of misunderstandings, Danny agrees to Bizarro’s request.

While Gotham's vigilante civil war continues on its rooftops, Jason is in a cell. He is trembling, practically catatonic again, and losing his mind. He’s seeing the flaming figure of a knight on horseback appear from the shadowy far wall of his room, like some kind of fairytale nightmare version of Batman. It takes a while for Jason to realize he’s talking. 

“... part of the treaty between the King of Ghosts and King of Demons, Jason Todd: Prince of Demons has been granted special status and is henceforth a protected and honorary citizen of the Infinite Realms.” 

Nightmare-Bruce touches his flaming sword on Jason’s shoulder and the unearthly fire instantly engulfs him. Relief washes through Jason, and it’s so strong he nearly drops asleep.

Bruce is apologetic when everything’s over and he realizes the mistakes he’s made... but nothing really changes. (It is a relief to Bruce that no one died or was permanently injured, Jason's condition resolved itself somehow, and Bruce is normal now so really everything is fixed or at least it will be fixed.)

Just like when Jason first came back from the dead, Bruce's response makes him hurt deeper than the physical torture itself. Jason is the one who died but Bruce acts like the ghost. Singleminded, possessive, stuck in time and blind to it; bound to repeat the same cycles again and again. Jason is the ghost but he's died multiple times now, and maybe that's kind of like living and maybe that means he can move on. 

Dani and Bizarro become friends, and she gets Danny's friend Tucker to somehow set up a working Wi-Fi connection in hell so they can all play games together. (He’s not going to question it. Everything about Amity Park is abnormal. They helped him and they’re good to Bizarro, that’s all that matters.) 

Jason forges a fake identity for Dani. He might ask Babs to make a better one for her if she ever needs it but he doubts that's likely. He hasn’t had a living identity for years now after all, he’s an old hand at fake identities. Dani is delighted and starts attending school soon after. 

Danny has good friends, and as far as Jason can tell plenty of reliable mentors in the ghost world. You wouldn’t think it, but Jason’s less worried about Danny in his role as a little godling than in his civilian life. He’s got too much on his plate- too much power yet not enough to actually resolve his real issues. Not enough to protect himself where he’s vulnerable. 

The “Guys in White” that Danny likes to complain about are concerning. So is the fact that Danny’s lives with mad-scientist parents who are trying to hunt down his alternate identity. So is his ever grinding cold-war with the mayor of his town… And something else too that had been niggling at the back of Jason’s mind ever since he’d first gotten to talk to these kids. 

One day Danny’s sister, Jazz asks to talk to him. He’s an adult she says. That’s true he replies. He’s capable of protecting himself and other people, she says. Well, he has the training and experience for it, he agrees. If things go wrong, would Jason let Danny or Dani stay with him- just until she becomes a legal adult? She asks. Jason’s... not the sort of person who should be taking kids in. Danny saved his life though. He won’t say no. He says of course.

Jason knew it. Everything about Amity Park is abnormal.

The town doesn’t technically exist- there are no maps that include it and even satellite imaging is corrupted where Danny describes his hometown is supposed to be. There are no references to it on the internet that couldn’t be referring to a totally different Amity Park elsewhere, and judging by the problems they occasionally had on gaming nights and the odd offhand remarks Danny and his friends sometimes made, it was looking extremely likely that all communications between Amity Park and the outside were being heavily censored. Before Jason knew it he had started a full-on investigation on the GIW, Mayor Vlad Masters, former Mayor Montez, and Axion Labs.

Hope and fear lodges itself in Danny’s chest. Jason’s an adult and he’s actually going to help.

#Batman 138 #Context for anyone unfamiliar: #This is the issue wherein Bruce injects a device into Jason that releases fear toxin when his heart rate rises in order to make him docile #I was horrified so I wrote something like a fix-it scenario and then I got ahead of myself and wrote a whole thing. #comics Bruce is really different from the animated Bruce I grew up with :( #I just want Jason to be safe and not have to be alone #this arc can go straight into Danny Jason and babs/birds of prey bringing the anti ecto laws to the JL #one of the major problems Danny faces is that he has good friends and good ghost mentors but he doesn’t have any real world adults #he knows his parents will love him no matter what but it’s clear he doesn’t trust them #he prefers them not to know even though he has faith they’ll still live him #love him I mean #dpxdc #Jason Todd adopts Danny #danny adopts jason #Gotham Wars

[crumpetz]

every week i reread Grilled Cheese and sob™️. like tears dripping snot running the whole shebang.

but i have Burning questions. in the story, are dick and bruce aware of how fcked up their relationship w tim is? it seemed like dick had some idea (like he feels bad but continues his behavior. Yikes) but idk. do u see them trying to fix it after the fic ends? it plagues my thoughts. Feel free to ignore this tho i just love ur writing 💕

thank you so much :D when i wrote it, i had a whole lot of ideas of how it got to that point and whether bruce or dick were aware!

it was important to me that tim wasn’t just getting upset on his own without anyone realizing they’d done anything. i wanted to write a story where bruce and dick weren’t malicious, but they did lean too hard on tim’s independence and willingness to compromise in a time of great stress, and they were to some level aware they were doing it.

in my mind, both of them had planned to address things with tim when the difficult adjustment period everyone was in had passed. but i imagined also that they were relying on tim to wait for that and to forgive them in the meantime. i didn’t see this as a “bruce and dick treat tim badly specifically” scenario, more like an “oftentimes in families going through a crisis, the kids who can take care of themselves get relied on by the adults unfairly because even adults struggle to navigate things like this.” not to excuse what happened, but to give it a sense of understanding.

but i imagined this all happening when tim was still just barely out of a pretty dark time, and his relationships with dick and bruce didn’t feel stable to him, so even as he was letting things go, it was wearing him down. and, to be fair, i don't see tim telling them all this.

i imagined tim’s accident and his refusal to see anyone but jason sort of shaking bruce and dick out of their autopilot, them being horrified at the state of their relationship with tim, but also having a good idea of how it got that way.

i do definitely see both dick and bruce fixing things with tim eventually, though that would look pretty different for both of them since i see bruce’s parental responsibilities as really different from dick’s older brother role. i put less on dick than i do on bruce because i don’t think dick should’ve been shouldered with so much responsibility for his siblings to begin with.

one thing i really love about bruce and dick is that both of them fixate once they set their sights on something, so now that they’re addressing the stuff with tim, it’ll definitely get better. tim’s also the type to want to forgive people and repair his relationships when he can, so i see them all being fine someday :)

#i am still working on the sequel lol #there'll be some reconcilliation #though the focus will mostly be on jason and tim same as the original

[threeletterslife]

Chapter 12 let's go bitches~

Holy SHIT that dream was... something. Just reading it is horrifying enough, if I actually dreamt something like that I would NOT make it through the night jfc

And the boxy smile??? Anything referencing to my guy taehyung catches my attention 👀 still very curious about what happened to him 😭😭

I've gotten so used to Heli I forgot what a miracle it was that he's here 😭 also considering the fact that we now basically know she's a Darlarean, it makes me even more happy that Heli's attached to her despite her not being Solarian

THE GENERAL YOONGI YOONGI YOONGI YOONGI YOONGI AJSHKABSSIXVWIS SIABAJ

My heart started beating so fast godammit this is the perfect scenario I fucking love you HAHZBABbV

She's riding a tiger that is so fuckinv cool man... I wanna ride heli :(

NOT THE TANK TOP AJZBXJJAZVIA YOONGI WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING GIVE ME SOME WARNING FIRST MY GUY😭😭

I love Woosang already 😭 what a cutie

Wait y/n has fans?? That's actually so adorable, I should have guessed by now but I didn't realise the people would adore her like with the other officers ahshshdb

Okay Jinhee 100% knew what she was doing with "the general always comes alone". She got y/n second guessing everything

Sohee trying to get gossip on the general from y/n is such a mood honestly. Poor y/n's been pushed on the spot but it's okay since it's funny 👌

Wait what did yoongi do? Omg y/n spill the tea

I SKIPPED AHEAD A LITTLE NOPEITY NOPE NOT THE AWKWARD SILENCE NOPEEEE I don't wanna read on... I can't take awkward moments man 😭😭 don't do this to me

SHE FIXED IT THANK GOD hallelujah 😭

Man please don't let something else awkward happen, this is such a cute moment. The Kim family ahhh I love them

Oh yoongi's nostalgic... it must be so weird being away from home for so long, and coming back to everything being exactly the same. And for him especially it must be so bittersweet

The memories... I wanna hug him 😭

Just to fangirl over your writing for a bit: The way their thoughts kind of merged together, and effortlessly transferred from his train of thought to hers... idk how to explain it. It reads so smoothly, you made it fit together so perfectly. In conclusion: I love you

HANA SWEETIEEEEEEE SHES SO CUTE I'm glad to hear she's doing well, lovelie <3

So many thoughts about this chapter, not enough time to write them all down. I have no idea how to write my thoughts into words-

But good. Good chapter 👌👌👌👌. Great chapter. You're doing amazing always <3

Also very exciting that you are now experiencing #adultlife. How's it going with that? To me it genuinely sounds terrifying

See you next time <3333

yes!! the legend is back 😩

your excitement is literally contagious! i wrote the story, but i'm still finding myself getting hyped up over what you're excited about!! this chapter really explored the intricacies of the general's past (his relationship with his family—plus his standing with our oc!!)

i guess word travels fast in solaria 😳 but it's also almost been a year since our oc woke up with all of her memories gone. i'm sure everyone and their mothers have heard of her by now. and to think she's also sort of a prodigy?? bro, who wouldn't stan?? 😩

LMAOOO WRITING AWKWARD MOMENTS IS ACTUALLY MY SPECIALTY (WEIRD FLEX, I KNOW). THIS MAY COME AS HORRIBLE NEWS BUT THERE MIGHT JUST BE MORE TO COME (I'M SORRY)

ahh it also looks like i have done my job 😎 my very intent with this chapter was to make a seamless transition between the thoughts of the general and the oc!! that way, if there were any parallels in their thinking, it would be ultra-obvious!

there were a hell of a lot of topics touched upon in this chapter! it's meant to be the kind where you really have to think about it!

#adultlife is kind of strange. i've already experienced being chased down by a man, a blackout, figuring out how to cook, scrubbing down my whole apartment after spotting two—yes, two—fucking spiders. it has been hectic, especially since i'm balancing summer classes, but i'd rather have a busy schedule than no schedule at all! it keeps me in check LOL. adult life is weird because you get so much freedom, but the caveat is definitely the arbitrary problems that pop up out of nowhere and it's your responsibility to fix them. essentially, no more hand-holding. but i'm honestly fine with that because i was always independent. yet... when it comes to things like spiders and men following me, i have to draw the line

anyways!! thank you for asking and leaving such a fun review to follow!! i always laugh and smile reading all of your thoughts for the latest chapter :) have a great week and see you next time ✨

#ask #chimchiekookie #legends of darlaria #lod

[omg-im-such-a-masochist]

COPING WITH YOUR FEARS

Prompt: You just bought a new house with your boyfriend Roman,with the thing he loves the most in it: a pool. The only problem? He doesn’t know you’re terrified of water and don’t know how to swim.

Word count: Long-ish

Pairing: Roman Reigns x Reader

Warnings: +18,clitoris stimulation,smut implied,cursing,praise kink,aquaphobia(fear of water),slight angst

Tag: My sister from another mister @ziasaph (she might recognize this topic hahahah thank you for always inspiring me,love!)

Notes: Hello loves! So this is a based on a true story event (I almost drowned when I was a little girl and have been terrified of water since then),so this is me trying to cope with my fear even if it’s only a fictional thing hahahaha(since this specific scenario with Roman is impossible for little old me! But that doesn’t mean a girl can’t dream right?!).Sorry for misspellings,english isn’t my first language...you know the usual. Please let me know what you think(if you’re comfortable with it) some feedback is always appreciated ❤️ Also feel free to check out my other stories typing ‘masochist writes’ on the search bar on my page and you can always find my latest story as a fixed post on my page. Ok I’m done babbling now hahahaha. Hope you’ll enjoy 😉

Oh summer...the best season to enjoy the life outside: wear nothing more than swimsuits and bikinis,get some Mother Nature’s natural vitamin D and swimming!

It all sounds like a dream,right?! Except for the fact that.. I DON’T know how to swim,in fact I’m terrified of the thought of swimming! When I was a little girl I almost drowned and since then I’m terrified of water,even the simple thought of it makes me shiver.

So I don’t know what was I thinking when I agreed with my boyfriend’s horrifying idea of buying a house WITH A POOL on it! And of course that the damn thing not only had to be large but also deep.

So here I am now,sitting on the living room couch,looking out the french doors that lead to the patio watching my boyfriend excitedly fill up the pool and the pool toys so we can “happily” enjoy our newest acquisition.

“Y/N? Babe,can you come out here for a second please?”

I reluctantly got up from the couch and made my way towards him outside.

“Yes,Ro?”

He looked at me with a frown and said “Why aren’t you changed into your bikini yet?”

I gulped before I respond “I don’t have any”

“You mean,you didn’t brought any?We can take the car and get a pair at our old house”he said with a smile

“No babe, I mean like, I don’t own a pair”

“That’s not a problem either,we can go to Target so you can buy one” he responded still smiling

“What I’m trying to say is that I don’t wanna buy one...” I said with a low voice

“Oh..so you wanna go skinny dipping huh?” He deviously smirks at me and started to take his shirt off “Ugh,I love the way you think baby girl” with that he closed the distance between us and captured my lips in the most sensual kiss.

“Hmmm...Roman..wait.”

He reached to the hem of my tank top

“Ro, I gotta tell you something..”

“Later,baby..” He hummed while he pulled my tank top over my head and I took advantage of the break to say

“Ro,baby, I don’t know how to swim and also I may or may not be terrified of water since I almost drowned when I was a kid” I said as fast as I could

“What?Wait...Y/N why you never told me this before,my angel?”

“Because the subject never came up..” I embarrassedly said

“Babe,how the subject never came up when I suggested that we should by a house WITH a pool on it so WE could enjoy it?Didn’t the subject came up then?” He asked slightly angry

“It did” My voice was barely a whisper

“So,why didn’t you said ‘Roman, I don’t wanna buy a house with a pool on it,because I don’t know how to swim and I’m terrified of water?’ You should’ve told me beforehand!”

Oh boy,now he was really angry! I’ve officially woken the beast

“I’m sorry... I didn’t say anything because,I saw your excitement when you saw the pool,and I know how much you like to swim,so I just wanted you to be happy with our new house.” I finished my sentence right before the tears start to roll down my cheek.

“Baby girl,come here” He pulled me towards his chest and buried his face on the crook of my neck “I didn’t mean to make you cry baby,I’m so sorry.” He kissed my neck and holded my face between his hands,looked me in the eyes and said “Will you forgive me?”

“There’s nothing to forgive Ro,it’s fine..”

“No it isn’t! I shouldn’t have talked to you like that, I was an asshole for no reason” he wiped my eyes off “I love you,so much..Just please promise me you will tell me beforehand if you don’t want something,this is OUR house! I want you to be as happy with it as I am.”

“I love you too big guy,and I promise,no more surprise announcements” I pout my lips so he could peck it,which he happily did

“So now that we have the pool...let’s help you out with your water fear,shall we?”

“Oh no no n-“

“Shhh yes yes yes! Take you close off baby” he smirked

“But Roman I don’t have a bikini or swimsuit”

“Oh baby girl,since when that’s gonna stop us?”

“Are you implying that I should overcome my water fear by getting in the water naked?With you?”

“C’mon babe,don’t get all shy on me now..we both know that you’ve got nothing that I haven’t seen before or haven’t enjoyed to it’s fullest” he looked me up and down with hungry eyes “Besides” he stepped closer and whispered above my ear “We both also know that,you ain’t got one single bone of shyness on ya” He slowly stepped back to his original place with that delicious look on his face and I couldn’t help but finish stripping my clothes off.

Once I was fully naked,he eagerly removed his own clothes,entered the pool and reached his arms towards me,making a ‘come hear’ motion with his hands. And as much as I wanted to go I just froze in place.

I started to sweat profusely,my heart was beating so fast I swear it was going to explode,my breath became shallow,I felt nauseous,my mouth was drier than the desert, I felt dizzy, I thought I was gonna faint...Until I felt a pair of wet strong arms surround my waist pulling me back from my near mental breakdown. *When did he came out of the pool?* I thought

“Y/N look at me” His voice was soft and sweet like melted chocolate,and I looked up slowly to meet that beautiful pair of warm brown eyes.

“It’s okay baby,you’re safe. I’m not gonna let anything bad happen to you, I’m not gonna push you to do anything you’re not comfortable with,we gonna take baby steps ok?” When I nodded,he continued “Good,now we’re gonna enter through the shallow side of the pool together and we’re gonna keep going until the water hits our waist,I’m not gonna let you go ok?” I just nodded again.

We entered the pool and as soon as I felt the water hit my calves I panicked.

“I can’t do this,I can’t do this..” I whispered

“Baby girl,look at me” he said with a soothing voice,when I met his gaze he continued “You’re doing great baby!You’re so strong and so beautiful,it’s just the two of us here,focus on me baby...” I started to relax so he pulled us further in,the water hit my hips and I started slightly panicking again.When he realized he rapidly said

“Hey Y/N,can you give me a hug baby?”

“What?”

“I said,if you could give me a hug?”

“Ummmm Sure?Why not” I said confused

He pulled me into his arms tightly and started babbling random things like: the details about our first date,our first road trip together,our terrible first year anniversary,the time that Jimmy bought lasagna from that very doubtful place near our old house and spent the whole night proclaiming his porcelain throne.

“Do you remember his face?” Roman asked between laughs

“Yes I do! You even took his picture while he was on the toilet with the Polaroid,wrote ‘Porcelain God’ on the photo and hanged up in the locker room so everybody could see” I was laughing so hard that tears started to roll down my cheeks.Roman couldn’t control himself either,so he let out a breathless “Man,he got so fucking mad about it”.

Once we were able to control our laughs,we enjoyed the few minutes of comfortable silence until I moved a little bit,felt the water around my waist and just like that,all the effort my lovely boyfriend did to distract me from my dying fear went down the drain.

“Oh my God,I’m gonna drown,Roman help me please...I’m gon-“ My words were cut off by his lips on mine.He was kissing me like a horny teenage boy,he turned us over,so my back could rest on the pool wall,he made sure that my arms and legs were securely locked around his neck and waist before he could start to roam his hands on my breasts,pinching my nipples.

“Hmmmm” I moaned

Once he was happy with how hard my nipples were,he roamed his hands further down,until he found what he was looking for.

“Oh my sweet baby girl” He circled my clit with his middle and ring finger

“Ah Roman” I whined

“Always so responsive baby” He applied more pressure making me moan his name deeper “I love when you moan baby..” He increased his fingers speed “It’s always so fucking hot!No woman can moan like you can,you’re the only one who can make my dick rock hard just by moaning my name..Fuck,here baby,take a look for yourself” He grabbed one of my hands and lowered down to his cock,making me grip it.

When I lightly squeezed,he growled.

“See what you do to me? Do you see the power you hold against me? I’m powerless around you baby, whenever you’re around me I’m helpless! Everything you do turns me on,your body,your voice,your smile,the way you look at me,the way you care about me...the slightest move you make has my cock wide awake to serve you as you please,my queen.”

Roman always had a way with his words,that’s how he convinced everyone to do everything he wanted,me included! And he was just succeeding,because right now the last thing I remembered was that I was inside of that damn pool!

“Ro,please..”

“What is it? Do you want me to fuck you baby? Is that it?” His voice getting deeper and deeper

“Mhmmm” Was the only thing I could say.

Then suddenly I felt a tug on my arms, the cold wind against my wet naked (now out of the pool) body,Roman’s lips on mine before he quickly say

“Now we don’t you to get drowned,do we?!” And smirked while he picked me up from the floor,leading us towards our bedroom.

Maybe this whole pool thing wasn’t a bad idea afterall.

#roman reigns imagine #roman reigns smut #roman reigns x reader #roman reigns fanfiction #roman reigns one shot #roman reigns #masochist writes #wwe imagine

[hannya-writes]

A White Demon love song

Title: A White Demon Love Song

Fandom: Star Wars

Pairing: Obi wan Kenobi x reader

Other characters: Anakin, a Mandalorian? It can be Din Djarin if you like

Category: Romance, Sad, Song fic maybe?, Implied sex scenes.

Warnings: Almost Sith!Obi Wan

Author's note: the first time I wrote this... It was in spanish cuz that's my first language, and I had to translate myself, which was weird and freaking frustrating, but I like the results! Hope you like it!

• • •

Obi wan had hear about "The Killers" bar. It was far away from the center of Coruscant and the jedi temple, it was a place were one could contract a mercenaries, have a nice drink and hear some music. It was one of the very few nice bars in the area. It also was the place where Master Yoda had been informed about the presence of a Jedi, but not just any jedi: someone claimed that Y/n Y/l/n was there every night.

Obi Wan and Anakin where assigned to look out the place. As they grew closer, publicity got heavier. Almost all of the paper and screens announced a singer by the name "Dragon Owl". By his side Anakin sighed in boredom, but he didn't dared ask why were they going to that place, the only data Obi Wan had have him as that they were looking for a death jedi.

As soon as they got to the hidden entrance the Jedi master felt a weird sensation through the force. He couldn't quite place the feeling it provoqued in him, but it was familiar.

A voice reached them and Anakin stopped in the middle of the stairs. Unlike Obi Wan, he recognized the force signature and the voice of the singer: it was Y/n Y/l/n's voice. She had hummed that song to him at night to help him fall asleep.

— Anakin? — Obi Wan made him get back to reality, making him move after seconds of music. His feet moved in a hurry, wishing to see the person singing. He had to see if he was being fooled because it couldn't be Y/n, she was dead, Count Dooku had killed her.

The Sith had gloated about his lost. He had told him how hard she had fought him, how he had tortured her. But there she was, eyes closed in concentration, her mouth open while singing.

— no — he muttered to himself incapable of believing what he was seeing.

— she's alive? — Obi Wan said under his breath, as surprised as Anakin by the vision in front of him. — it can't be... She...— Her eyes opened and Obi Wan felt as if someone had hit him with a blaster. It had to be a clone of Y/n.

"Let us be in love" she sung and the Jedi Master felt a knot in his throat "Let's do old and gray" a headache started with those words as memories came back "I won't make you cry" Y/n was crying in his memories as she cupped his face "I will never stray" no, she hadn't said those words. She had said "You will never stray, you will do your part"

— what are you talking about? — he remembered himself asking her, a smile in his face as she laughed with sad eyes.

— will you let us be in love tonight? — she asked and he lifted an eyebrow.

— I will let us be in love forever — he answered to her delight before taking her closer to kiss her.

He remembered that night a couple of years ago. How the kisses turned wet, how he had traced patterns through the naked skin. How she had whispered love words in his ear while he moved against her, inside her making her moan in pleasure. Her barely audible voice calling for him, singing "Obi wan" like it was the only words she knew. The pleasure, the sweat, the lust. The dangerous need to posses her in every possible way. Then the morning after, her quiet sobs as she explained that they couldn't be together, how it was better to forget. She confessed she had a vision of him falling to the dark side because of his love for her. Why she couldn't allow it to happen so she erased all the memories that made him love her. And he forgot.

Until that moment, with that song. She had made him forget and ran away so he wouldn't fell in love with her again. But she was there singing about the past, about an unreachable love when he was right there dealing with feelings that he was forced to forget.

He wanted to walk towards her, kiss her, hold her in his arms. He wanted to sooth the pain away. It hurt him to listen to her singing about something he could fix, because he could fix her broken heart.

The song ended slowly and someone asked for a big applause for the Dragon Owl. Y/n bowed for the clapping audience and went to the little stair to walk down of the scenario, she had a big smile in her lips. Obi wan felt a brand new blast in his chest seeing her smile, it had been a life time since he saw her smile. He walked towards her to help her get down, he was going to offer his hand but someone beat him to it.

A gloved hand offered it's help and she took it in her left hand, she winked at the person and Obi Wan saw that hand guided to a man with a mandalorian armor, the beskar shone under the bright light.

His muscles tensed acknowledging the treat a mandalorian supposed, however his hands turned into fists when Y/n turned and stretched out to kiss the mandalorian helmet, not in any place but in the spot where the lips of the man should be. As an answer the man took out one of his gloves and caressed her lower lip, as if making a promise to kiss her.

Obi Wan knew that little touch over her lower lip could mean a lot of other things, but the intimacy in it annoyed him. Hand in hand, the couple walked to the back door and he followed with Anakin right behind him.

They kept the distance with the couple, waiting for the right time, the perfect moment to pull Y/n away from the mandalorian. Her loud laughter made Obi Wan jealous, he wanted her away from that man.

Funny enough in that moment she shoved the man while laughing, the man got closer and pressed her to the closer wall. His bare hand pushed the helmet up to uncover his lips, his free hand cupped her face gently, tumb caressing her cheek.

— oh, my dear Mandalorian — she sighed the words charged with a tender love that made Obi wan's gutt twirl.

Anakin gasp was barely audible. From all the people in the galaxy, Y/n was about to kiss a Mandalorian. A Jedi and a Mandalorian. He couldn't avoid thinking about Obi Wan and the Duchess of Mandalore subtly flirting. On the other hand, what he was seeing was everything but subtle. Y/n hands getting the helmet off a bit more, a chaste kiss turning lustful.

A deep blush formed in his face and felt angry, annoyed by this man, kissing Y/n in that way in an alley. He was not going to let it happen, he stepped out to protect Y/n but Obi Wan had moved a couple of seconds before, he ran the little distance and kicked the man away from the supposedly dead Jedi.

The mandalorian huffed trying to get back the breathe he had lost from that powerful kick, he tried to stand up but an invisible force was pushing him to the ground. Somehow his helmet had got back to cover his face.

— how dare you put your hands on her? — Obi Wan voice was calm but hide a underline of danger. If someone had asked him why did he do that, he would have answer that he saw a threat against Y/n. The truth however was he moved because he couldn't stand to see the woman he loved with another man. It made him get mad and jealous. His fear of losing her again was in control.

— Obi? — Y/n said in a surprised tone, eyes open in a expression of astonishment. Her eyes took in every detail in him, from his clothes to the bear. She couldn't stop herself from thinking "it's really him". But there was something wrong, his stance, his lightsaber on and in his hand ready to kill the enemy and the enemy was the man dressed in beskar. — wait! — she jumped in front of her lover.

Y/n felt the force, forcing her to back off, step by step with a strength but carefulness that she found amazing.

Obi wan brandished his light saber aiming for the head, but the lightsaber stopped midair. His eyes turned to Y/n, hand reaching for his weapon, stopping him.

— Stop! — she ordered and the force keeping her still vanished, a second later she let go his saber. She walked quickly to get back in front of Obi wan. — Obi Wan, look at me — she asked looking at man she was still in love.

— Are you willing to die for him? — the question held rage even being said in a low tone. His hand moved to get the lightsaber closer to her, the blue flame of it almost touched the skin of her neck. She made an expression of pain but held her ground.

— I'm not doing this for him, it's for you — she clarified and her eyes looked at those of the Jedi. However for the first time, they weren't of that baby blue color she loved so much, they were golden. — you are good man, an excellent jedi, you are a role model, I won't let you stain your hands with blood —

— Master! Stop! — Anakin said standing behind Obi Wan, looking horrified how Y/n walked towards the Jedi master without getting away from the lightsaber.

— you lied, you didn't love me— loathing was the only thing in his voice.

— but I did and I still do — she muttered with the very first step to get closer to him.

— you left, you faked your dead Y/n — he was threatening, his expression made her feel fear and a deep desire to ask for his forgiveness.

— It was necessary — she claimed standing by the hilt of his lightsaber, the blue fire bit on her neck and she made an expression of pain. Her hands reached his, holding the weapon.

Only then with the touch of her hands he reacted, his mind finally processed what he was doing. He was holding his lightsaber against Y/n. He had hurt her in her delicate neck

Obi wan didn't put resistance as she disarmed him and went to hug him while stating seven words that made him relax.

— I only love you Obi Wan Kenobi — she said softly and he hug her back, nuzzling his face in the crook of her neck, in the side that wasn't hurt.

— My apologies, I didn't meant to hurt you — he said in a low and barely audible voice, she sighed holding him close. — I don't know what happened to me —

— I know — she answered not knowing what else to say, she couldn't tell him he had tasted the dark side, that he had acted motivated only by his feelings. How could she tell him? How could she explain to him that was the only path they could take while being together? How would she explain she left because it was getting out of hand? How could she tell him he had killed a squadron of clones because they had looked at her too long? How could she confess that his love for her will turn him into a sith? — It's fine, everything will be fine— she lied looking at Anakin with sadness.

The young man looked at her and she almost smiled, the pressure of Obi Wan's arms around her made her stop, along with a soft petition that sounded more like a demand.

— Stay with me — those words make her tremble and understand, there was no way to avoid destiny.

— of course, Darling —

#imagine star wars #star wars #obi wan kenobi x reader #obi wan fanfiction #obi wan x reader #obi wan #obi wan kenobi #obi wan x y/n #obi wan x you #obi wan needs a hug #obi wan kenobi x you #imagine obi wan kenobi #reader insert #sith!obi wan

[ereawrites]

HCs: Jason with a crush

this was requested by: anon

Jason’s just about settled back into the family by the time you come along - Tim’s managed to convince him to go to therapy, he’s fixing his relationship with Bruce, and Dick’s confiscated all of his guns. He’s not 100% yet, but he’s getting there, and he’s learning how to deal with his emotions healthily.

So, he thinks he’s fine, he’s pretty sure that he can handle most things life throws at him again... and then you show up. Jason’s a pretty visual person, and you’re obviously hot, he’s attracted to you: it’s okay, though, he can deal with this. After all, it’s only physical attraction, right? Except, he kind of psychs himself out, and he ends up terrified that it’s going to turn into something more.

He’s very reluctant to allow himself that kind of vulnerability, or closeness with someone new. His family are different (he’s known them for years, and none of them back down easily), but you’re a mystery, and he doesn’t know how you’ll react to his temper, or nightmares, or scars. Worst case scenario, you’ll want nothing to do with him once you get to know him - other worst case scenario, you’re incredibly sweet about it, and he ends up with a crush like he used to have when he was a teenager.

Jason’s self-aware enough to know that it’s likely to happen. He’s kind of a sucker for kind people, especially ones who are hot and could quite possibly kick his ass. he had a crush on dick when he was younger. So he does everything in his power to avoid getting close to you - he’s not about to fuck up years of emotional stability by falling down an unpredictable rabbit hole. 

Don’t get me wrong, he absolutely feels like a dick for doing it. You’ve done nothing wrong, per se, and you seem to be lovely. Jason just doesn’t want to act on his attraction. He’ll speak to you a little, maybe poke some fun at Dick with you, but the second you try to speak to him in any depth, he’s shutting down.

And, somehow, he still gets screwed over - even if he’s not talking to you much, he’s still watching you (he’s not a creep, he’s just interested), and watching your interactions with his family just gets him. When you’re around Tim, Jason can tell that you’re clearly a genius, and he actually finds himself laughing quietly when you and Tim get into a debate about the real-world possibility of lightsabers. He’s horrified. 

He tries to distract himself with Damian - it’s Damian or Dick, and at least Damian doesn’t ask questions - but, wait, Damian’s absolutely enamoured with you, he won't shut up about you, he’s probably got a little crush of his own but mostly he just thinks you’re cool. Jason has to sit through a 40-minute talk about how ‘interesting and sophisticated’ you are before he can escape.

Over time, your interactions with his family - and even the limited interactions with Jason himself - are enough for you to carve out a little place in his heart. You’re kind, you’ve got a good sense of humour, you help him cook after a hard day of training: he ends up catching feels, and he hates it, but he figures that it’ll be okay as long as he doesn’t act on it. 

Unfortunately, Jason’s inherited Bruce’s tendency for broodiness and dramatics. He spends his sleepless nights thinking about you, debating if he should come and speak to you instead of staring at the ceiling (he never does). He walks off in the middle of conversations, because you said something just a little too flirty, and he doesn’t like the way it makes his heart jump. He stares daggers at Dick for flirting with you. He highlights passages in his books that make him think of you.

Tim finds one of his poetry books, with the corners folded on the pages of poems about love. Jason says it’s as a study, in case he ever has to seduce anyone. Tim calls him out immediately. Jason threatens him with disembowelment. Tim swears to secrecy.

Jason feels like a sappy teenager again, but he can’t help it, and he compensates by reverting to his grumpy, I-don’t-feel-anything persona, at least when he’s around you (or so he thinks). He’ll sneak glances at you over the breakfast table, and all the while he’s thinking of Browning’s Sonnet 43; he starts to understand why people wrote poems about their lovers in the past, except you’re not his lover, and he’s so sick of Tim teasing him, saying you’ve got stars in your eyes, Jay, stop staring.

You probably assume that he hates you at first, simply going off how broody and grumpy he is around you. Sometimes you’ll catch him staring, though, or Dick will deliberately ramp up the flirting and casual touches when Jason’s around, and you’re probably smart enough to develop a niggling suspicion that he’s compensating for something.

Let’s say you start to flirt on purpose, just to wind Jason up a little bit. It fucking kills him. Sends him into overdrive, storming out for a motorcycle ride, splitting his knuckles on the punching bags, flat-out refusing to speak to you for the rest of the day, only to fall for it all over again the next day. He’s grumpy, but he’s fallen hard. You’ve got him wrapped around your little finger without him even realising.

#dc #dcu #jason todd #jason todd x reader #red hood #red hood x reader #batman #batfam #tim drake #timothy drake #red robin #dick grayson #nightwing #damian al ghul #damian wayne #robin #x reader #fluff #headcanons

[cyclogenesis]

For the writing ask (you don’t have to answer all of them since I probably picked too many, sorry!): 1, 2, 7, 8, 10, 19, 20, 26, 30, 31, 32, 36, 38, 39, 40. (Thanks 💜)

I did it, I answered all of them!! (Yes, it took me a couple of days aha.) Thanks for asking anon! 😘

1. Which of your fics would you keep the basic plot of but rewrite completely?

Generally speaking I would rather die than rewrite anything ever, and most of the stuff I’ve written I can look back on and be like “nice”. I did recently reread a few bandom fics I wrote and felt mildly horrified by the fact that some of the writing was so spare that the dialogue sections were like reading a screenplay, so I’d have to say those would come the closest. Like I wouldn’t actually ever rewrite them, but were I to write them today they would read very, very differently.

2. Anything that you’d like to write but feel like you’re unable to?

Honestly I read soooo much Hydra Trash Party stuff and would love to vibe with Bucky’s sexual trauma in fic more but I feel like I’d really struggle to write that kind of background given my usual writing style. That’s the kind of super iddy thing I usually do in chatfic, but unfortunately I don’t have anyone to do that with in this fandom, so I’ll just keep whining internally about the lack of HTP Sam/Bucky while doing absolutely nothing to address that glaring lack.

Rest of the answers behind the cut!

7. Your favourite ao3 tag.

I cruise the Bottom Bucky Barnes tag like a 50s kid dragging Main.

8. How slow is a slow burn?

HERE’S THE THING. So if I ship something super hard, like hard enough to write or read fic about it, then I have already interpreted the canon itself as a slow burn because presumably they haven’t kissed yet, and I’m writing or reading fic because I’m ready for the kissing to be happening. I also don’t tend to read a whole lot of long fic. So basically I’m gonna need kissing by at least the 15k mark unless it’s like, masterfully written.

10. Top three favourite fic tropes.

You know, I’m honestly not usually drawn to stuff that’s very traditionally tropey! I don’t write it too often either, usually with fic I’m just a simple gal who wants to look at canon and then figure out a way to get them to acknowledge they want to kiss each other. I do love fake relationships though!

19. Share a snippet from a wip without giving any context for it.

“There’s more than one Loki,” Sam is disturbed to tell him. “A bunch more. One of them is a good guy now.” Actually, Strange had described him as ‘moderately helpful and uncomfortably sincere’. “Another one, uh, broke time, and now there are multiple timelines that have created different universes.”

“Got it,” Bucky says, in the tone of someone who in no way has it.

20. Do you work on a single project or many at the same time? How does that work for you?

I usually have a couple of things going at once that I bounce between until I decide that I’m Going To Finish Something, Dammit and force myself to focus on just one. It’s generally fine because I’d rather have too many ideas than none at all, though I’ll sometimes inadvertently cannibalize myself and have to edit out things I’ve used in two different WIPs.

26. What would you describe as OOC?

I’m honestly pretty forgiving about that, having been trained to suspend my disbelief by liking really dark fic hahaha. One weird thing that tends to throw me in not-dark fic is a lack of humor in the dialogue. I tend to like fandoms with pretty funny characters or people, so I like to see their sense of humor reflected in fic. Sam and Bucky in particular are really funny characters in their own ways - gimme the banter, please!!

30. Describe a fic that almost happened, but then it didn’t.

In so many fandoms I’ve had visions of an OTP epic spanning years and years, and in zero of those fandoms have I ever completed one of those stories.

31. What was the most difficult fic for you to write (but in the end you made it)?

There is a point where every fic feels like the most difficult thing I’ve ever written. Something particularly cute that I do, which I love, is writing very intensely up to the sex scene, and then getting shy about it and wandering away and not working on it again for a little while, despite the fact that usually the whole point of the fic is that I want to get to the sex scene!!!

32. Do you have a word/expression that you always use in your writing?

I’m sure I have plenty of things like that!! I try to edit repetitive things like that out because when I’m reading a lot of a writer’s stuff little phrasing quirks always stand out to my copyeditor brain. That said, I know when I’m doing it and still tend to huffily be like “well that’s the best way to phrase that action!!” so, whatever.

36. How do you come up with fic titles? What’s the one you’re most proud of?

I either have a title from the jump or I’m combing my music library for a lyric snippet I can use like ten minutes before I post the fic. I’m pretty fond of This Is A Song About Fucking in that I committed SO deeply to jacking myself off there; it’s a phrase that Brendon Urie used to say to introduce Lying Is The Most Fun A Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off during the Nothing Rhymes With Circus tour (I had to look that tour name up. Thank GOD I had to look that tour name up) and I used it for a 5SOS group sex fic posted a cool eight years after that tour (which I went to multiple dates of, oh god) ended.

38. “This never happened” fix-it fics or “this happened but” fix-it fics?

Definitely the latter, when a canon makes a lousy choice I’m usually like well here we are, let’s talk about where we go from here. But I don’t really look for anything with the fix-it tag in general, once the canon breaks something I loved I’m usually so moody that I just abandon ship and stop reading fic haha.

39. Wildest AU scenario you have written?

I verrrry rarely write AUs for posting, but have chatficced some truly bonkers nonsense in my time. My old writing partner in bandom and I used to get weird with Brendon/Ryan - the satyr/fairy and fisherman/selkie days were really something.

40. Write a 9-word fic.

I’m too invested in the thing I’ve written 5k words of these week to think of anything new, so here’s a snippet from that instead.

“Come here,” he chokes out, and the helpless hope on Bucky’s face in response nearly undoes him completely. He sits up to meet Bucky halfway, grabs at his shirt the moment he’s within reach and drags him close, Bucky climbing onto the bed all long limbs and graceless need. The kiss is a surprise only in how rough it is, a hard press of lips like Bucky’s greedy to touch Sam any way he can, like this is just another way for them to collide.

#anonymous #asks #WHEW #this was good i love talking about fic #really hoping i can finish this one i'm working on sometime next week pray for me plz #i'm like HARD back on my feelings bullshit love to write sam and bucky just like desperately in love with each other #i'm 11k deep and don't see a way out of this under 20k help

[phoenixkadeu]

Revenge and Retribution. Pt.2

“Is everyone ready, does everyone know what to do?” Asra’s deep voice was heard through the mask he was wearing, the exact same one everyone else was using in order to completely conceal who they really were. The only thing that gave his identity away was his uncovered eyes and hands, otherwise he was dressed in a full black attire with leather boots, a small duffle bag hanging from his shoulder.

He saw everyone around him nod. All three of them. 

Asra had come up with a plan, his trip back from Umibe gave in time to think. He really did not want to get other people involved in this, he needed to do this alone, however he had no choice but to contact them, it was the only way his plan would succeed. This small group of elementalists were one of the very few people he trusted and right now the only one’s who were crazy enough to agree to help him, the only ones that could.

Sure, he hadn’t told them everything. They hadn’t asked either. Asra’s plan of breaking into the King of Hearts’ house, was solid enough. Get in, get the servants under control, steal the safe that Asra knew Lucien kept hidden in his study on the first floor of his estate and then they could split the goods amongst themselves. Most of them were as a broke as he was, and to be fair, The Academy did charge them a ridiculous amount of money just to discourage them for continuing attending their lessons, so they would do pretty much anything to keep that from happening, they still needed some kind of education. And so did Asra, but right now he didn’t give a shit about the money, he only needed a distraction, something that would have the servants running around in panic.

“Good, let’s go, then” 

They split, two earth elementals being the firsts to make their presence known. Asra could hear the screams coming from the estate, he could feel the ground shaking as he came through one of the open windows. Then, once inside, he waited, ignoring everything that was going outside of those four walls, suddenly a heavy box resembling something close to a coffin came floating through the open window followed by one of Asra’s friends, an air elementalist.

“Really, Asra, what is this?” the woman asked, already sensing that Asra might have some other plans. They all knew that Asra probably thought they were only doing this for the money, but in reality, they had all heard about Allore. They didn’t know much about what was going on between them, didn’t really know how much Asra loved her, but they were used to seeing him running down the streets, sneaking into the rich part of the diamond’s territory so he could see her. The fact that he kept Allorre hidden from everyone, protected, the way he kept his mouth shut every time they teased him about it was an indication that it wasn’t something to joke about. So, upon hearing the news and after hearing Asra’s offer, they thought that this would be a good, fun thing to take his mind off of it all.

But, right now, she was already starting to regret that decision. However it was too late to back down.

“C’mon” Asra replied, getting out of that room and walking up the stairs, avoiding trapped servants who were too busy to notice him and the other girl, the sight of an heavy and large box floating in the air was the least of their worries when they were to concern with their own lives. Even if they made it out of this, they would with no doubt receive some kind of punishment from Lucien once he got home and noticed that a great deal of his money had just been stolen, so nothing about this whole scenario was looking good for them. 

Still, Asra had no time to worry about any of that. He had other plans in mind, he wanted Lucien to come home. He would be ready for him this time.

Long and heavy, velvet curtains blocked the moonlight coming from outside. Still, even without the proper light, the room was still huge, cold. An enormous bed, filled with pillows and soft sheets occupied the center. 

He crouched down and opened the box, lid thrown to the side, the sight of a rotten Allore caught the attention of both elementalist.  Asra heard a small scream from the opposite side of him even before he felt the horrid smell fill his senses.

“oh my - Asra, is that?”

“Put her on the bed” 

His elbows were resting on his knees, his sharp eyes were looking at his horrified friend. Her black mask had been pulled over her head, just like his, he could see every little expression on her face, could see the way her hand shook against her lips, wide eyes staring down at the corpse. Then, she took a step back and Asra let out a sigh, hands already reaching out to pick up the body in front of him before another gasp stopped him.

“Fuck - shit -  Asra, don’t” her leather boots squeaked against the expensive floor, tiny steps being taken into his direction “Don’t touch it, I’ll do it” and then the body was floating. For a few moments, as Asra stood up he thought that the woman would drop Allore, but she didn’t and he was pleased. He hid the box quickly under the tall bed and then he turned around, fingers get lost on his hair as he got completely rid of the mask.

“You can have my share, I don’t want it and you deserve it” he simply spoke, not sparing a single glance at his friend as he approach the corpse that was now lying down on the bed, an almost bored expression on his face. When he didn’t hear any movement, not even the door opening he looked back at the air elementalist. “You’re staying” it wasn’t a question, but it was said with such uncertainty that Asra wasn’t sure what she meant by that. He couldn’t quite understand the emotions that were crossing her face, did she think that this was enough? He didn’t bother questioning her, and simply said “pull your mask down and get out, I’ll see you tomorrow” the woman did as he told her, trembling fingers pulling the fabric to hide the concerns on her face, before she got out. The others were probably waiting for her outside, the servants were probably already writing letters for Lucien to come home, trying to fix the damage. 

And Asra was there. Inside the room, both him and Allore waiting patiently for him to greet them.

Asra could tell the exact moment Lucien had arrived. He could hear the screams, the cries of his servants asking for his forgiveness, he heard some crashing sounds who were probably a result of Lucien’s anger. Seconds, minutes and hours passed before Lucien had finally let his anger out. His steps were heavy against the stairs as he kept mumbling things under his breath and finally the door to his luxurious bedroom was opened.

He didn’t saw it. Didn’t see Asra standing in a dark corner, didn’t even notice the corpse above his head, but his nose twitched slightly and with a hand still holding the doorknob he shouted towards the corridor. “And you didn’t even fucking cleaned my room, why the fuck do I keep spending my money with all of you. It smells fucking disgusting in here”

Then the door closed, Lucien crossed the room, pushing one of the curtains back as he opened one of the large windows, completely oblivious to everything until he went to sit down on his bed, probably just to take off his shoes. A scream pierced the air and the next second he was already running towards the door. Problem was, Asra  was already standing there in front of the door, keys inside of his pocket.

“What-what is this? You are one of the thieves aren’t you? You’re not taking anything else from me” there was fear there and Asra could practically smell it, but his expression did not changed he just stared at the man. The one they had chosen and what a ridiculous fucking choice he was.

“I thought you would recognize your fiancé” Asra replied. He watched the expression change, realization mixed with confusion. Now Lucien knew that this wasn’t about money, this had something to do with Allore but he still didn’t know why this was happening or who Asra was.

The man opened his mouth, but Asra was quick to punch him right in the nose. He felt it crack, blood staining his knuckles as he heard him cry out, holding his nose. The fire elementalist didn’t even wait for him to recover as he kicked him on the side of his knee making him lose his balance and falling down. When he was satisfied, he gripped the back of the man’s collar, the other hand under his arm as he pulled him back to his feet in order to push him towards the bed.

The man stumbled, feet hitting his own ankles as if he didn’t know how to walk, but Asra couldn’t care less. Once near the bed, he only pushed the man, hand still gripping his collar as he held Lucien’s face too close to Allore’s. “Open your eyes” Asra didn’t need to look at the man’s face to know that he wasn’t looking, the blood coming from his beaten nose fell down onto Allore’s pale lips and suddenly Asra was pulling Lucien back, puke splashing onto his leather shoes as he held the back of the Lucien’s head down with an unimpressed look. 

Asra could still smell it and he wasn’t totally blind, the rotten corpse on top of the bed was a sight he was sure most people could not handle, but he had been through hell this past few days, he had stared at that dead face until the image he had of Allore got completely corrupted, until he stopped caring about a body with no soul. Once he heard a shaky gasp and his eyes stopped watching liquid coming out of the other man’s lips, Asra pulled him once again against the bed. “Tell her what you wrote about her on the deck” there it was, the second instruction and Asra was getting impatient, he waited for a few seconds and was about to press further when the other man spoke up again “I-I can’t remember” Asra scoffed, the one hand that wasn’t occupied reached inside of his black robe pulling out a ripped and crumpled piece of paper, throwing it onto the top of Allore’s chest, right under the king of hearts frightened eyes. “Then read it”

“It’s a shame she died so suddenly. I’d have liked to have seen her rot in prison for the disrespect she showed myself, Mi Eunbi, and the late Kim Minho. I would like to personally thank Sergeant Caddel for pursuing the murderer despite being on vacation and will be paying for him and his entire family’s next beachside stay as a thank you.”

Between sobs whimpers and pleas the entirety of the statement was recited back. The end of it was acknowledged by a simple “hum” coming from Asra’s throat, and nothing else was said until Lucien decided to speak up again, a small hint of hope and authority still present on  his voice. “You can let me go now, I will not tell a single soul about this if you stop this madness right now” it was a perfect time for a joke, Asra was forever a fan of rude behavior mixed with a bit of humor, but now he was not in the mood for any of it.

“No, you still need to apologize” 

“Well, then, I'm sorry alright?” Asra tilted his head, fingers flexing further, gripping the back of the man’s neck tighter, until he kicked the back of Lucien’s knees hard, making him tumble down onto the floor. “Not to her, to me”

And that’s when he really saw Asra, standing tall as he looked down at a him, someone who clearly outranked him, but now with his own two knees on top of his puke and with dread filling every inch of his body it did not look like he had much advantage. However, recognizing Asra brought some arrogance back to the man along with a stupid sense of superiority. “I know who you are and I have connections inside of The Academy, I promise I’ll make sure that they will kick you out right after hearing how insane you really are, you will rot in jail for this, you’ll see”

Ah, so there was the joke Asra had been waiting for. Circling the king of hearts until he was standing behind him, the other had already started to get up in victory, as if that poor excuse of a threat had somehow managed to make Asra regret what he was doing. But that sentiment clearly changed when Asra kicked him once again, the force of it enough to make the man lay down on the floor, now with the sole of Asra’s boot to his neck in order to keep him down. “She’s dead, she can’t hear what you say, I fulfilled your wish, you wanted to watch her rot and now you did. Now, it’s my turn” he pressed down further, the man’s hands gripping his ankle in an effort to push him off of him, but Asra wouldn’t move. “I want to hear an apology”  

Cold, blue eyes, watched the desperation on that man’s face, the way his mouth opened in an effort to welcome more oxygen into his body, legs kicking down onto the floor and hands quickly losing the initial force they had, the longer Asra’s boot crushed his throat. For the first time since he was here, Asra was patient, but time had never been on his side, not even now. 

He had been late to save Allore, he did not even had enough time with her, not nearly as much as he would like anyways. And now, as the doorknob started to shake and another set of urgent yells filled his ears, Asra knew that he and Lucien had ran out of time. 

There was a mix of puke and oh, so so much blood staining the otherwise clean floor and expensive carpets. There was a bloodied axe, right beside the decapitated body and the head of the now deceased King of Hearts was inside a black duffle bag. 

As Asra’s flames consumed that whole estate, servants screaming out on the streets for a help that would never be able to contain Asra’s grief. He left, leaving Allore’s body to burn down along with her would-be husband, in a house that would have been her own.

The next morning was an agitated one in the Diamond’s territory, at least for the richer side of it. Rumors of a fire in The Hearts territory had already started to spread out, speculations had already started to take place amongst the various groups of people when yet another event was able to get everyone’s attentions.

The sun had started to rise when the servants who worked at The Kim’s estate were greeted with a horrific sight. Two heads, belonging to King of Hearts Wang Lucien and LEA Sergeant Caddel Noah had been impaled on two of the spikes, one on each side of the front gate of The Kim’s Estate, both marked with two red M’s on their foreheads which had obviously been done by some sort of sharp object.

While everyone went crazy over the recent events and all chaos broke loose with theories about the deaths, Asra was sleeping in his home, leather boots still painted all kinds of vile substances beside his front door, the sole evidence of what had happened. Balance, he had told himself once he got home, he should have put a stop to them sooner but still he managed to make everything right in the end, so the fire elementalist allowed himself to finally sleep, with a clear conscience but still with a painful and heavy heart.

#revenge and retribution #this is the end :) #I'm sorry for him #Allore's death #need to read this over again but I want to get rid of it so I can go work on my other replies #have fun with this or not #also sorry this is so long

[none-of-us-are-real-blog]

Growth

(A quick story I wrote for a writing contest with some friends. I didn’t have time to edit, so it’s not the best but... The prompt was “A horror story about a table”)

   “Who the fuck are you?” She shouted, the sleep that had been tugging at the corners of her brain chased away by adrenaline. In the corner of the small single person hospital room sat a man. He was curled in on himself, one arm clutching the other tightly, sound asleep, purple circles hanging themselves under his eyes, contrasting strongly against the pale of his skin.

   While Louisa certainly was not weak, she was not particularly strong either. Nor did she know how to fight. Despite this, it was clear she could take him in a fight. Skin clung tightly to his body, bones and thin muscles showing through. He was small, both in height and structure. And he was unconscious.

   The reaction to fight might have been a bit overkill and soon, but Louisa could not help it. The hospital she was in gave her the chills. She felt as though she was being held much longer than needed, her broken arm was healed more than enough to go home. Still, the hospital insisted on holding her. Instead of being worried of something being wrong with her, though, she became quite wary of the nurses and doctors, closely watching her blood pressure and other stats, silently observing her, holding her in the room to the extreme that she felt more a prisoner than a patient. All this had had her on edge, keeping her up at night and stressing her in the day.

   Now there was a stranger in her room. Untangling herself from the warm sheets, she swung her legs over the bed and stood, repeating herself. “Hey, the fuck are you?”

   Again, the man did not answer. He stayed in the same position, deep in his slumber. Although he did not move in his sleep, it was still clear to anyone with half a brain that it was not a peaceful rest. The corner of his mouth twitched every once in a while, a pained grimace evident on his ghostly face. A twinge of concern echoed through Louisa, and she stopped, crouching down to the man's height, and cautiously trying to shake him awake. Any aggression and fear she had felt towards him dispersed. After a few gentle shakes, he woke with a start, flinching back away from her, fear clouding his blue eyes. Louisa tumbled back, too, still wary of the stranger who had invaded her room.

   “Whoa, hey-” She started.

   “Who- Who...” the man managed to stutter out, confusion and fear dancing across his face.

   “That’s what I’ve been trying to ask you.” Louisa said, calmly, trying to earn his trust. At least long enough to figure out who he was.

   “I’m...I’m Elliot.” He stated, relaxing slightly as Louisa clearly had no intention to harm him. “Who are you?”

   Before Louisa answered, her eyes drifted to his arm, still being clutched tightly by the other. “Are you hurt?” She asked. It was probably a stupid question, considering they were in a hospital, and the man was wearing the typical patient gown all the patients wore.

   “I, well...” Elliot seemed to contemplate what he was going to say, clearly hesitant, mouth half agape in thought. The arm in question shifted slightly, and something poked out between his bony fingers. Louisa’s train of thought stopped immediately. What the hell was that? It was an earthy green and a thin, flat, slightly triangular chunk stemmed off from it, and at the tip was a-

   A flower. A flower on a stem. Her eyes trailed down the stem to where it poked out of the skin. A thin, irritated cut was held slightly open by the plant growing from it. A plant growing in his skin. Growing in his arm. What the hell?

   Following Louisa’s gaze, he too looked down, and quickly shifted his hand so it was covering it again. “I- wait!” He said, seeing the slightly horrified expression on her face. “I don’t-”

   “Dude, what the fuck happened?” She interrupted, frowning in thought as her mind tried to go over what scenario could find someone a plant growing out of them.

   “I don’t know...” His voice faded, a strange expression washing across his face. It was the same expression one might have when they misplace something important, such as their car keys, and can’t seem to find it. Or perhaps the look of someone waking up in the morning, trying to figure out if a memory was real or just a dream. Either way, it was concerning.

   “OK, well,” Louisa began, just as confused as he was. “How’d you get here?”

   Elliot shrugged. “I’m not sure about that either.” He looked down, slightly embarrassed. “I think I’ve gone mad...”

   Louisa tilted her head. “You’ve what?”

   “I just...everything here is crazy, there’s people with wings and tails and mad doctors and a table-”

   “Whoa, hey, wait just a minute.” Louisa cut him off once again. Her mind was still trying to catch up. Wings and tails? Maybe he came from the mental section of the hospital. When Elliot had talked, he had waved his arms around in wild gestures, giving Louisa a clear shot of his entire arm. Loads of small flowers sprouted out from cuts, tinted red by irritation, small trails of dried blood tracing down from where they came. “Let’s back up to the beginning. Why’d you come to the hospital in the first place?”

   Elliot sighed. “I got into a car crash a few months ago. I broke a few of my ribs and there was light trauma to my lungs...And then a few weeks ago my lung collapsed because of it. It was supposed to be an easy fix, and I could leave in just a few days, but,”

   “But they kept you here.” Louisa finished, thinking of her own situation.

   Elliot took a deep, shaky breath. “Yeah.”

   “They’ve been keeping me here longer than I should be, also.” She said, trying to comfort him.

   “Th-that’s because they’re using us!” Elliot blurted out suddenly.

   “What?”

   “In the basement, where they took me, they were, uhm, they were taking patients down there. And, and when you went down, there was a lot of, I mean at least I thought I saw, er, I-” Elliot stumbled painfully over the words that flowed out of his mouth like a waterfall. Louisa couldn’t make heads or tails from what he was saying.

   “Dude, slow down.”

   Elliot nodded and took a breath, starting again. “They took me downstairs, they said it was for treatment and...” his voice trailed off, not confident in what he was saying. “I saw people who had wings spurting out of their back, and some of them had beaks and talon feet. And then there were some with tails and ears and wolf-like snouts, dark horrifying black eyes, and then there were those who had robotic limbs, eyes torn out and replaced with lights, wires spewing from unnatural gaps in their bodies.

   “And then there was a table.” Elliot said this as though it had great meaning.

   “Wh-” Louisa’s mind was reeling. God, he really was crazy. “I’m- OK, you know what? We’ll address all that other stuff later and I’ll humor you at the moment. What’s so important about a table in the midst of all of the other things you saw?” She asked.

   “They took me in the room with the table. They were still cleaning blood off it from the last victim, who was being carried away on a stretcher. And they might’ve been the most horrifying one...but the table. That’s where they do all of the experiments, I think.”

   “Experiments?”

   “All those people I just told you about?”

   “Oh. And so you were an experiment?” Louisa said, raising an eyebrow.

   “I, uhm, I think so. I went under when they put me on the table, and then I woke up in a strange room with...with these...” He looked disdainfully the leafy things sprouting from him. “And then a doctor came and put me under again. And then I was here.”

   Louisa figured that all of this must be from the anesthetics. He was hallucinating from them when they took him to the operating room. But the flowers? Maybe he was delusional, he did something that got the flowers growing out of his arms, came to the hospital for help, and then made up with the whole story. But what would cause such a thing to happen?

   Louisa was lost. There was no doubt in her mind that something was wrong with the hospital. But Elliot’s story? That was beyond the point of reasonable belief, the type of story that someone could write a book about, not something that would happen in real life.

   Elliot saw the disbelief on her face. “I can take you there.” He said, desperate for her to believe him. His eyes were wide and haunted. “I can take you there and you’ll see.”

   Louisa sighed. It wasn’t like she had anything better to do. Besides, what was the worst that could happen? A doctor scolding her for going where she shouldn’t?

   Sighing, she agreed. “Yeah, sure.”

   His face lit up, looking happier than a kid on Christmas. “Yes! Let’s go!” He shakily rose to his feet on unsteady legs, opened the door, and scurried out. Louisa followed shortly behind, walking normally, unlike Elliot who was trying his best to be sneaky and looking every which way to be sure no one was watching. He stopped at the end of a hallway, of which at the end was a door

   “There.” He said.

   Having finally stopped and just stood still, Louisa observed that she was at least a head taller than Elliot.

   “Well, are we going in, or?” Louisa asked impatiently.

   “Uh, I guess...well, n- maybe this wasn’t a good idea, OK? We should go back-”

   “Oh, no.” Louisa quickly said. “You promised experimental furries, I want to see them.”

   “What, they weren’t furries-”

   “Now come on, you coward.” She grabbed him by his normal arm and dragged him to the door.

   The descent to the lower level was unsettling. If Louisa disliked the normal, clean, bright hospital, then she absolutely despised the dark, dank staircase that was tucked away underneath. Dark, but not dirty. Just as the upper level, it was stark clean, and Louisa presumed the walls were just as white as the rest of the building, but could not be sure in the lighting.

   Elliot was still being dragged by his arm, resisting slightly, clearly unhappy to be going back down. She could feel him shaking slightly.

   Stopping she turned to him. “You OK?”

   He laughed, a short burst of laughter that held no humor. “Am I OK? No, yeah I’m fine. We’re just going down to where they fucking turned me into a human garden and the horrible monsters live, no big deal!” He hissed in a hoarse whisper.

   Louisa felt a bit guilty for making him come down here. While she believed his story was insane (and he probably was too), he was still clearly terrified. But, hopefully, when they got to the bottom and Elliot saw there was nothing to fear, he would remember what actually happened to his arm. Louisa was genuinely curious about the plants.

   When they finally got to the bottom, Louisa ran straight into a door.

   “Ah, fucking shitty hell-”

   “Shhh” Elliot hissed. “They could be listening.”

   Louisa didn’t know who “They” were, and wasn’t going to ask. She fumbled around for the doorknob, found it, and opened the door. And then was immediately blinded. Bright lights beamed out from the room in front of the duo, just the same as the floor above. Looking at the door they entered from, a large stain stood out like a sore thumb. Louisa tried to move forward, but Elliot wouldn’t budge.

   “Come on, dude.” She said.

   “I, I can’t...” He said.

   She sighed. “Dude, there’s nothing to be afraid of, OK?”

   “But I saw-”

   “Yeah, and you were probably high as fuck on all the pain killers and anesthetics!” Louisa exclaimed. She still felt somewhat bad for him, as he was clearly terrified, but at the same time she was at her lengths end.

   Elliot considered this. Looked like he wanted to believe it. Finally, he responded. “OK.”

   And they walked on into the unknown.

Pain. Endless, unwavering ebbing and flowing of pain. She tried to think. She couldn’t. Why couldn’t she think? Why couldn’t she open her eyes?

   After a few minutes of silent panicking and effort, she discovered she could open them. And good glorious heaven, was it a bad idea. The bright lights beamed directly into her eyes, the pain shooting through her skull intensifying. A few more minutes passed. Silent minutes. The inside of her head empty. It felt like someone cut it open, stuffed it with cotton, and then did a half-ass job sewing it back up.

   When Louisa finally could open her eyes, and the pain had receded enough for her to make coherent thoughts again, she sat up. A hospital room. She was back in her old hospital room? Maybe Elliot and his monsters were all a dream. She laid back down and closed her eyes.

   “LOUISA, HELP, HELP THEY’RE HERE-” someone screamed from an adjacent room. Their voice was hoarse, as though they had been screaming for hours. She shot up. Elliot. It wasn’t just a dream? Well, shit. Her legs didn’t want to move, and she wasn’t sure they would hold her weight. Louisa remained on the bed.

   “Elliot?” She called back. “You OK?” A dumb question, considering from the tone of his voice he most certainly was not. Silence sounded back. No, not silence. If Louisa positioned her ear the right way, and listened real carefully, she could hear it. A quiet whirring noise, like a drill at the dentist.

   Whether or not her legs would cooperate, Louisa would get to Elliot. She had to. She made him come here, anything that happened to him was her fault. And, she had to admit, she had grown quite fond of the strange man in the short time she had known him.

   Her legs didn’t fail her when she tried to stand up, but it felt like they would. The room still spun slightly, and it felt as though someone was giving her a fucking lobotomy. She walked on. On to the door, which opened with effort. And then to the hall.

   “Elliot?” She called out, quietly. Probably too quiet for him to hear. The room was brightly lit, yet shadows still danced ominously in the corners. Shelves covered the walls, jars of weird substances with names only someone with a medical license could understand. Books, on birds and the spine and wolves and robotics. An unidentifiable sound escaped from a door to the left, and after it Louisa went.

   She didn’t know what she was seeing. Cages and cages built of glass, filled with creatures. Creatures that almost looked human, but not quite. Just as Elliot described. Was she crazy too? Still dreaming? Or, perhaps, he was telling the truth. A cage was marked “Homo Aves.” Inside, people with large wings perched on branches and sticks. Some of their faces had large beaks, resembling a plague doctor mask, sticking out of their deformed faces. Eyes large and black, somewhere between a birds and a human. Others were perfectly normal humans besides the wings. They were all asleep. Louisa decided it best to stay that way.

   Then another cage. People with puffs of fur, ears and snouts, dog eyes, claws, some walked on all fours, others bipedal, and few somewhere in between. It was not time for humor, yet Louisa couldn’t help a small chuckle. Furries.

   Robotic people were next. Cyborgs? Strange gaps in their bodies, places like where their elbow should be replaced with wires and screws. Some had third robotic eyes attached to their foreheads, skin around it bumpy and red and disfigured. At this point, Louisa was trying to block it all out. Down the long corridor she walked, walked on in search of Elliot, who was nowhere to be found.

   Louisa didn’t want to go on. She didn’t want to find anymore people. Not after she found some that were awake. Some had eyes still full of humanity. Others were devoid of it. All held a broken look, a look of pain and emptiness, forgotten people, deleted from the world. She didn’t want to look into their eyes anymore. She didn’t want to be here anymore. Become one of them. Removed from the world. Not human.

   Yet she walked on. She wasn’t a pussy, Louisa told herself. Nothing was going to stop her from helping Elliot. And then punching a few doctors faces in. The door at the end of the horrible horrible hallway emitted a few noises.

   She opened the door.

   ”Elliot” She said, louder than she should have. There he lay, on a stretcher among others. But she was only focused on his. She gently shook him awake, for the second time that day.

   “Elliot? Come on, wake up, dude.” The flowers were much larger now. Looking at where the protruded from the skin made bile rise up, burning the back of her throat. She shook harder. He started to stir. Other things in the room stirred with him. She ignored them.

   “Wh-Louisa?” He questioned, finally conscious.

   “Yeah, it’s me, dumbass.” She said. “Come on, we have to get out of here.”

   Elliot sat up suddenly, winced, and looked around wide-eyed at where they were. And then he screamed.

   Louisa jumped. The fucking idiot? What was he doing, someone was going to hear and-

   Oh. Oh good glorious god. Louisa saw what he screamed at. And then had to stop herself from screaming with him. On the other stretchers that filled the room, horrifying grotesque monsters sat, staring at them. Horrifying grins held shut by stitches tracing along their mouths. Eyes wide and a deep, hollow black. Their skin looked as though someone had held a blowtorch to it. Their noses were melted in, as were their ears, which were at this point just ear-shaped lumps of skin pushed into their heads. They looked as though they had been human at some point.

   Her hand flew over Elliot’s open mouth. He slowly got up, and they silently started moving for the door. Dozens of black eyes followed their movement, their awful grins only getting wider. They didn’t blink.

   Louisa groped for the doorknob. Tried to opened it silently, walked out silently, closed it.

   And then she screamed. She couldn’t help it. Any form of logical thought was chased out of her brain, replaced by the replaying of horrors they had encountered.

   Following the scream was footsteps. And clawing and muffled yelps and laughs and giggles and shouts. The doorknob jiggled.

   “Oh my god, they’re coming Louisa, they’re going to fucking kill us-”

   “Shut up and move,” she grabbed him by the arm once again and ran, down the hallway and past the atrocious hybrids, through the door into the room of shelves. Where was the exit? She looked at Elliot, who offered no help. The footsteps grew louder, slapping of bare skin on tile floor. One walked out into the room. The villainous glee on his face grew, and with a muffled, low giggle, it reached a misshapen hand up to its mouth and tore off the stitches. Mouth free, a sharp, insanely loud ear piercing shriek rang out from it, triggering more and more sounds of tearing and shrieking from behind it. Blood oozed from its torn up lips, screams echoed through the hallways. It moved again, towards them, a painful gate that was uneven and slow. Louisa looked around the room as fast as she could. ”Think, think, think, think, think,” she angrily thought to herself. Looking for a way out. There. A door. A familiar door, somewhere hidden deep in her memory. The door with the large brown stain on it. She ran as fast as she could, carrying her and Elliot’s weight, as Elliot seemed to have shut down completely. She would too, if their lives weren’t depending on her. Up the steps, so many fucking steps. Each one sent a jolt through her sore body, a spike through her pounding head. Something yanked on her arm, hard. No, not something. Someone. A yelp. Elliot’s yelp. The world slowed as she turned around, watching as he was torn from her grip, falling down into the crowd of twitching, shrieking monsters. Blood flew up. She screamed. Her mind said to go get him, to save him, but the instinct to survive programmed into every human forced her legs to up, up, up and away from Elliot’s broken body.

   She was back at the hospital. Adorned in normal clothes this time, the patient gown left behind a month ago. She’d come back every day, in search for her partner in crime. Dead, probably, but Louisa wasn’t one to give up. The doctors knew nothing. The police found nothing. In terms of evidence, there was nothing. He had disappeared.

   This time, Louisa wasn’t going to ask questions. She wasn’t going to rely on anyone else getting her friend back. She was going to take matters into her own hands. The door to the basement sent a surge of anxiety cutting through her body. Ignoring it, she continued. Down all the stairs, to the door with the brown stain. To the hallway with the strange people. To the place she found Elliot and the monsters. She stopped at the door. What if they were still in there.

   A voice cut through the silence. Though, it was more a shriek. Through the horrid shrieking noise, she could make out a word.

   ”LOUISA,” It shrieked. There was something familiar about the voice. Something she couldn’t quite put a name to.

   Something slammed against the door.

   A face.

   A deformed, melted, misshapen face.

   Broken, black eyes.

   Ears melted into skull.

   Elliot’s face.

#writeblr #story #short story #original writing #horror #hospital

[mittensmorgul]

Below a cut, my flaily-notes about 8.14, 8.15, 8.16, and 8.17 from this morning... posted entirely to get them out of my drafts folder, but I don’t expect (or encourage) anyone to actually, you know... read them... it’s just notes for future meta reference during s13. basically it’s cut and paste of my chat with lizbob. nothing to see here folks, really. It basically reads like all the meta I wrote last time through the loop, but pulling out key points I want to remember going forward.

You’re really better off going and reading my posts about these episodes from the hellatus rewatch...

The morning tnt loop trip is wild... 8.14... what a shift from "it's what I do" and Dean's determination to take on the Hell Trials, because he needs Sam to be safe. Sam just... takes Dean's reasoning wrong. This is like Codependency 101. And now after 13.01, it's just his job... D:

elizabethrobertajones D: So how much is Dabb murdering you right now?

mittensmorgul almost all the way! *twitches*

elizabethrobertajones He really hates the codependency :P But it's good because it sets up the whole trials arc to be about it

mittensmorgul yeah, and he made it look real ugly here.

elizabethrobertajones so it all grows from there! mmmm

mittensmorgul I mean, even the nerdy little sister who thought her whole family could be happy if they just had money... who sold her soul pointlessly because they were ALL still miserable afterward (except the one nerdy dude who asked for love and didn't give a crap about the money), and the girl who sold her soul to heal her mother of Parkinson's... she at least was content with her decision

elizabethrobertajones yeah she got her mom "back" oh my god I hate this show :P how long were they planning to do this?

mittensmorgul I think Dabb was keeping a file in case he ever got the showrunner gig

elizabethrobertajones probably :D Or he knows the show's themes inside out and exactly what to do with them to move the story along

mittensmorgul I still hate the fact Sam and Dean had just got to this point where all the big bads were essentially out of their lives and then they find the bunker and all that... they could've retired at that point but noooOOOooOOo They could've taken Kevin in, protected him, etc. I always thought that was why he transcribed the entire Leviathan tablet in a matter of hours, but it took him agonizing (i think I had a small stroke) months of suffering to translate the demon tablet.. He was MEANT to translate the leviathan tablet (it's the one that woke him as a prophet)

elizabethrobertajones yeah

mittensmorgul He wasn't meant to translate the Demon tablet

elizabethrobertajones it was what he was called to work for All the tablets were left for us but I think as in case of emergency things

mittensmorgul just one more sign that boarding up hell wasn't their decision to make

elizabethrobertajones Maybe the Angel tablet would have been an easy read during season 5 if anyone had found it and 12 year old Kevin had had to read it for them :P

mittensmorgul or the current "prophet Chuck" but slamming Heaven shut wasn't the goal of s5

elizabethrobertajones no, but angels were causing all the problems :P it's not how the story was SUPPOSED to go but say if Sam n Dean died or said yes or something the tablet as a back up emergency switch for humanity :P

mittensmorgul yeah

elizabethrobertajones but the story was all around Sam and Dean and they did what they had to to resolve it]

mittensmorgul yep siblings

elizabethrobertajones and only hit a "pull lever in case of emergency" moment in season 7

mittensmorgul yeah. I want to write about this all but... I feel we already have... :P I wrote about the hubris of s8, thinking they could just alter the structure of the universe that way... the codependency of it all, Sam's choice to take on the trials because he felt inferior...

[...] (insert THREE HOURS LATER dot gif)

Meanwhile I haven't done anything and I've STILL got the 8.14 chat notes sitting  in another tab and I'm already up to 8.16 and have no idea how to turn that into a useful post :P

And it's terrible because of Prometheus wanting to run away from his son because he's a god and wants to keep his son safe, but it's too late because his son's already inherited his curse...

elizabethrobertajones Oh my god is the prometheus episode going to be relevant AGAIN

mittensmorgul yeah. I hate all of this

elizabethrobertajones it gets a YEARLY turn around :P mittensmorgul Plus, Dean's all proud of being a Legacy of the MoL...

[... long enough to get to the beginning of 8.17 which is just as awful as ever :P]

OH NO CAS IS KILLING ALL THE DEANS SEND HELP

elizabethrobertajones I always forget about that scene MISTAKE mittensmorgul and how have we never seen the Spear of Destiny again?

elizabethrobertajones It says a LOT about the current landscape of Destiel that this is a severely under-mentioned scene and we rarely bring it up as an example any more about how much Cas cares, compared to how I used to see it used when I joined fandom :P I think it's not really forgetting so much as it's just not as impressive any more... mittensmorgul But it's so painfully important about Cas's complete loss of agency there

elizabethrobertajones :< mittensmorgul everyone still talks about the crypt scene and cas breaking free of that control, but somehow the exposition of just how powerful that control was, and how horrifying the scenario of Naomi's "fixing him" really was seems to have been pushed aside

elizabethrobertajones yeah

[...]

gah, just like in s6 cas isn't answering their prayers, but this time it's due to naomi forcing him not to... he must've been torn to pieces with all the lies she forced him to tell, and all the horror she forced him to enact... but then all of Cas’s lies start to unravel, and Dean’s suspicion of Cas just shoots through the roof...

[...]

Sam: So... what happened? I mean, Cas touched the tablet, and it reset him to his factory settings or something? Dean: I don't know. And I don't care. All I know is that he is off the reservation with a-a heavenly WMD. Listen, man, I can't take any more lies -- from anyone. Sam: Yeah. Um... I know. I'm sorry. I should have told you. I-I... just wanted to believe I was okay. I don't know. Dean: Well, you heard what Cas said -- that that first trial hurt you in ways that even he can't heal. Sammy, I need you to be honest with me from here on out, man.

#spn 8.14 #spn 8.15 #spn 8.16 #spn 8.17 #note to self: these are just notes to self

[eregyrn-falls]

In the Reverse Portal AU, How long do you think it would take for Ford to get Stan back on earth, realistically? While Ford doesn't have to teach himself physics and the other necessary information, Ford does have to worry about Bill driving him insane, The Society of the Blind Eye, and possibly re-designing the portal so that a rift will NOT form at all.

(First, apologies for the delay on answering this!  I had this huge long answer written out – because of course I did – and I lost it all, which is always disheartening.  Second, in the interim, @stanfordpines-phd posted meta on a related question, here.  I’ve only read the first paragraph of their post so far, but once I’ve got this rewritten I’ll go back and read over it, and see how close we both were to the same thoughts. :)

Let me say, too, that I’ve read a few story takes on this idea already, and the variations are always interesting!  But what I’m getting here is, what if there was a variation in which Ford really does start immediately to try to get his brother back?  I’m not sure I’ve seen that done, and yeah, I’m into that.

To get there, I’m proceeding from the assumption that the act of losing Stan through the portal would shock Ford out of his guilt / anger / paranoia spiral.  This almost happened in canon, after all – even considering the stakes, and the way they pushed each other’s buttons, and Ford’s state of mind, the moment Stan was seriously hurt (by being branded by the symbol on the console), Ford *stopped*, and was basically jolted into the most genuine response I think we’d seen from him in those scenes.  If Stan hadn’t come up swinging, I almost think the fight could have ended right there, with Ford’s concern for his brother defusing the situation long enough for them to talk.  So I feel like it’s reasonable to say that an even bigger shock – losing Stan entirely – is enough to set Ford on an entirely different track than the one he’d been on.

Obviously, this is SUPER LONG, so let’s put the rest under a cut…

(Which, to review: he had decided to hide the instructions to working the portal, and once that was accomplished, figure out how to destroy Bill; or, die trying.  What Ford wrote in Journal 3 indicates he was going to hike back up to the cave to see whether there were more clues about how to destroy Bill there.  A lot of people have asked: why did Ford not disassemble the portal FIRST?  I’ve thought about this a lot, and I usually came down on the side of thinking that he considered the instructions in the Journals equally dangerous and decided to prioritize them.  He was already afraid, at that point, that Bill would possess others in Gravity Falls – see his experience at the truck stop.  Not only was he afraid of Bill possessing him again, if he slept; but, probably,  of Bill possessing someone else, and using their body to come stop him from destroying the Portal; kill him; and/or, use the existing instructions in the Journals to get the portal working again.  However… I also had a new thought, having now really absorbed what Ford wrote about going back to the cave to look for a way to destroy Bill.  What if he thought that he might *need* the portal in order to do that?  For example, what if he found out that Bill would be vulnerable to destruction while in the act of coming through the portal?  That sort of thing.  If Ford destroyed the portal, he would keep Bill away from the physical world… temporarily.  But, what if Bill found another pawn to guide through the process of rebuilding the portal?  Separating the instructions was a step towards preventing that.  And it would have sucked to destroy the portal, only to find out that he needed it.  Note: I’m not saying that the whole “my life’s work!” thing didn’t also factor in; but by the time Ford is actively thinking of trying to stop / destroy Bill, that can’t have been the only reason he hesitated to disassemble the portal.)

Okay, so next, in order to figure out how long it would take, we need to figure out some other variables.  

Ford has to worry about Bill possessing him.  That’s definitely a big problem.  To be honest, I’m not really sure how Ford expected to keep that problem at bay, should Stan have actually left with J1.  There’s really only so long Ford could go without sleep.  And you’d think that the more Ford worked against Bill, the more Bill would try to overpower him.  But okay, let’s say that Ford’s plan immediately changes from “finding a way to destroy Bill / destroying the portal”, to “figuring out how to get Stan back”.  What could protect Ford from being possessed by Bill?  Bill-proofing the Shack.  Ford would need to get some unicorn hair.  And he has to do it fairly quickly, before Bill gets some natural opportunity to possess him again.

(Actually… if Ford is working on the portal again, I think Bill would leave him alone.  After all, isn’t that Ford doing what Bill wants?  Bill is arrogant enough to think that things will go his way if that portal is just turned on again, even if Ford is trying to thwart him.  However, while Ford might reason this out, I don’t think he would trust his safety to that reasoning.  Even if Bill is leaving Ford alone, Ford would try to find a way to protect himself.)

The SOTBE.  This might or might not be a problem.  We know from the Journal that they’re already formed, but they aren’t yet targeting him.  (They run away from him, in the only encounter he reports on in J3.)  If they DO decide to target him, that’s a big problem.  But he only encounters them once he goes in town.  There seems to be an implication that if they’re afraid enough of Ford to run away from him, they’re also afraid of the Shack.  Unless something happens to change that status quo, I’m not sure I see them mounting an attack on the Shack.

Redesigning the portal so that a rift doesn’t form when he reactivates it to retrieve Stan…

On the one hand, to do that, presumably Ford would need to track down Fiddleford.  Partly because that’s what the Better World AU suggests happened  (or does it? I’ll get to that in a moment).  And partly because since Ford needed Fidds’ help to build the portal in the first place, it stands to reason that he’d need an engineer’s help to make any major modifications.  

… But the thing is, Ford isn’t actually worried about a rift forming.  He doesn’t seem to know that that’s a possibility.  His fear of the portal destroying the world is about Bill and his Nightmare Realm friends *coming through* into the real world.  He never mentions instability or the danger of a rift, prior to going through the portal himself.  Even after Ford returns, he doesn’t suspect that danger until he’s actually in the process of dismantling the portal. He thinks that destroying it shuts the interdimensional gateway for good – until he spots the tiny rift just floating there. *Then* he’s horrified.

In the Better World AU, it doesn’t go into specifics at all about how p!Ford managed to keep Bill from possessing him.  It only says that p!Ford and p!Fidds built an addition that allowed them to use the portal while bypassing a connection to the Nightmare Realm. It’s been said before, but there’s so much left out of the account of the Better World AU, that it has to arouse suspicion as to whether p!Fidds actually told real-Ford everything accurately, and Ford just condensed it when writing it; or whether p!Fidds gave him limited or inaccurate information, and Ford filled in the blanks from his own wishful thinking.

The thing I can’t quite figure out yet is this: so, Ford knows that turning on the portal puts the world in danger, because Bill wants to come through with his buddies from the Nightmare Realm.  Okay.  But then, why has Bill not done that already?  The portal has been turned on twice so far.  Once to “test” it, and once when Stan was lost through it.  What about those times wasn’t sufficient for Bill to use it?  Was it length of time?  Was it where it was connected to?

But both of those things seem unlikely.  In the initial portal test with Fiddleford, the portal was active for over a minute.  It’s already on when Ford and Fidds go walking up to it carrying the test dummy; it stays on, with an apparently stable wormhole, through the entirety of the rest of the scene.  It’s still apparently on when the scene ends, 1:06 later.  And it WAS connected to the Nightmare Realm – that’s the whole point, seeing that and seeing Bill in his “true form” is what drove Fidds mad to begin with.   It’s only on for 20 seconds the second time (at least in canon, when Ford goes through), but again we know it was connected to the Nightmare Realm, since that’s where Ford goes.  So what more did Bill actually require, if he couldn’t use either of those opportunities?  I’m not sure we know?  

So anyway, I’m going to say that in the simplest possible scenario – I think that Ford could have gotten the portal back up and running in a couple of weeks.

He has to take time to go out and get some unicorn hair, to protect himself from Bill while he’s working in the Shack.  Given the snowy conditions, that might take a bit more time than it took in canon (which was 1 day); on the other hand, Ford doesn’t have to waste time trying to please the unicorns, the way Mabel did.  I’m going to just assume that Ford showing up with his crossbow and Stan’s brass knuckles would be sufficient to get him some of the unicorn hair.

Possibly, he combined this expedition with a trip to the cave, to see if there WERE any hints for guarding against Bill or defeating Bill.  So that might add another day.  And I suspect he’d go and retrieve the other two Journals; although I don’t think that would take very long.

He doesn’t need to contact Fiddleford, if he doesn’t know that he might need to fix or create an addition to the portal in order to guard against a rift forming. If he doesn’t try to contact Fidds and reconcile with him, that saves time.  (But you could do a variation on this, by saying that he does want to contact Fidds, in order to build what it’s said they built in the Better World AU: a way to use the portal while bypassing the Nightmare Realm.  However, Ford might not even be sure this would be a good plan.  If he thinks / knows the portal connects directly to the Nightmare Realm anyway, then he’d know that’s the first place he’d have to look for Stan.)

If, after getting the unicorn hair and protecting the Shack, Ford is finally able to get some rest, he might also be thinking a bit more clearly.  So he might, on his own, come to the realization that the portal just being on, and connected to the Nightmare Realm, is somehow not enough for Bill to come through.   (Especially since it was turned on for such a long time during the first “test”.)  He may not be able to figure out what it is Bill is waiting for, in order to prevent that. But it may allow him to reason that just turning it back on in order to retrieve Stan is no more dangerous than the past two times it was turned on.  He might also wonder / theorize that the fact that the gateway now opens into the unicorn-hair-spell protected Shack might actually keep Bill from coming through it.

He needs more fuel.  I’m assuming that what happened in canon – with the fuel gauges for the portal hitting zero just as Ford is lost through it – also happened here.  There’s apparently a source of the radioactive waste that’s needed nearby, but Ford still has to go GET it.  (Pro: he has Stan’s car.  Con: deep snow.)  He may have had Fiddleford’s help the first time they got a supply of it.  On the other hand, apparently it only took Stan one night to get what he needed, by himself.

Finally, there’s a scanning function built into the portal – at least, there is when Stan activates it in “Scary-oke”, and it appears to be scanning the sectors; the assumption is that it’s scanning for Ford, so that the portal can form a gateway to where he is.  This part of the portal machinery isn’t mentioned in J3.  It could certainly be something Ford and Fidds built originally – on the theory that, if the portal were really to be used for exploring the multiverse, you’d want a way to lock onto the people who went through it, to get them back.  At any rate, in canon, it seems to take more than 10 days for the scan to complete – if, that is, that’s what Stan is waiting for to activate the portal for real.  (It’s interesting that Stan starts the scanning process, and only much later goes to get fuel to actually start the portal.  The last firm date in J3 is July 29, the date of the confrontation with the SOTBE.  After that, we have Soos’s birthday and Globnar, the Woodstick Festival, and the Northwest Mansion mystery, however long all of those take, before we get to NWHS.)

So, again – simplest possible scenario – Ford would need several days, to a week, to accomplish some of the tasks and errands above, by himself.  Possibly including the scanning so that the portal can lock onto Stan – the extra time tacked onto that week would be for how long that took.  Otherwise, I *think* that once he accomplishes those tasks, he could activate the portal and, hopefully, get Stan back.

Obviously, if you wanted to complicate this for it to take longer, you could certainly add in various problems.  Maybe Ford DOES think he needs Fiddleford’s help, so he has to go through the process of finding him, reconciling with him, and then they have to do whatever it is they are going to do.  Maybe the SOTBE does prove to be more of a problem than they seem to have been in canon, and time has to be taken to deal with them.  That sort of thing.

But if you want “fastest”, that’s my guess.  Couple of weeks.

Also, what happens afterwards could also be interesting.  Once Ford gets Stan back, what happens?  How do they THEN address the problem of the portal, and Bill?  The unicorn hair would have kept Ford safe inside the Shack while he was working on this stuff, but they’d need a more permanent solution in order for Ford to live a normal life, not to mention, to keep the world safe.  Do they actually reconcile and work together, or are there further complications?  Did a Rift form while the portal was on, to retrieve Stan?  ( @stanfordpines-phd makes a good point at the start of their meta post here, about why a rift didn’t form the first 2 times the portal was on; and why it probably did so in 2012 because of the passage of time.  So – maybe not.)

(Final note: having now read through @stanfordpines-phd full meta post – yeah, although they were answering a slightly different question, we DID hit on some of the same ideas. :)  Including both of us thinking of the unicorn hair!  Their answer goes in a different direction, though – another variation on this storyline that I’d LOVE to read!  Though, I don’t entirely agree that for the story to be interesting, Ford would have to fail to get Stan back at first.   I do think that WOULD be interesting!  But I also think you could make an interesting story out of the problems they still have to deal with once Stan is safely back – foremost, how DO they defeat Bill once and for all, in order to keep Ford’s mind, and the world, safe?  And, just the story of Ford and Stan truly reconciling at that point would be interesting; though I’ve also seen some stuff – including @as-be-low‘s “Time Has Changed Me (and Left Me Full of Doubt)” – in which Stan accidentally falling through is such a traumatic experience for him that he is just as angry at Ford, as canon Ford was at Stan when he returned.  That sort of thing.)

#gravity falls #meta #stanford pines #stanley pines #bill cipher #fiddleford mcgucket #reverse portal au #long post

[dreamin-of-somewhere-else]

Brown Cardboard Box

Characters: Dean x sister!reader, Sam [mentioned], Lisa + Ben.

Words: 2400-ish.

[Previous character death.] - That’s the only warning I can think of really.

A/N: Hey guys! Guess who wrote a fic instead of studying for a Spanish test? Anyways, I started re-watching season 6, because I wanted watch a few souless!Sam episodes, and after 6x01 I got this idea. So the fic takes place in between season 5 and 6. 

Not my GIF

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Sometimes you imagined what it would be like if you didn’t live the life. Wondering. Making up your own little scenarios and such. How you would live in Lawrence, and how you would have actually grown up there, how you would maybe have a pet (probably a dog, satisfying Sam’s everlasting love for them), how you would have childhood friends, how you would do sports in school. How you would all graduate and then how you would go to college. Grow up. Meet a partner (hopefully). Maybe have a family of your own someday.

Now, in this very moment, you were standing here with a brown cardboard box in your embrace. A single brown cardboard box containing whatever sad excuse of a wardrobe you had, as well as the few things that actually were yours. Photos, diaries, a gun and so on. You were moving into your own place. You never thought the day would come.

You had imagined it though. In your daydreams, infinite fantasies. In those, you were moving out to go to college. That wasn’t the case right now, but that’s whatever. You were getting your own place.

You never even had your own room. It was a big deal.

In your daydreams, you had imagined your mom and dad being there, helping out. But more importantly, your brothers. They had been there too. Now, your logic, the rational part of your mind, was telling you that it was probably unlikely. You were the youngest, so Dean and Sam had probably already moved out. Heck, maybe they would have been on the other side of the country. But still, your daydreams had no limits, and you always had wanted them there. Part of the scene, in frame. There when the cameras were rolling. Wishing you luck.

Now, in the real world, present time, Dean was here. It felt good and reassuring and it almost brought a smile to your face. Almost. It had, if it wasn’t for the fact that Sam wasn’t here.

Sam was dead. The cold hard truth that always caused a paralyzing pain through your body, twisting your stomach, and it felt like you couldn’t breath. It’s amazing (in an absolutely horrifying way) that a word can do that to you. But it could, and it kept being proven to you.

Sam wasn’t here. He wasn’t by your side, he wasn’t helping you carrying boxes (that should have been more than one) to your car. He wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t even grunting in mock annoyance when you would have given him another thing to pretty please fix for you, like helping out with a second box. He wasn’t here to give you a goodbye hug. To tell you to stay safe and take it easy, or he (and Dean) would come and get you back home. He wasn’t here to wish you good luck. Or to ruffle your hair.

Sam was burning in hell, alongside with Lucifer and Michael. It still didn’t feel real, it was too absurd, too scary. Too disturbing. But the dull, but ever so lasting, throbbing pain inside of you, clenching your heart, told you otherwise.

Instead of Sam, there was Lisa and Ben. Dean’s new family.

Okay, you shouldn’t say it like that. Dean had told you off, saying that it wasn’t true. ’Don’t say that (Y/N).’

And maybe it was your realistic, fine, maybe cynical, viewpoint — but it kind of was the truth. For now, at least until Sam was back (because, yes, you would get him back). But, well, maybe for the future too. Who knows if he even wants to return to the life. Most people probably wouldn’t. Who would want to continuously risk their life for strangers, spending their life in a car, missing out on what most people just simply considers life. Why would you do that when you could have a real home, a partner, a kid, real food everyday, friends, stable routines? All that with a quite a lot higher percentage of a chance making it to a tomorrow.

Pretty much no one.

”Are you sure about this? I mean, you could just stay here?”

The voice is distant, kind of feels like you were underwater and someone was trying to talk to you from above the surface, but the words quite never reached you. You were too occupied with absentmindedly watching the beautiful speckles of light dancing in the water, broken sunlight, created by the water surface.

”(Y/N)?” Your big brother calling on you again brought you back from the sea of thoughts.

”Huh?”

”I said, are you sure you want to do this?” He gestured with a hand towards the cardboard box in your arms. ”You could just stay with me, Lisa and Ben. Right, Lis?”

Dean looked over his shoulder, where the dark-haired woman and her son stood. Her arm was gently draped around the preteen’s upper back, as they stood huddled together, watching you with kind, respectively curious eyes.

”Yeah, of course. The guest room’s always available—” Lisa nodded, but you interrupted her.

”Thanks, Lisa, I appreciate the offer. But I’m good.” You reassured her, and then looked back into Dean’s solemn, green eyes.

The truth was that you sort of felt like an outsider. A guest. You didn’t fit in. You were a piece of a different puzzle, a stray piece that got mixed up and ended up in the wrong box. This wasn’t your family. It never was meant to be. Dean was your family though. Dean and Sam.

But you couldn’t keep on living here. It was hard enough these first three weeks. It was hard leaving too. But your intuition, your gut feeling, was telling you that it was the better option. You didn’t wan’t to descend upon them anymore, gate-crashing. It was time for you to leave and go on — by yourself.

Because this, this was Dean’s. Dean’s own little family. That was ’stupid enough to take him in’ (not your words). Dean, who had been yours (and Sam’s) for all your life. Who laid down anything for you, no matter if you told him not to. And this was, for the first time, only his, and it was cosy, loving, and safe. And you didn’t want to ruin that, not for the world. It was his, and you wanted him to have it.

Speaking of Sam, you were going to find a way to bring back your other big brother. You would not stop until you got results, or you died. That was the only two possible outcomes. And that was a promise.

Dean’s lips curled into slight grimace that you could tell was supposed to be a little smile. He didn’t like this. Even though it was for his best. But he tried, for you. It hurt to look at him though, so you turned to Lisa. She immediately opened her arms, and you gratefully gave her a hug.

”Thanks for everything Lisa. Really. You took us in when we really needed it.” You pulled back from the hug and met her chocolate gaze. ”Tell me, whenever, if there is anything I can do to make it up to you. I owe you, big time.”

Lisa just smiled. ”It was nothing.”

You rolled your eyes slightly, but laughing a little meanwhile, to show that you weren’t serious. You would object, if you didn’t know that Lisa would immediately do the same, and you would just continue that way, forever.

You turned to Ben next. He was still in the age where hugs, if they weren’t from his mom, still were kind of awkward, and frankly uncool. So you settled on reaching out a hand, which he took and shook. And then, quickly before he could protest, you ruffled his hair.

”Promise me something Ben?” You asked, as you slightly bent down to his height. Then you pointed at Dean. ”Keep an eye on that one for me, would you? He can be pretty good at getting himself in sticky situation, but if you check in on him every now and then, I’m sure he’ll be fine.”

”Yeah.” Ben grinned slightly as his round eyes turned to Dean, excited and proud that he had gotten that mission. To keep an eye on Dean. ”I promise.”

”Great.” You grinned back.

You glanced sideways, and caught Lisa smiling. And Dean… Dean himself looked even more emotional.

”Well,” you said as you bent down to pick up the box that you had sat down on the pavement by your feet before hugging Lisa. ”I probably should get going.”

Dean nodded, pensively.

”Bye, (Y/N).” Lisa waved.

”Bye!” Ben echoed behind.

You smiled, before starting walking away from their porch and towards your parked car on the street. Dean followed next to you, if not slightly behind.

Once you reached the car, it was quiet for a moment. But, with you and your brothers, silence wasn’t awkward or scary — sometimes it was needed. And you three could always tell when. So you just waited for Dean collect his thoughts. Soon enough he did speak up.

”You sure you don’t wanna stay here?” He pressed a last time, gruff voice laced with hope, his green eyes almost pleading.

”I need to go, Dean.”

”Why?”

The question left his mouth before he could stop it. It was innocent, almost childlike. It made you feel guilty.

”You know why, Dean-o.” You smiled sadly. ”This is for you. Not for me.”

Dean nodded and looked away. He kind of looked teary eyed, but you weren’t going to point that out.

”I’m gonna be less than an hour away.” You tried to lighten the mood. ”It’s nothing. You can visit whenever, easily. And you better.” You quickly added that last sentence, while you nailed him with a hard gaze.

Dean chuckled just a little. You smiled. It was nice to know that you still knew how to get a laugh out of your brother. Still had it in you.

”I promise.” He smiled back, this time an actual one, as he repeated Ben’s words. ”If you promise to swing by here every now and then.”

”Deal.” You agreed, and you fell in silence again.

Dean looked sad. Actually even more so than you had expected.

You could imagine how he was feeling. How he didn’t want you to go your separate ways. Because, in a way, that meant that Dean lost another sibling. That it would only be Dean, on his own in the world. Of course, he had Lisa and Ben. But they weren’t you and Sam, because you two were a part of Dean. Lisa and Ben were a part of the world Dean had to face.

It was hard for Dean to let you go. All his life, he had been watching over you. Keeping you right by his side, under his protection. Hunting together. Dealing with the crap life had thrown at you. Seeing the country with you. Meeting new people with you, sharing friends. Basically doing everything together. And now you wouldn’t even live together anymore.

Slowly, you turned around to your car, that you had been facing away from whilst talking to your oldest brother, and opened the passenger door and placed the cardboard box in the seat. It wasn’t like anyone was sitting there anyway, like it had been for all your life. You were truly on your own now.

When you turned back towards Dean, he surprised you by enveloping you with his arms, clutching tight, hiding his face in your hair. You gently patted his back, and held on tight as well.

”I’ll miss you, squirt.” He murmured quietly, but loud enough for you to hear it clearly. The words tugged at your heartstrings, and suddenly you doubted your decision.

But, then you regained your determination again. Dean’s life. Dean’s family.

”I’ll miss you too, jerk.” You smiled into his shoulder. You really, really would.

It wasn’t like you never would see each other again. But when you go from living with a person, seeing them everyday — to once every two weeks, once a month or maybe even every other month — it was difficult. Especially when this person was not only your brother, but your best friend and right now the only person you had left of your family.

But you let him go. And he lets you go. After placing a lingering hand on his cheek, giving him a final smile, you walked around the car, and got in behind the wheel.

Hand placed on his hip, Dean ran a hand over his face, thinking that you wouldn’t notice, but you did. You didn’t point it out though.

You closed the door, and started the car. Rolling down the windows, you said goodbye to Dean once again. He appeared at the window, sending you a shadow of a smile.

”Good luck, (Y/N).” He said with a gentle voice, slightly strangled, if not.

”Good luck, Dean.” You responded. Always good luck to you. You and Sam.

Then he tapped the car twice before straightening up. You nodded meanwhile.

It was hard to press down on the gas, but eventually you just did. Driving away from the Lisa’s street, you looked through the rearview mirror. There you saw them, Dean, Lisa and Ben, all waving at you. You stretched out your arm through the window by the driver’s seat — that also was rolled down — and waved back. Soon, they were out of sight.

The weather of this moment was beautiful. It was a sunny and warm evening in May (one of your favorite months). Everything was mildly lit up in this golden light, and the sun was about to set on the blue sky decorated with pink and orange tinted clouds. The wind, as you drove, tousled your hair.

You glanced over at the brown cardboard box — that was just sitting there in the passenger seat — and that’s when you saw the old photos sticking up from the bundle of flannel that you had quite carelessly thrown in there.

You took your eyes away and focused on the road. You didn’t even need to inspect the most visible photo, to know what it pictured. You had already seen it so many times, in fact it was one of your most prized possessions.

It was one of you, Sam and Dean all together, smiling. It was taken a few years ago. You were only 18 in that one, barely an adult. Sam was 22 and fresh out of college, and Dean — full on laughing — was 26, wearing John’s old leather jacket, as well as the amulet and was happy to have his little siblings together and right by his side again. So that he could watch out for them like the mother hen he was and tease you senseless like the annoying bastard he also could be.

You missed those times. Of course you did. But more than that, the photo built onto the burning fire of pure determination to get the three of you back. You were going to take another photo like that, all three of you together, smiling happily.

Tags: @winchesters-favorite-girl @daughters-and-winsisters @evyiione @samanddeanshotsis @darkestgrungeuniverse @fabulouslycassie @delessapeace-blog @mariairwin666 @1amluke @saveprettydays @cookee50 @yoursmilemakesmeloveyou @infamati--et--obliterati  @stillcooli0

If you want to be tagged in my fics: Read this and then send me an ask telling me which one you want on :)

#winchester sister #dean winchester #sam winchester #lisa and ben #dean x sister reader #dean x sister!reader #dean winchester x you #dean x reader #s6 #supernatural fanfiction #supernatural fanfic #supernatural #spn #spn sisfic #spn sister #spn sister one shot #sister winchester #bro!dean #sam winchester x you #little sister winchester #reader insert #name insert #dean winchester sister #sam and dean winchester #sam and dean winchester sister

[themessafterthemarty]

The Temptation

A Dan and Phil fanfiction

(COVER)

Summary: 

A re-telling of "The Urge" by Dan Howell.

In which Dan has already written that story.

Tags: Angst, grief/mourning, (ambiguously) happy ending, vampire/ghost/general undead, questionable sanity, bromance or romance it’s up to you bros Warnings: Death is major theme. Average Dan-levels of strong language. Note: Jumps a bit into the action to avoid just outright plagiarizing the first page.

Synopsis of ‘The Urge’: Phil dies, and Dan is heartbroken. However, Phil wakes up after his funeral, and Dan freaks out, claiming he's not the real Phil, while Phil says he wasn't killed but turned into a vampire, and Dan says he's just a demon possessing Phil's body. Against Dan's will, Phil turns him so, in his words, nothing has to change - just their diets. Dan wakes up as a vampire, and they go out for lunch. (ao3)

The next day was to be Phil's funeral. Dan had no interest in going. His friendship with Phil was personal to him and not something he wanted to share with family and friends who would mean well but insult with every word of comfort. He decided that even if he had to attend physically, he would be somewhere else in his mind. He had to.

Dan remained silent and stoic through the service. People left to return to their lives, the relatives trading condolences, leaving Dan alone in the room with the coffin.

He didn’t want to look. If he looked, it’d be real. He would rather have ran far, far away from the nightmare he was trapped in, but maybe that was exactly why he had to see. His desperate mind would do anything to pretend none of it was real, would do anything to fill the pain of the real world with some pleasant fantasy, and he had to stick to reality.

He strode over and gazed into the box. Lifeless. It was as if it was nothing but an object lying there. Even with Phil’s typically pale skin you used to see the warm glow of life from within him. Now all that could be seen there was the sickly pale-green colour of death.

Dan turned abruptly and strode away, before a voice stopped him mid-step.

“Don’t go.”

He froze completely. A part of him was screaming at him to run, to run as far as he could in as little time as possibly, and to start now.

Now.

The other part of him was inexplicitly filled with something that could only be described as anger, and that might be what kept him standing exactly where he was.

“It’s okay,” Phil’s voice came from behind him.

“Who are you?” Dan asked slowly.

Laughter. It didn’t sound right to Dan. “You know who I am. Looking away from the obvious part where there is no one else here, even though it’s a really weird situation – I mean, you can hear it’s me, right?”

“Hear it’s who?” Dan said, no emotion in his voice.

“Just turn around and look at me, then-“

“Hear. It’s. Who?” Dan repeated carefully, biting every word.

A sigh. “Phil.”

“That’s impossible. Phil’s dead.” The words hurt something deep within him, but he couldn’t run away from them. It was the truth.

“Look, I know it’s really, really weird, but I swear, it’s me!”

“No.”

“But Dan-“

“SHUSH!” Dan whipped around with a ferocious look in his eye, finger pointing directly at something that really, painfully looked exactly like the body he had looked at just seconds before, but that should not be standing in front of him.

“I’m-”

“You’re NOT Phil!” Dan spat out, taking a step closer to the figure in front of him, his tone inviting no challenges. “YOU’RE NOT EVEN REAL!”

Phil looked at him, confused. “I’m standing right here, Dan, I’m right in front of you!”

“No you’re not.” Dan’s hands fell to his sides, and the stoic look returned to his face.

“Dan, I promise you, I’m real! I can’t explain it, I don’t know what happened, it was all really confusing, I can’t even figure out my own head right now much less how I got here or how I should explain it-“

“Oh, really? How convenient.”

Phil was looking thoroughly perplexed now. “What makes you so suspicious about me even being here? I get that I can’t explain it and it’s all really bizarre, but if you can’t even believe this-“

“You’re not real.”

“Why do you keep saying that? I’m right here!”

The huff of laughter that came from Dan’s mouth would have sounded to no one like an expression of amusement, just like the smile on his face would have looked to no one like an expression of joy. The tears pressing on his eyes were clear as day to anyone looking. “Because I’ve already written this story.”

Phil frowned. “What?”

“I’ve already written this story. For TABINOF – the phanfiction, remember?”

“What? That’s not true, it’s not the same-“

“Yes, it is.”

“Well, when you never even let me finish a sentence, that doesn’t give me much room to explain anything, does it?”

“Well, I’m just interrupting myself, aren’t I?” Dan countered, the mockery of a smile not reaching his eyes.

Phil threw his hands up in exasperated defeat. “What are you on about?”

The question echoed in the room unanswered. Sad brown eyes studied the motionless figure by the coffin – the suit that was too smooth and unwrinkled, the skin that was too pale, the eyes that just weren’t right somehow. He turned away again, the sight making his stomach turn, but even with his back to the impossible creature he could not ignore the silence in the room, empty except for his own breathing that lacked the echo that should have come from behind him.

“You know,” he began, telling himself he was only filling the silence, a part of him wondering why he didn’t just walk out the door instead. “When I first showed that story to Phil, he thought it was a horror story.”

His eyes flitted around the room, like there was a chance he’d find some comfort if he looked long enough.

“He thought it had a bad ending, like it was a bad turn of events, because of how much I resisted in it, because the demon possessing his body had won. Since I’d resisted his advances at every turn until the very end, and just generally…. showed how much I didn’t want it, how I didn’t for a second think it was him. And yet I was still turned, and I had eternity as a vampire ahead of me, with the deceptive monster that turned me.”

The warmth behind his eyes had spilled over. He knew he was crying now.

“But that was never a horror story. Far from it.” Every word seemed to get stuck in his throat but he worked them out of it. He tasted warm, salty tears. “All the horror of it was in the first few paragraphs.” He swallowed. “The horror was him being dead in the first place.” The words were still hurting like hell, but he couldn’t ignore them, he couldn’t. He couldn’t run from it. He couldn’t let himself.

“Now, this?” he said, turning back around and gesturing at the deceptive figure who’d apparently walked a few steps closer while he’d talked. “This right here,” he whispered, choking back a sob, “This is my fucking dream scenario.”

The look of confusion in the thing’s eyes softened.

“This isn’t the problem. This,” he said, stepping forward and pointing to the point right between the light blue eyes. “is the fucking solution to my ultimate nightmare.”

The figure looked taken aback by this. “So … why did you resist it? In the story, I mean,” he asked quietly. “You wrote it, after all, and you didn’t seem very happy in it.”

“Because of countless reasons!” Dan threw his hands up in aggravation. “How the hell would I know it was actually you, not just some demon imitating you? You’ve watched Buffy more than I have, you know that’s totally possible! We know fuck-all about vampires in real life, because as far as we know, they don’t bloody exist! And why the fuck would I want eternal life – much less eternal life where I didn’t even know if I was myself or if you were yourself? I knew nothing about what was going on or what was happening, only that you were dead and I wasn’t and something that looked an awful lot like you apparently wanted to change this and gave me no choice in the matter and it was kind of a really fucking scary situation!”

There was a pause as the last remains of Dan’s shouts echoed in the room. The figure of Phil only looked more confused.

“So, then…” it asked as quietly as before. “How is that – this – your… dream scenario?”

Dan just looked at it – him, it, whatever. With tears still trickling down his face, he just looked at the figure standing between him and the coffin that to him was like the elephant in the room. He looked at the blue eyes, dark blue in the soft light, that looked so much like the eyes he so dearly wanted to look into. He looked at the jet-black hair, at a fringe gap he wanted to reach out and fix, at the pale skin that was just barely on the wrong side of yellow, at the lips that should always be smiling but instead were tinged purple. He looked at the suit he’d seen in Phil’s closet more times than he’d seen him actually wear it. He looked back into blue eyes that still looked back at him in confusion.

“Because this,” he whispered, gesturing at the whole figure he’d just so closely examined. “despite all it’s flaws, despite everything horrifying and scary and unknown about it…. It would’ve been a chance, and that… This is so… this is such an infinitely more tempting option than…” He waved his arm in the general direction of the coffin he struggled to look directly at anymore, despite it being placed too high up for him to see anything but the side of a box of painted wood. “That.”

The Phil figure followed Dan’s gesturing to look at the coffin behind him, like he’d forgotten it was there. “That?”

“That,” Dan repeated.

“What do you mean?” He turned back to look confused at Dan again.

Dan looked at him incredulously. “You’re kidding?”

The look didn’t change.

“There’s another… Phil’s in there. A Phil I didn’t make up in my head. The real Phil. The….” He swallowed, the damn words once again hurting every part of him on the way out of his throat. “The dead Phil.”

The figure raised its eyebrows. “Is he now?”

Dan frowned. “Yes, he is.”

“How do you know that?”

“I just saw him in it a few minutes ago, and he was, y’know…” He huffed in annoyance, giving up on trying to bring those words out again. “He wasn’t exactly in a state to move.”

“But you don’t know he’s still in there.”

“Yes, I do.”

“No, you don’t. You said he ‘wasn’t’ – you’re not even sure yourself, are you?”

“Shut up.”

“Okay,” Dan wasn’t sure what he expected, but somehow it wasn’t that the figure would listen. The was a minute of eye contact before it spoke up again. “Why do you keep insisting I’m dead if you don’t even want me to be? If you’d rather have me here,” It tilted its head and stepped closer to Dan. “Why won’t you accept that I am?”

“You’re. Not. Real.” Dan squeezed his eyes shut. This whole debacle was pulling at too many painful strings.

“And this dead Phil is?” 

The word wouldn’t stop hurting. They made him want to start screaming and never stop until they stopped existing. “Yes,” he whispered.

He heard no response for too long, and opened his eyes to a doubtful look from the other man.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, he’s right there!” He gave in and in a couple of long steps was once again by the coffin’s side, a long arm gesturing at its contents.

It came as a surprise to him how surprised he was to see the body in the coffin. It hit him like a punch in the gut, even though it had no reason to, and he looked away and closed his eyes immediately for fear of either throwing up or just breaking down crying if he spent too long staring at what looked like a morbid wax-replica of his best friend. He already knew it was there. He didn’t understand why it shocked him so much.

“He’s right…” he choked out, now less frustrated and more simply suffering. He couldn’t finish the sentence. Gritting his teeth together, he looked back at where Phil’s living figure had been standing, but was faced with nothing but an empty room. Again he was surprised at his own surprise, and his crushing disappointment. No, this was good. He was back in reality, where he needed to be.

Reality is good. Phil was dead.

The words didn’t seem right. The more he tried to repeat it to himself, the more it hurt. His breathing was slowly becoming more and more rapid as the words fluttered past his lips in constant repetition and the world closed in on him and his legs couldn’t support him anymore and the words, the words, the damn words weren’t right, they weren’t right-

“Is he?”

Dan’s eyes flew open again. He’d somehow ended up on his knees and his arms were hugging his waist but more importantly there was a pair of fancily clad legs in front of him.

“Am I actually?”

Dan looked up into Phil’s eyes. Before even granting him an expression, Dan got up and turned to look in the coffin again. It was empty. He slowly turned back to Phil. “You’re not real,” he said slowly.

“Aren’t I? I feel quite real to me.” And the rosy pink smile, and the joking glint in his bright blue eyes and the crinkles around them… it was so, so painfully familiar.

He looked back at the coffin, and was startled to see something, something was there, but then it wasn’t. He continued to stare at it for a while, wide-eyed. Nothing appeared. Footsteps approached him from behind, but his eyes remained glued to the empty coffin, expecting something to show up in it. It really was a much more pleasant sight without something in it. However, it was still unnerving him, and something in him suffered at the sight.

He drew a sharp breath as he felt a hand lay comfortingly on his shoulder. His eyes finally shifted away from the coffin and to Phil on his side. “You’re … not real,” he whispered, frowning, with less conviction than before.

Phil hummed. “That’s actually entirely possible,” he agreed. “But you can’t tell the difference, can you?”

Dan didn’t reply. He just looked. There wasn’t any good answer he could give.

“So does it really matter?”

Dan still said nothing, and instead looked back at the coffin. Slowly, he lifted his arm so his hand hovered over where Phil’s chest would have been if he lay there. Assuming he wasn’t completely out of it, his mind couldn’t empty the space completely, could it? He’d feel something there, or there’d at least be some kind of disturbance as his mind tried to work around his hand landing on something, on, on…

His fingers curled in distaste at the very thought.

All he had to do was lower his hand, and he’d know. He’d see something. He’d feel something. If… there was something there. If Phil actually, truly, in reality was…

He pulled his hand back. He hardly noticed he did, but before he knew it, it was back at his side. His face remained expressionless as he simply took a moment to breathe. His eyes didn’t leave the empty coffin.

Then, before Phil could ask what he was doing, he turned and walked towards the exit. Before he’d reached the door, he stopped. He turned back to look at Phil, still standing by the coffin, looking at Dan questioningly.

“Well?” Dan asked.

Phil raised his eyebrows, and then cleared his throat awkwardly. “Well what?”

“You coming or what, slowpoke? I haven’t got all day.” It was a lie. He did have all day. He had all week. He had all month. He would have waited all that time if he needed to. He had nothing more important waiting.

Phil’s questioning look was replaced with a smile so bright one could with a single look understand why some called him the very essence of sunshine, and he ran with light steps over to Dan's side.

The sight flooded Dan’s cold, empty chest with a wave of warmth, and finally, he felt like he could breathe again. A/N: This is the first time I've finished and posted a fanfiction or basically any kind of creative writing in about six years if my calculations are correct. While that is no big deal to anyone else, I'm just going to go back to hiding now until my breathing returns to normal. I hope you have a lovely day!

#my writing #fanfic #phan #dan and phil #dan howell #phil lester #phan fiction #phanfic #phanfiction #my fanfic #tabinof #the urge #platonic phan #vampire #vampire fanfic

[braindamageforbeginners]

Another Trip Around the Sun

Cycle 12 Day 6 (January 2)

I pen an annual, getting-old piece on a regular basis, but, realistically, this is the birthday I didn’t expect, Horribly, my life looks much like it did when I was 17, which, I suppose, is the point of this whole thing. I was 17 when I developed Tumor #1, and, not surprisingly in retrospect, that’s kind of where my life froze. In retrospect, that’s disappointing but hardly surprising - I’ve met cancer patients who take a year or more off to “discover themselves” (or, perhaps more accurately, discover who they are now that the costs can be accurately summarized). At the current rate, I’d need to sleep for a month before I could even attempt that.Herculean task. So, I usually just go straight back into the fray of my life, which, as I’ve discovered in the last year, is a mistake. The past year would normally count as an unmitigated disaster, not least because it signaled a really bad trend of tumors speeding up both in terms of lethality and formation - I had brain tumors at 17, 28, and 32. Based on that math, I’m overdue for the next one, which should be far worse.What? I hear you ask, “Could be worse than one of the - if not the deadliest - forms of cancer?” Well, that would seem to be the horrifying answer I’ve sent 12 months figuring out. I’ve sat next to people who literally didn’t have a face. I watched a woman sob in a parking lot - and, to my shame, did nothing (that incident was detailed in the archives). I had a stroke (or ministroke). I’ve probably shaved decades off my life via radiation exposure (I like to think that just makes me more-likely to become Godzilla). The guys at Toca are looking at immunotherapies. I absolutely do not want to face another brain tumor - again, I absolutely do not want that, and I do not want anyone reading this to face that - but it is feeling less like that’d be a final call, and more of another interruption. Which I think I should get a pass on, but, as I’ve learned this past year, the gulf between “deserve” and “receive” is vast, and usually requires a major organized religion to bridge.

So, even though I’m a year older, I’m in much better shape than I’ve been probably at any previous point, mostly due to my only new year’s resolution last year: 1. Get in better shape/go to the gym more often, and; 2. eat better. That worked out so much better than I’d expected, I’ve learned the importance of making resolutions out of things you’d be inclined to do, anyway. In that same spirit, I’m just going to 1. Get something like a real job (again, I’ve heard of some cancer survivors that spend years on that one, thanks to the delightful insurance issues that follow us around), and, 2. write more (ideally related to resolution #1, but I’ll use my powers for evil if the price is right).

Speaking of which, there seems to be massive demand for some one to address the question:

My physicians are offering to treat me, but if it only gets me 8 more months, should I take the treatment?

Yes. Goddammit, if there’s one thing I’ve learned that you should take away from it all, it’s that treatment options are not kept on the table indefinitely, and the milisecond they’re removed they do not come back, and the options get worse. I have been phenomenally lucky my whole life - or half of it, anyway - to get treated/diagnosed by the very best neurology/neurosurgery groups in the world. One thing that I wish I’d known a year ago is, untreated brain cancer - like all cancers - doesn’t just quietly sit on the sidelines until you hit your allotted threescore and ten (or 14 months) - it’ll be there with you, dogging you, slowing you down and making you feel it every step. And no one will force you to finish or continue treatment - I have two infusions left, if I don’t show up for them, I doubt anyone will ask; I’ll just lose my slot in the drug trial. Which, given almost a year of progression-free survival, I’d be a fool to lose, even though the side-effects are vicious. If treatment’s not working, they’ll actually yank you from it. However, that 14-month life expectancy is also based on decades in which physicians didn’t treat the disease as aggressively as they could. So, if you find a medical team willing to work with you toward an uncertain end, take that offer.

That seems to be the horrifying undertone you hear all too often in the world of terminal cancer. “Yes, we could treat it, but it would be a temporary fix.” These same people rarely like it when you point out that, based on market volatility, that retirement savings account isn’t worth the receipt it’s printed on. Yes, cancer patients - particularly terminal cancer patients - are just playing out the clock, but, realistically, that’s all any of us are doing. We just have to learn to operate in that headspace where uncertainty is a victory. If you think that’s a horrifying situation, well, you’re right, and, just wait until you become a parent (Author’s note: I am not a parent, nor could I with good conscience bring a child into the world with my genes)(assuming the chemo hasn’t already sterilized me). Yes, the very best I can hope for - and I am still somewhat hopeful; as Warlock Sr mentioned, you build on success, and each month/scan without a definite recurrence bodes better for the next scan. It’s a hard-sell, to be certain, so let’s put that in a slightly different context. Let’s say you accidentally won some local radio station’s call-in competition or something, and got an 8-14 month cottage rental in, say, Antigua. You may or may not take the time off, but no one would say, “Well, what’s 14 months in paradise going to do? We’ll have all the same problems at the end of it?” Same goes for cancer treatments - you’ll probably have a miserable time and die, but, since that’s now your all-weather, worst-case scenario, you might want to explore other options. Or not, it’s your life.

So, as mentioned, Priority #1 - assuming that scan in two weeks comes back clean - is to take a solid break from it all. By which I mean, sleep, eat, and exercise until body no longer feels like Trona. If you’re a regular reader, that might mean May... of 2024. If I awaken before then (and I know I’ve regularly threatened to go off and sleep for a few months)(it’ll happen sooner or later), well, then we get to discuss the hardest part of cancer: recovery.

I was a big fan of the travel/adventure genre, growing up, especially short-story anthologies (again, not a big surprise). At the end of each of these anthologies, the publisher usually had some paragraph-long insert about what happened to each writer, which, since they were usually contemporary writers, could be edited to, “And they got their terminal degree, or marriage, learned to sit still, and never wrote again.” My favorite - and my apologies for not running this down - was, “[Person X] was last seen in 1909. His friends who confirmed the sighting last saw him crossing the border to Mexico, three weeks before the revolution.” I love the ambiguity and potential of that - “He could’ve found the fabled Fountain of Youth and be alive today, he might’ve fallen off his horse ten minutes later and fatally smashed his head.” It’s a choose-your-own adventure with someone else’s life. I’m aware that cancer limits the options, but I’d still go for broke and play for as much time as I could. Today, it’s eight extra months, ten years from now, it’s a bonus decade. Admittedly, I can’t - and wouldn’t be interested in - making that choice for everyone, but, my message to both healthy and sick people is, if near-certain death is a major turn-off, you should consider turning back and crawling into bed. Life, death, and all points between, are not for the faint of heart.

[stack-of-shame]

Tony Hawk’s Underground: Go Get Some Women, You Woman

Game #37: Tony Hawk’s Underground, Neversoft, 2003

Playing Tony Hawk's Underground as the female avatar is the strangest experience. First of all, it's dead obvious that they were imagining a male character when they wrote the dialogue. Everyone is calls you "dude" and "man" constantly.

At one point, you and your friend, later villain get arrested. This scene starts with a police officer's boot on your avatar's neck. Then the cop tells you you won't make your skateboarding competition unless your avatar is willing to "do them a couple favors, hehe.” This is an outright horrifying image when your avatar is a WOC. 

Later, you're put on a mission to retrieve women for a party. You drive up to strangers on a motorized cart full of potted plants. After you impress the women, they say something vaguely flirty and join you, a stranger, on the cart. Keep in mind the cart is a two-seater, so women nos. 2, 3, and 4 are foced to ride with the plants. 

Don’t make the combo too big though. You’ll look like you’re compensating. 

This party was thrown in your honor for a successful magazine shoot. But it's now your job to go "get some women", because the party honoring you, a woman, is "a total dudefest,” says an NPC you’ve never met and never meet again. This is clearly the result of the female avatar being an afterthought, but taken at face-value, it is incredibly creepy. Not that riding around in a cart full of strange women and plants is any less creepy if you’re playing as a man. Actually it’s almost worse because now it’s creepy in a more intentional way, I guess?         

This all is just my reaction as a privileged white cis dude. I don’t even want to think about what this was like for any women playing the game. I think when we talk about representation in games, we forget how bad it used to be, and how many of those problems simply got toned down rather than fixed. Re-experiencing Tony Hawk’s Underground has made it all the more obvious how games pushed women away. This game takes masculinity beyond masculinity, to a place where there are only men, and girl-objects. And if you’re a woman you better count your lucky stars you’re on the skateboard because it’s the only thing keeping you a man. 

Ah, I remember you mentioning something like that in your Ted Talk

I considered the possibility that the female avatar is intended to be off-the-charts butch. Call it my last stand in the fight against being overwhelmingly embarrassed and ashamed. But it doesn’t hold water. The female avatar’s voice is bubbly, with a little fry. Her voice is perfectly honed to sound cool and relatable, but not so masculine as to threaten the other characters’ masculinity.

Without having heard this voice, I had used create-a-skate to make a badass biker-punk looking character with a red Mohawk. Now, there’s no reason that someone who looks like my character couldn’t talk like a 12 year old Miranda Cosgrove. But unless you go far, far out of your way to make the character look like the girl from Lazytown, the sound you expect to hear is a brassy 20-something alto with a pack-a-day rasp. This is not the time for lofty hypotheticals about dissonance between a character’s voice an appearance. This is a case where the game gives you a grown woman to play as and then makes her talk like a toddler who takes elocution lessons.

Or perhaps the avatar is meant to be a lesbian, the straw man in my head says.  If that’s the case, so is every other woman in this universe. It’s the only way to explain the coos of, “Wanna put lotion on my back?” during the “Impress 3 Bikini Girls” mission. Again, one could disingenuously twist this scenario to try and argue some kind of statement about sexual liberation. But the obvious truth is that the question is directed at the player. “Your combos are sooooooooo big,” comes the voice again. 

It should come as no surprise that women weren't flocking to a game where even if you play as a woman, women are still treated as a prize.

#women in video games #representation #too many games #stack of shame #tony hawk #retro review #feminism

[theyearofhealing]

Day 52

I feel like one of the biggest parts of healing for me is to change the way I perceive and interact with the pain that I have that still lingers from my illness.

Since getting sick I have monitored my pain almost daily except on the rare but increasing days where there's very little, which I am very grateful for happening. But it's always on my mind, it's always lingering.

At first I almost didn't pay it any mind because I thought okay it'll get better. But time passed and it got worse and worse and I got more and more fearful of it. And then it became this Obsession of why is this happening. I wanted the cause of it to be found and I wanted it to be fixed because I for some reason I have always had this idea in my head that if there's pain there's a reason for it and it can be fixed, and now I've finally encountered a situation in life where it's like oh wait no that's not how it works. So I started, once I kind of accepted that this pain was there and it wasn't going to magically disappear, I started monitoring it to see how it changed throughout the course of a day, the course of a week, just basically looking for any improvements to sustain me. And aspects of it did improve, but it's never completely went away and sometimes it flares up and gets a lot worse.

When it flares up it scares me because I'm always worried oh what if I went back to the absolute sickest that I was... and that's an absolutely terrifying thought for me. That's really where a lot of oh, I don't know, everything that I hold onto comes from. There's this fear of ever feeling the way that I did it again, because it was so horrifying to me. And I didn't get the help that I needed, I didn't get the care that I needed, and really people just wrote me off as being kind of a hysterical woman who needed mental help more so than actual help with my health and it was completely devastating and demoralizing.

I did have to kind of face the fact that medicine the way that it is now really didn't have much to offer me. There's not much that they can do for viruses that wreak havoc on the body. And sadly there's so little that they can do for pain that is logical for certain situations so to speak. Like I have this small area but it causes intense pain sometimes. The only thing that they can offer me or drugs that totally inebriated my entire system. As miserable as I was I didn't want to be made more miserable buy prescription medication. I had to wait if the pain and what little relief the medication gave me from it was worth not being able to drive myself anywhere or not being able to get out of bed for 48 hours or throwing up you know... just all these shitty alternatives and it felt really hopeless.

But I guess after all this time they're still been this little part of me that is hoped that you know something somewhere will make sense of what has happened to me and there will be a solution and I'm starting to realize that I need to get over this fantasy that I have that I'm going to go back to where I was before this. Like I truly need to accept that that's never going to happen. And I still feel a lot of grief sometimes in that realization because I think of who I was and where my mind was before all of this, and it just pisses me off.

Last night was one of those nights where I just had enough. Like I was glad that I had been able to get out of the house and do some things but when my body was done for the night, it was just done. And it really just stressed me out and frustrated me and made me really angry because I didn't get a say in it. I cried some and I felt a lot of anger in just a lot of raw grief still.

And today I realized that I just want to restructure my whole experience with pain. I want to find acceptance, but most of all I want to remove my obsessive nature to focus on it every chance that I get.

Lake earlier today I was in the kitchen mixing up some what I call superfood cereal, and I was just so focused on what I was doing that I forgot a little bit about the pain and monitoring sensations and all of that and I kind of came back to myself and I was like wow that's really nice.

I realize this part of me that monitors at isn't going to go away overnight. I also realize that this part of me that monitors it is the same part of me that has monitored bodily sensations for a very long time in regards to having anxiety, especially health anxiety. I've actually had less health anxieties since being sick for real, in part I think because there's been a real tangible thing to put all my focus on and obsess over. And yeah that's kind of sick I get that.

I think the reason that my brain says monitor this constantly is because I think that is a way of control over it. I know it doesn't actually control anything, but in my mind there's this feeling of if I know what it's doing constantly AKA I'm conscious of it, then if my perceive worst case scenario does in fact happen it's not going to be like it was when it happened the first time. I'll be aware of it. I'll be in control of it. And all of this frankly is bullshit. I know it's bullshit. You know it's bullshit. Everyone knows that this kind of thinking is bullshit. It's that whole PTSD thought process of if I'm constantly hyper aware about everything, then nothing can harm me. I'll be prepared for it. All those things we think we can control to avoid pain and trauma again.

And I guess maybe some form of acceptance of that is the first step forward. I don't know. But it's where I have to start. I cannot think about it constantly anymore. That in itself is its own kind of mental torture.

I don't have a lot of tools to do this right now. Like these are things I have to learn. One tool I do have, is using affirmations. That was one helpful thing I did learn in my stent in therapy. I think as my first step I'm just going to start reciting in my head positive affirmations when I find myself obsessing about or constantly checking in on the pain. Because I have often wondered where would I be in dealing with everything mentally if I put as much effort towards changing things as I do keeping them the same. Maybe it won't change as fast as I like but I didn't get here overnight either. And maybe I just have to be okay with whatever happening. I have to learn to trust again at some point. Maybe that some point is now.

Besides all of that today was a little better than yesterday. I didn't have as much fatigue. I do have some pain obviously. It's not the worst but it's frustrating especially when it turns into head pain. A few odds and stations here in the air. But mostly it was just really nice to not feel as completely exhausted as I have been feeling the past week or so. Maybe I am on the upswing of this flare.

#chronic pain #chronic illness #anxiety #health anxiety #anxiety recovery #ptsd #ptsd recovery